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Generative Leadership in a VUCA World

In today’s VUCA World, leaders need to think and act differently. Complex problems in an unpredictable environment require the integration of multiple perspectives. Leaders must learn how to welcome and value people’s innate wisdom, and their capacity to offer unique insights. It is the richness of this collaboration that makes the process generative.

Inclusive Life Leadership

Many inclusion and diversity programmes in organisations involve training for compliance. Few it would appear have achieved systemic change. It’s a “nice to have”, but it can fail to secure active engagement. As a leader, you are in service of something that really matters to you. What impact do you want to have on those who are in your care?

Do Leaders have to be both Responsible and Accountable?

We tend to think that responsibility and accountability are the same thing. Responsibility requires a commitment to take action. We choose how we relate to that action. But we can be accountable for things that we are not directly responsible for.

Life Leadership Fundamentals

When we face the “wicked issues” of leadership, only the fundamental aspects of what makes us better human beings can provide us with the best solutions. We have to tap into our innate human wisdom.

Leadership in a VUCA World

Adapting to changing global environment will require a much greater capacity for awareness. The capacity to notice and deal effectively with increasing volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity.

Being Appreciative and Asertive

When productivity drops or fails to grow, the focus for change goes on measuring and incentivising performance. What is not often understood, is the innate capacity of human beings to do better.

Breakdown or Breakthrough

The Coronavirus Pandemic is showing us that breakdowns can make us more adaptable and agile in the way we “lead our lives” and produce breakthrough results in transforming social networks and economic structures.

Feeling Good about Difficult Choices

What could you gain in the future if you were to carve out half an hour each day for a fortnight to invest in observing your choices and the thinking behind them? Start each day with a commitment to identify the “cues” that triggered negative feelings and your reactions. What value would you gain from making a better decision in those moments?

Being Certain and Uncertain

It’s the inability to predict outcomes that generate fear, indecision, hesitancy, doubt, lack of conviction, disquiet even scepticism. In this mood state, we become hesitant, tentative and lacking in confidence. We can lose sight of the fact that certainty is thought created and serves an intention or value, so we fail to let curiosity guide us.

Growing Stages in the Life of a Leader

When we fail to understand how the mind works, we become dependent on others to tell us what we should think, feel and believe. This is outside-in thinking. It’s not just about changing what we know, but adopting a new perspective on how we know and understand our world and how to transform our mindset.

Complexity in Wicked Problems

An increasing number of life and leadership issues are becoming multidimensional and interconnected. We have to deal with the resulting complexity. Complicated problems can be analysed and responded to logically. Complex problems cannot as they shift from moment-to-moment.

Creating Something from Nothing

Being able to listen more deeply to what you feel you are sensing is one we intuitively have, yet can fail to notice in the feelings and messages you are getting from your whole body – not just in our mind. You might sense a blockage, a tightening or numbness that is telling you something about your insecurities.

Can Personal Change Really be that Simple

Change takes courage as you are taking action to change your lifestyle to give your life more meaning. You have to face facts, explore possibilities and embrace an uncertain future. The past has gone. Don’t hold on to it. It’s what you do in-the-moment that is your future. You may not be able to forget the past or avoid its consequences, but you can clarify its value to you.

Predicting Your Future

Neuroscience is showing us that we lead our life in a constant process of prediction based on previous experience, This experience is a simulation that our nervous system programmes for us as we can navigate and make sense of the world. As our nervous system reinterprets our experiences from moment-to-moment and its predictions are not always accurate.

Holding Yourself Accountable

We are all made of the same elements and capacities that enable us to grow, explore and give meaning to our life journey. It’s our willingness to question the way we see things and practice new actions that will improve our effectiveness and change our relationship with the world. However you look at it, we are responsible for our thoughts and choices.

Which Wolf are You Feeding?

We can observe which emotional “wolf” we are feeding by observing our way of being, our speech, body movement and mood state. For example, we can observe eight basic moods that give structure to how we lead our lives. For example, our “good wolf” accepts that facts have to be faced if we are not to be stuck for ideas or frozen by uncertainty.

Moving from Breakdown to Breakthrough

Breakdowns happen when you’re not thinking clearly, events disrupt your expectations, your values are threatened or your identity is challenged. They can also be seen as triggers for learning and improvement if your emotional triggers do not blind you to the thoughts that are driving your habitual reactions.

Are You a Hedgehog or Octopus Thinker?

Your brain is programmed to connect what you are sensing in your body and your environment. They are “structurally coupled”. Are you stuck, unable to face difficult facts, or do you explore your possibilities?

Making Difficult Choices

Loss aversion bias is a behaviour or sensation you experience when you feel you are missing out on something important and it bothers you. How wdo get clarity on the facts and what really matters or makes sense so you can take action.

Concerns are Your Early Warning System

One of the most common forms of “break down” in the normal flow of life is the little concerns that come to mind. If they stay on your mind they create a mood of anxiety or dissatisfaction. Procrastination will only hinder your effectiveness.

Leadership Conversations

Achieving our objectives requires the effective coordination of human activity. This happens largely through conversation. Without it items cannot be purchased, decisions made and knowledge developed or exchanged. Knowing when to ask,suggest and tell enables people to perform effectively in different roles and get the action needed for a desired result.

Lessons from Taoism

Taoist principles require an ability to reflect and use our insights to effect action. This requires us to practice how to be fully present in every moment. Our attention is captured when we sense that we want more from the moment, be it in silent observation or in active conversation.

Seeing Time

We know tomorrow never comes and the future can only be anticipated. By taking action today we changes things tomorrow (which of course is today). Likewise, the actions we took yesterday means the present that we creating now makes will influence our tomorrow (which becomes today).

Reading Body Language

You already pick up on more body language cues than you’re consciously aware of. UCLA research has shown that only 7% of communication is based on the actual words we say. As for the rest, 38% comes from tone of voice and the remaining 55% comes from body language. Learning how to become aware of and to interpret that 55% can give you a leg up with other people.

Believing is Seeing

A growing domain of knowledge and skill that’s sweeping the world is an understanding of Human Ontology. It combines cognition, emotion, and spirit to offer new insights for leadership to be understood a life skill, not a body of knowledge. It focuses on how everyone has everything we need to be effective human beings that can hold ourselves accountable, behave with integrity and be authentic in our conversations and relationships.

New Thinking – New Action

Thinking lies at the heart of leadership and life. The problem is that shallow thinking leads to a superficial life and poor performance at work. Thinking and conversation are the two skills you are expected to develop as an adult to help you navigate your way through life’s breakdowns and opportunities. But how do you engage yourself in deeper thinking so that it changes your way of being?

The Power of Inquiry

Dealing with growing volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity in everyday life are presenting us with new challenges. A good starting point would be to realise that we can only change how we respond.

Adaptive Action and Climate Change

Today’s leaders have a new responsibility – to promote initiatives that support adaptive action to address the vulnerabilities and opportunities presented by climate change. Mitigation strategies will not be enough. Leaders must learn how to make more than adjustments in infrastructure, agriculture, urban and regional planning, issues of nature conservation and preserving energy supply.

Being a Caring Leader

When we adopt the posture of a Caring Leader, we look to satisfy what really matters, to us and those we care about. We connect with and commit to a life-affirming and heartfelt purpose. Our caring way of being is observed in the language we use, the moods we display and the body state we adopt to communicate our passion, sincerity, empathy and rapport.