A leader’s authentic engagement requires a sense of presence to one’s environment.  It requires the development of an acute sensitivity to the internal workings of oneself and the constant awareness and adjustment to the “field” that exists between the leader and those whom the leader is relating to.  It is often said of effective leaders that they have a certain “magnetism” that is inviting and warm; people want to be around them to bask in a certain “glow” they emanate.

Such a leader does not operate from the edge of themselves.  They understand the power of authentic engagement and have acquired the skills to inhabit and act from the center, the core of who they are.  They have developed a strong inner observer, and as mentioned in the previous post, this begins with the recognition that their preconceived mental constructs and belief systems are filters that obscure them from the core experiences of reality.  They have come to realize that authentic experience requires sensitivity to our human frailty and necessitates the exercise of skillful means to attend to it in modest ways.  They understand the importance of establishing new patterns of awareness while slowly dissolving old ones that keep them in a state of trance; a state that keeps them at the foggy edge of themselves, disconnected from what is authentic in them and in the other.  This requires consistent effort to step away from pre-conceived ideas and strongly held assumptions and to effectively learn to manage one’s emotional reactivity.

Connecting to the center of oneself, or that of an organization, is a thesis whose latest iterations by Peter Senge in his System’s Thinking work, or Otto Scharmer’s U-methodology, has been an age old question in Western philosophy and Eastern mysticism.  A central running theme in many philosophies has been the recognition of three primary centers of intelligence that are required to be aligned and active with each other, thus allowing for a more authentic self (the center) to emerge; these constitute the Mind, the Heart and the Gut – Otto Scharmer replaces the gut with what he calls an “open will.”

The premise for an authentic engagement lies in developing presence through an “Open Mind” by which our preconceived notions, ideas and knowledge momentarily recede in the background allowing us to listen deeply and sense into what is emerging in the subtle field between us and others.  Presence also demands an “Open Heart” through which we perceive others with compassion and gentleness and respond to their vulnerabilities with sensitivity and respect.   An “Open Belly” allows for a deeper sensing of our environment and the ability to be attuned to our deeper wisdom.  Actively engaging these three centers demands commitment, attention and steady effort; the reward of which is a centered presence and greater awareness of our experience in the moment.

Living from our center generates a grounded authentic engagement that brings with it deep listening, subtle sensing, open curiosity and a natural ability to suspend our agenda.  We relax and open to sitting on the edge of the unknown with the other.  The German philosopher Heidegger called it “the spirit of availability before What-Is.” In this state we listen with a different ear; we intuit deeper patterns and find larger context. This is the ground from which our wisdom and true competence emerges.  It is a grounded state of being-ness informed by subtlety and deep knowing.  Profound authentic encounters are possible in this place and people are enlivened and changed by it.  Loyalty and trust from those we lead emerge with ease.

The post Beyond Our Professional Persona – Part Two appeared first on Catalyst.

Why are younger companies more likely to be better innovators in the short term? 

Curiosity and an attitude of openness to possibilities, ideas, experimentation and a sense of excitement tend to be underlying drivers for innovative organizations.  Therefore it is not hard to see why youthful organizations would have a higher innovation drive; in general young people are by nature open and curious.  Unfortunately this path of youthful exuberance is littered by entrepreneurs that could not sustain these traits; typically after many years of experience their openness and curiosity tends to shrink in direct proportion to the number of battle wounds they endure in the marketplace.

Many however, do not succumb to such fate, any more than older leaders with more years of experience under their belt.  What differentiates these leaders?

These are leaders who have recognized along the way the importance of developing their emotional intelligence as their organization was growing.  They developed a keen inner observer (read previous blog “Leadership & the Inner Observer”) and have come to value how that aspect of themselves drives them toward curiosity about their thinking and in turn about the thinking of others.  They have come to understand that their colleagues’ experience, concepts and ways of expression can add value to their leadership if they stay open to them and curios about their impulse.

An emotionally intelligent leader tends to be a curious one, and a curious leader tends to inquire, and frequently so, before they make their decisions.  They have learned how to navigate their curiosity through skillful means of inquiry; asking the right question at the right time and with a tonality that is open and inviting of others to reveal their thinking.  These inquiry skills create opportunities for everyone around the table to explore without judgment, to add and subtract without hesitancy, to challenge each other toward more possibilities and fresh new perspectives without personalizing their differences.  This is a leader who will purposefully move away from the tendency for an unwarranted style of command and control; instead they will drive their teams to develop the sharp edge of innovation by becoming comfortable sitting together on the edge of the unknown exploring possibilities.

When a leader teaches an attitude of curiosity and skillful means of inquiry by example, and begins to insist on it with the rank and file, such attitudes begin to spread within the culture of the organization.  As enough people adopt these attitudes, a new culture of innovation begins to emerge; a culture that does not take anything at face value.  Its members learn to skillfully ask the difficult questions, driving themselves and their peers to higher levels of thinking, productivity, creativity and new ideas.

Asking difficult questions of yourself and your peers requires skills that include mutual respect, encouragement of all ideas and the recognition that in every idea, even the least significant, lays a kernel of wisdom worth inquiring about and worth teasing out of the collective wisdom of the group.  A culture of innovation demands the unfettered collective imagination and wisdom to be skillfully and persistently nurtured by its leaders.

Related articles

• 3 CEO Essentials For Igniting Innovation (ceo.com)
• 10 Tips on Making Executives Understand Innovation (customerthink.com)

The post Leading a Culture of Innovation appeared first on Catalyst.