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.

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Most of us, especially when we are operating in a pressure cooker fast-paced environment tend to quickly leap to assumptions and conclusions that may have not been carefully examined.  This pitfall can be circumvented if we adopt an attitude of curiosity about our own assumptions and conclusions and choose to do the same with those that others have.  To do this requires taking a mental and emotional stance that keeps one’s own position flexible and open to be influenced by others’ input.  Such a stance is achieved through a practice of inquiry – to be curious enough about my inner and outer circumstances that I am driven to inquire about myself and others’ ideas, assumptions and conclusions.

Over time an attitude of inquiry tends to build a larger capacity for curiosity, which in turn allows for a stronger inner observer and a deeper propensity for emotional intelligence.  We become more “tuned-in” to our environment, our team, our employees and the culture of the organization.  These skills become the hallmark of a Transactional Leader.

Typically I find that those that practice an attitude of inquiry with their teams and employees tend to be more effective in creating influence and buy-in.  Transactional leaders tend to recognize the importance of developing their own emotional intelligence which naturally cultivates an inner observer.  It is the inner observer that drives us to be curious of what others may be thinking or experiencing.  An emotionally intelligent leader tends to be a curious one, and a curious leader tends to inquire, and frequently so, before making their decisions.

If a leader is looking to determine outcomes, obstacles, solutions or anything else within their realm of decision making, then having a healthy sense of curiosity about what others are thinking in addition to a set of skillful inquiry habits goes a long way to harness the collective intelligence of the whole team, generate collaboration, build buy-in and create influence.  Such a transactional leader is able to build creative organizational cultures in which differences of opinion are valued, and where curiosity and inquiry about these differences are used to fuel a constructive dialogue that drives innovation and fresh solutions.

Related articles

• Business Leader Richard Zahn Says “Emotional Intelligence” is Critical to Leadership (prweb.com)

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So many books have been written about the subject addressing many of the important facets that the act of leadership demands; clarity of vision, strategic thinking, high level management skills, cultural acuity,  influence and emotional intelligence, to name a few.

I find that the most challenging aspect of training up the leadership ranks in an organization lies in the work around emotional intelligence.  A leader’s emotional intelligence is tied directly to their ability to create influence within the ranks and to build a high functioning culture.  Though these “soft skills” may be considered secondary to basic skills of good management by some, emotional intelligence tends to be much harder to teach on an individual level and embed within teams.

Why is it so difficult to teach?  Three words:” honest self-observation.”  It requires developing within oneself the “Observer;” this is the honest broker within each of us that tends to steer us in the right direction by witnessing our behaviors and thoughts and their impact on our surroundings.   The Observer exists in all of us; one may consider it the voice of our conscience, the whisper of our intuition.

The challenge we face is that more often than not we don’t pay attention to this voice; we choose to either consciously ignore it, or by course of habit, we turn its volume so far down that we can’t hear it.  The loss of clear access to this voice over time begins to blind us to our impact on our environment and those around us; as leaders we begin to risk creating the positive influence we seek in our organization, and over time we risk becoming less and less effective in how we lead.

When we talk about “leadership”, we are addressing the issue of how someone can lead people, be it individuals or teams.  Technical skills aside, a leader’s primary job is to influence and impact the people around them in positive directions towards the business goals that need to be met.  What differentiates an effective leader from a mediocre one are the skills inherent in their emotional intelligence, and one’s emotional intelligence is explicitly connected to how well their inner observer is developed.

How then does one develop their inner observer? 

1. Start by committing to do a professional assessment, something like a 360 assessment, once a year.
2. Collate the feedback and solicit someone’s help to create a plan to address the issues found in the assessment.
3. Follow the plan with the support of a mentor or a coach.
4. Begin to notice how the issues raised in the assessment may correlate to some things that you already were aware of within yourself, or that you may have had indications about.
5. Focus on these issues and begin to pay more attention to what the voice of your inner observer is telling you about these issues as you interact with your colleagues.
6. This focus will strengthen your awareness of the observer within you; over time it will expand your ability to hear its voice more frequently.
7. Develop your trust in it as you develop your willingness to listen to it and heed its feedback.

The inner observer is a necessary vehicle to grow our emotional intelligence, and being emotionally skillful increases our success in influencing people in positive and productive ways.  A leader who understands the value of their people, and in his endeavors works intelligently to create a positive impact will build a contagiously positive culture where success results are the norm, not the exception.

Related articles

• Linking Emotional Intelligence to Neuroscience (neurocapability.wordpress.com)
• Business Leader Richard Zahn Says “Emotional Intelligence” is Critical to Leadership (virtual-strategy.com)
• Are You Emotionally Intelligent? EI – The Inner Side of Leadership: Part I (changingwinds.wordpress.com)

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