The lazy [leader’s] guide to saving the world

As the first truly global accord, the Paris Agreement, ratified on the 4th of November is monumental.

I can’t begin to imagine the work involved from the grassroots campaigners to the signatories that has enabled this to happen.  Decades of hard work and cycles of complex international negotiations. A powerful reminder of what can be achieved through individual and collective action.

This week in Morocco, the discussion will be about how to put this accord into force, and meet its aims.  This is where the real work begins.

And we know as individual citizens, we can make changes in our lives now to help combat climate change and be more loving towards the earth and its inhabitants.  Recognising that we all, even the most laziest of us, have a part to play in creating a sustainable world, the UN has provided a ‘lazy person’s guide to saving the world’.

Perhaps we are all inherently lazy.  Working with leaders,  I wonder if actually many of the busy leaders are paradoxically, the lazy ones. 

Those leaders who, swamped with tasks and desperate to get things off their desk, or get their direct report out of their office, or respond to yet another demand from higher up  – will take the lazy option of giving quick answers, barking instructions or giving their well-rehearsed opinion.  They fail to see the opportunity the occasion presents to them.  The possibility to pause, get off automatic pilot and listen and inquire with courage and compassion.  The chance to go off a familiar path, out of one’s comfort zone of interaction and let the other be truly heard. To dig into what is really going on and discover new realities and solutions rather than ‘clipping one’s wings’ and creating a sense of dependency through a fixed answer or view of the world. 

For the lazy leader becomes unnecessarily busy.   Because the direct report they gave directions to, comes back time and time again for their advice, having not learnt to take ownership or think for themselves. Or hot potatoes continue to get passed down the line.  The lazy leader, having not helped to unleash potential in the other, stymies the creation of new ideas and innovation, so is forever chasing their tail. The lazy leader tells mindlessly rather than coaches consciously, so nothing advances or changes.  They just get drawn into a spiral of fire fighting, rather than strategically driving transformation in the organisation. 

So here’s my lazy leadership guide to saving the world.

• Pause

• Listen

• Ask

                                   

The only thing, it may take some hard work.

For a conversation on how our Earth Coach programmes can build capacity in the Sustainability Industry, please contact me. 

  

Image: via google images (http://nobleanarchist.com/blog/comfort-zone-lazy-mammal-danger-zone/)

2030 is on the line...

2030 is on the line...

And breakthrough catalysts Volans, who were commissioned by the Business and Sustainable Development Commission to explore business models, challenges us to step up and take that call.  

As per the introduction on the Commission’s website, “global business leaders need to see the Sustainable Development Goals for what they are: the opportunity to adopt new business models for exponential and inclusive growth”. John Elkington, co-author of the paper [Breakthrough Business Models], argues that business leaders first need to develop an "exponential mindset" that shuns slow progress and contributes to accelerating systemic change.

You cannot help but be stirred by this work of love.  It is rich in resource and stimulus, combining depth and breadth with succinctness. It provides clear arguments for the way forward and tangible examples and sources of inspiration of organizations already breaking through the mould.   However, despite the reference to leadership, there are only a few recommendations for top teams.

To use an expression of Lane4 Management Consultancy, 'leaders create the environment in which people perform'. Going deeper into what leaders did in the organizations showcased and getting more nuanced about leadership and people development, will be a valuable further addition to this work.  Perhaps this will happen on the complementary website Project Breakthrough, which showcases where and how transformational change is happening right now.

For if the Sustainability Industry (as the term used) is to "reboot", it must invest in and develop its people in order to unleash potential and drive breakthrough change.  As a start, from my perspective as a leadership coach and consultant, such development would benefit from considering, at least, these four interrelated factors: 

A redefinition of leadership: We need to liberate ourselves from the still pervasive ‘great man theory’ that leadership is solely the domain of ‘global leaders’ or the ‘top team’ or someone else. As Impact International advocate, leadership is not about a special person but a special action.  Similarly, Kevin Roberts wrote in his recently released 64 Shots: Leadership in a Crazy World, “we must all be Creative Leaders. We all can be, because ideas come from everywhere, because ideas come any time, and because ideas take flight like never before”.  

Coaching:   Despite demonstrable benefits, coaching is still widely misunderstood, under-utilised or non-existent, in organizations.  The dominant leadership style,  born of our education, organisational and societal tendencies and that of our tender egos, is still one which is more inclined to tell, advocate, direct and close down, rather than to ask, inquire, explore and open up. In my experience, coaching is key to transformation.  As a mindset and activity,  it raises consciousness, helps people reclaim their own authority and encourages them to dig deeper into their own wisdom and release their gifts in a way teaching, never can.  To quote Peter Drucker, 'the leader of the past knew how to tell, the leader of the future will know how to ask'.   We need to start asking now.

