Lead with Conviction —
Acting Boldly in the Face of Increasing Complexity and Escalating Change Leadership through self-differentiation is not easy.
Despite the anxiety swirling around, self-differentiated leaders manage to do something that requires a great deal of courage and stamina. It sometimes means taking a risk that invites vulnerability, ridicule, and failure. A leader's willingness to act boldly, even though it makes him/her vulnerable, is the essence of what it means to lead with conviction. Doing so is never easy, and it can be especially challenging when the system’s level of chronic anxiety is on the rise. Anxiety can derail even the best of leaders from taking the bold action that is needed.
A New Way of SEEING: Recognize when anxiety—in yourself or in your system— makes it more challenging to lead with conviction.
The challenges we are facing across the globe, here in the US, and right in our backyards are more complex, more intense and more immediate than in any recent time.
We need a clear pathway forward, and we need to come together if we are to move along that pathway successfully.
- Stay Calm: Be curious about the reactive behaviors within yourself, in others, and in the emotional systems of which you are a part. Find ways to be less anxious than those you lead. But remember that staying calm does not mean staying quiet.
- Stay Connected: Maintain a healthy balance in your leadership presence. Work to remain close enough to influence others, yet distant enough to lead them. Remember that maintaining a healthy close-distant relationship with those you lead is an ongoing balancing act. Building and sustaining healthy relationships is the work of a lifetime.
- Stay the Course: Act Boldly in the Face of Increased Complexity and Escalating Change. Be brave. Learn how to stand apart and even when to stand alone. In order to Hold the Vision, you must be courageous, determined, and persistent.
(Some excerpts taken from Resilient Leadership 2.0)