To my leader readers (and all interested), I authored an open access article in the summer issue of Leader-to-Leader, titled: Dialectical Leadership: New Leadership Calling in an Era of Polycrises that I hope you’ll find useful. Here’s a summary in a few sentences of what it covers.
How do we lead through the challenges and polarizations of these times? My thinking, based on a couple of theoretical perspectives and leadership experiences in the midst of this complexity has led me to what I call dialectical leadership. I define dialectical leadership as a process through which leaders model practices that inspire positive transformative actions and outcomes, in a context of multiple, conflicting and compounded forces. I propose this as an emerging new form of transformational leadership for polarized times, requiring six shifts/ways of leading.
Download it here
I will take a break for August…see you again in your inbox in September. Enjoy the summer.
Rehumanizing us: The Power of Storytelling
Earlier this year, a colleague and I led a discussion which ended with an audience member asking: What do we tell our children about how to live through these times of so much division. My colleague answered by telling the story of being on a bus with their child. The child became fascinated and fixated on the emergency exit sign on the roof of the bus. With the curiosity typical of young ones, the questions followed in quick succession:
- How does it work? You pull and push
- How do we get to it? We climb out
- But I am too short, how will I reach it?
This last question resulted in a prolonged exchange in which the child got increasingly agitated by the idea that they could not reach the exit. Bystanders on the bus got involved as the parent asked – in an emergency will you help my child? As the child teared up, the parent reassured, “you see, everyone here says they will help you. In an emergency, look for the helpers.”
Look for the helpers!
There were not many dry eyes in the audience as we ended the dialogue.
This story has not left me since. I have found myself in many different situations, reminded of this story…and looking around for the helpers. This is a truth I have long known as a leader, but what has fuelled me to remember this practice this year hasn’t been my prior knowledge that no one is an island or the oft-quoted African parable I use in talks and presentations – if you want to go fast go alone, if you want to go far, go together. This year, my reaching out, asking for help and also offering help has been fuelled by this story and the lesson in it: Look for the helpers! Be a helper!
As another colleague said in a different public forum after another powerful story was shared… “thank you for your story, even though you had shared all the statistics, numbers can numb, but stories stick!”
In my life and leadership in these times, I am returning again to the power of storytelling and public narratives, practices I have considered core all along but find invaluable today. As I say in the article noted at the opening of this post, these are times of polycrises, a time when multiple, compounded and complex crises are happening simultaneously. In this context, one of the ways we can lead effectively is by practicing compassionate storytelling. This means taking the time not just to share your analysis of situations but doing so in a way that makes people feel seen, heard and understood, because you help them connect to the stories behind facts.
Here why:
Stories Rehumanize. It is time to rehumanize us. We know from social psychology that persistent negative and polarizing rhetoric distances, demonizes and ultimately dehumanizes others. Once people are dehumanized, we no longer see them as our fellow humankind and natural others. Negative stereotyping and language opens the door to violence, oppression and injustice. We need to turn the tide of othering to see each other again as mirror images.
Stories Reconnect. Where divisiveness disconnects us from each other, stories reconnect. It reminds us of our shared humanity, within our diversity. It gives us the empathy needed to cross the divides that threaten to collapse us. We must see, understand and hear each other, even as we seek to be seen, heard and understood. Stories like connective glue, brings the other closer. Stories of shared experiences connect us, across cultures. No matter who we are or where we were born or live…we humans all know what it is like to sleep, to wake, to dream, to be sad, to be lonely. Stories of shared human experiences will always reconnect us to each other. Stories also restore our memories of ourselves and our human story.
Stories Redefine. The stories we tell ourselves about ourselves are beyond critical…they are life-affirming. Stories allow us to make meaning of who we are and when necessary to reimagine and refine ourselves, individually and collectively across our shared identities, challenges and opportunities. Through stories, we explore: who am I /we? We also answer: who do I/we want to be? One of my most favorite poems about telling our stories to redefine us is Tell Your Story by Lebogang Mashile. Watch a reading of it at the link below.
So in these times of so much turmoil, please keep telling your stories. Share your stories with friends, family and colleagues over meals. Write your stories. Let’s Rehumanize, Reconnect and Redefine who we are in these times. How we cross the threshold of these liminal spaces being called times of Anthropocene and navigate what I call Grey Zone Change depends on it. And when you are tired, overwhelmed and think you can’t do it anymore…remember to look for the helpers.
Watch Tell Your Story here.