Experiential learning – with rigour:   As the paper points out, top teams need to go on experiential learning journeys.  As adults we learn by experience – and we need to be rigorous in reflecting on, and making sense of those experiences, and what we can apply. And the more diversity we are exposed to, the better.  Organizations like Common Purpose who I worked for, bring leaders from different backgrounds, beliefs, generations, geographies, specializations and sectors, to help them lead across boundaries.  Opening our hearts and minds through exposure to diversity in all its forms, is at the heart of innovation, collaboration and sustainability. 

And that experiential learning has to include our experience in nature.   I like this story...

Activist and author Naomi Klein tells about the time she travelled to Australia at the request of Aboriginal elders. They wanted her to know about their struggle to prevent white people from dumping radioactive wastes on their land.

Her hosts brought her to their beloved wilderness, where they camped under the stars. They showed her "secret sources of fresh water, plants used for bush medicines, hidden eucalyptus-lined rivers where the kangaroos come to drink." 

After three days, Klein grew restless. When were they going to get down to business?

"Before you can fight," she was told, "you have to know what you are fighting for."

Nature is worth saving for its own sake.  If we as humans want to co-exist, we need to realize our connectivity with it.

Which leads me to..

Thinking and.. going beyond thinking:  The central argument of the Volans paper is about thinking differently.  We need to Think Sustainably. Think Exponential. Think Social. Think Lean. Think Integrated. Think Circular.   And paradoxically part of doing that, will be to train ourselves to also go beyond thought.  To draw on Brendel and Bennett’s (2016) research on embodied leadership through mindfulness and somatics, as we are fundamentally integrated whole or embodied beings, to rely purely on cognitive-behavioural processes to develop leadership or create breakthrough will be insufficient.  For optimal performance and sustainable change, we need to look holistically at our development, one which nurtures the mind-body connection, to tap into a greater intelligence.  We must, as Osho wrote “get out of our heads into our hearts”.  Or in the words of my own haiku

Be yourself fully

In the thousand and thousand

Variants you are

Perhaps if we did that,  we would have breakthrough.

 

Sources (not with hyperlinks):

Brendel, W and Bennett, C (2016) “Learning to Embody Leadership Through Mindfulness and Somatics Practice”, Advances in Human Resources 1-17

Naomi Klein story (tinyurl.com/5q84zh) as told in R. Brezny (2009) Pronoia is the Antitode of Paranoia, North Atlantic Books, page 76

Osho ( 2001), Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic, Osho International Federation, NY  (quote from page 172)

Roberts, K (2016)  64 Shots: Leadership in a crazy world, PowerHouse Books, NY

Photo: FreeImages.com Content License (Paul Harvey)

Earth Day

Today is Earth Day.  But of course every day is earth day.  

Here is something to contemplate.

Activist and author Naomi Klein tells a story about the time she travelled to Australia at the request of Aboriginal elders. They wanted her to know about their struggle to prevent white people from dumping radioactive wastes on their land.

Her hosts brought her to their beloved wilderness, where they camped under the stars. They showed her "secret sources of fresh water, plants used for bush medicines, hidden eucalyptus-lined rivers where the kangaroos come to drink." 

After three days, Klein grew restless. When were they going to get down to business?

"Before you can fight," she was told, "you have to know what you are fighting for."

I retold this story to a company recently as part of a pitch for working with sustainability managers.  Suffice to say, it wasn’t appreciated.  “As a person I get it, but it is not appropriate in this context” we were told.

Nature is worth saving for its own sake.  If we as humans want to co-exist, we need to realise our connectivity with it.  We can so easily disconnect ourselves, particularly if we are sitting in an office feeling far removed.   It can bypass us that everything around us is born from the earth, that everything we do has an effect.  To ponder on the raw materials and production processes, that made this city, this chair, this cup of coffee, one can only be humbled and awed at the gifts of nature and the ingenuity of people, and be pained at the impact we have.

The path to sustainability or a more respectful co-existence with the earth, is a spectrum.  At one end, are the companies who adopt sustainable practices as a legal obligation.  For others, it is purely a profit-driven motive, a strategic approach for survival.  Along the continuum is recognition that there is shared value in a balance (good for business, good for society).  At best,  a systemic approach, one that recognises the interrelationship between economic, social and environmental elements, is taken.

We can only do this if individually, we become more conscious of our own actions, and our sense of belonging in the world around us.   This collective sense of interconnectedness will help our communities and companies make more earth responsible decisions.

There are numerous ways and experiences that we can draw on to nurture this.  Here is one...mindful walking.  As Thich Nhat Hanh said,  'Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.'

 

Naomi Klein story (tinyurl.com/5q84zh) as told in R. Brezny (2009) Pronoia is the Antitode of Paranoia, North Atlantic Books, page 76