Coaching & Mentoring

With so many buzz words about leadership floating around at the moment, it can be hard to make sense of them all. Servant leadership. Authentic leadership. Transformational leadership. Many of these terms have been with us for a while and still have relevance and resonance today. However, the question of “What is leadership today?” , set as it is against the backdrop of todays changing environment is a challenge to answer. What good leadership looks like today and what it will evolve into is complex. Many of the demands on leaders and the skills needed to meet those demands are still emerging. It can be challenging to sort through the noise and make sense of what being a leader really means right now. What’s clear is that as organisations navigate the unchartered waters of hybrid working patterns, fluctuating markets and the new rules of what it means for employees to be engaged at work, we now more than ever need skilled and capable leaders. This is the age of nuanced leadership. Leadership which can be at once subtle, clever, values-led and often intensely emotionally intelligent, and all strategic, risk ambitious and visionary. The leaders who will set themselves, their people and the organisations up for success in the annuls of time are those who recognise the scope and power of their impact. Today’s leadership is about understanding our orbit. It is recognising that leadership happens in every micro-decision we make and extends to every large piece of strategy we influence. It is about knowing and keeping in mind at all times that, as leaders, we do not – nor cannot – exist in a vacuum. Leaders getting it right today are those who understand this breadth. These leaders recognise the impact of their decisions and their actions extends way beyond the horizons that are known to them. They are the leaders who operate from a start point of humility – intellectual humility – where the psychological ‘base station’ is one of wonder and openness to the system in which they operate, and a truly healthy acceptance of the limits of their own knowledge. Before behaviour comes mindset. And it is the mindset of the leader in today’s organisation that bears most scrutiny. One of the biggest challenges for today’s leaders is how to navigate the galaxy and fly their organisational ‘spacecraft’ into unchartered territory. This requires that we can demonstrate both strength and vulnerability. It requires that we are authentic in how we show up and true to ourselves our inner values as well as being sensitive to the workings of the planets in our galaxy and the many forces that operate on them. It is the skill of catching ourselves in thinking that leadership is something we must do, rather than a space that we must simply be. The skilled orbital leader has a deep understanding of the impact they have at all points of his ‘galaxy’ and is able to adapt and flex their approach to take in the needs of those in their orbit.