During my last Mindful Leadership Webcast, one of the attendees remarked: "I have never seen these two put together – Mindfulness and Leadership."
So let's try to unpack this. Mindfulness is the agency which enables us to see things clearly, think intentionally, and respond calmly and skillfully to the challenges we face. It seems that when. Leadership is devoid of this agency, it lacks impact, particularly in the age of disruption
Mindfulness means slowing down enough to be thoughtful about what you're doing. It brings more self- awareness of how you feel, how you speak and how you treat others. - Eileen Fisher
Our working environments are becoming increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA).
Change brings up fear, resistance, insecurity, and reactivity. To help people move beyond these regressive mental states, modern leaders need to hone their focus, work on their mindset, dial-up their resilience and emotional intelligence, and face their vulnerability around the challenges they face.
Change is stressful.
When leaders cannot self-regulate and manage stress, they are seen as ineffective and even harmful. Extensive research from workforce consulting firm Life Meets Work finds that when leaders do not handle stress effectively, more than 50% of their employees believe their leader is either harmful or irrelevant to their job and the entire organization's performance. Yet, when leaders are adept at managing stress, only about 10% of their employees harbor such negative opinions. Mindful Leadership fosters mental and emotional agility and resilience needed to stay calm and focused under pressure.
Leading change and the capacity to connect are the primary leadership competencies needed today, according to Janice Marturano, Mindful Leadership expert, and former vice president of General Mills. Yet, it is surprising to see how many leaders lack the ability to connect meaningfully. The Interact survey conducted online by Harris Poll showed that a stunning majority (69%) of the managers said that they're often uncomfortable communicating with employees. That means that two-thirds of managers are uncomfortable talking with their staff!
Why is this? Because we come up against ourselves - our insecurities, the need to be liked, the need to be right and remain unchallenged, aversion to conflict, fear of rejection, self-doubt, apathy, and overwhelm, the list goes on. The ability to face our common human failings and to challenge our beliefs and assumptions is at the heart of Mindful Leadership. Self-reflection is vital if you want to embrace your vulnerability, engage your people, earn their trust, and pursue leadership excellence.
There is one more Mindful Leadership distinction I want to highlight. People end up in positions of Leadership because of their experience and their expertise. Yet the third part, their essence – who they are as people and as leaders - is often neglected, and the ability to leverage experience and knowledge is compromised. (I wrote about this previously)
Our passion lies deep in who we are, not what we do. – Simon Sinek
MINDFUL LEADERSHIP guides us to re-acquaint ourselves with the essence of Leadership, our leadership presence. It is less concerned with tools, skill sets, knowledge, and experience and is more about the ability to access, at will, an individual's natural leadership qualities. It provides leaders with access to sincere self-awareness, It tells them if they are on track and learning to observe impartially and with both internal and external wisdom. It bypasses mental ruts and other habitual, unexamined responses to challenges.
Mindful leaders are intuitive, creative, honest, wise, compassionate, and deeply resonant with the continually changing needs and demands of the workplace and the surrounding environment.
Mindful leaders navigate complexity with the flexibility of insight and leadership presence.