SAFE STATESMINDFUL LEADERSHIPRESPONSE – ABILITY

Dr. Aliki NicolaidesAssociate Professor & Graduate Coordinator

Learning, Leadership, & Organization Development The University of Georgia

So glad to learn with and from you!

Mindful – Leader

My summer story

Mindful Leader

Look around you and find an image or two that

represent what mindful and leader means for

you.

You can choose one image that captures your

meaning for both and or two images that

captures your meaning for each.

Once you have your image(s), return to your

table and spend some time sharing your image

and the meaning they carry for you with your

table mates.

MindfulnessHow do you bring yourself to the present moment when reality looks & feels like this?

Paying attention in a particular way:

on purpose, in the present moment,

and non-judgmentally.

Joh Kabat-Zinn

Living under the influence of:

V.U.C.A.

Volatility: turbulence and constant

intensity

Uncertainty: lack of predictability,

prospect for surprise; sense of limited

awareness

Complexity: multiplex of forces, chaos

and confusion brought by system

interdependence and globalization

Ambiguity: haziness of reality, lack of

clear understanding of meaning of

events and patterns

In Flint, Michigan, siblings Julie, Antonio, and India Abram collect their daily

allowance of bottled water from Fire Station #3, their local water resource

site.

New shifts(World Economic Forum, 2018)

Organizations (profit, non-profit,

governmental, non-governmental, higher

learning institutes) - are moving from a

focus on profit, operationalizing

hierarchies, leadership as control,

planning before action and privacy to more

fluid, and organic systems that demand

new forms of learning in action.

Vertical & Horizontal Learning to Grow & Develop Capacity for Response-ability

Vertical Development -

Growing the capacity (mindset) to respond to

disruptive change, which requires that we

learn to shift our awareness from one state to

another. Its about suspending our habit of

increasing what we know, so that we may also

grow the ways we know.

Horizontal Learning:

Acquiring skills, tools, and practices that solve

problems. Increasing the base (skillsets) of

our knowledge.

We are asked to respond in these ways:(B. Johansen, Leaders Make the Future)

■Vision: the capacity to project a positive

picture of the desired future state 3-5 years ahead.

■Understanding: the capacity to pause to

reflect, and intuit the bigger picture amidst the details.

■Clarity: the capacity to make sense of

chaos and bring order forth with intention and purpose.

■Agility: the capacity to communicate and

act in a timely, responsive, and skillful manner.

LISTENING TO RESPONDDeep Listening for Authentic Action

Breath & Listening

The ideal anchor for wayward

attention…paying attention to the

sensation of breathing in the body serves

as the first object of attention, a beginners

practice, simple and yet has within it

everything you would ever need for

cultivating the full range of our humanity,

especially your capacity for wisdom and for

compassion.

VoiceSpeaking from one’s place of

identity Speaking from the heart

Declaring what you wantTaking a stand

SuspendStepping back to see what is

missing

Examining what is taken for

granted”Providing greater

perspective

ListenHearing without judgment

Genuinely receiving

another’s point of view

Being generousEmpathizing

RespectSeeing the other perspective/s as legitimate

Acknowledging boundaries

Identifying and naming when boundaries

have been crossed

Practices for Dialogue

How to bring a disposition of mindfulness

to a powerful leadership tool -

Dialogue: Cultivating a mindful approach

to Speech Acts

Dialogue and Discussion

There is an important distinction between

dialogue and discussion:

KronosKairos

CircumferenceCircle

Hierarchical

Right/wrongSide by side

KnowledgeInsight

DecisionChoice

Notion of Time

Interpersonal Dynamics

Theory of Truth

Type of Knowing

Action Focus

DiscussionDialogue

Dialogue

An art and science of giving voice to our

thoughts, feelings, perspectives with

mindful compassion.

Demands psychological safety.

A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within more than the luster of the firmament of bards

and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his own thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come

back to us with a certain alienated majesty.

Great works of art have not more affecting lesson for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility

then most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else tomorrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought

and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.

– -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Four parts of speech

■ Second-person practice for

increasing mutuality

■ Components

– Framing

– Advocating

– Illustrating

– Inquiring (and listening)

Tools for Inquiry –We will Practice

•4 Parts of Communicative Action

•Framing, Advocating, Illustrating, Inquiring

Speech

Framing – This is what I want to communicate. Purpose, focus, intention

Advocating – this is what I think about what I want to talk about

Illustrating – An illustration of what I mean

Inquiring – Asking for your understanding, point of view, reflections, insights, support…

Practice ■ Role play a scenario using

the four-parts of speech Describe basic context, relationships

of actors, briefly situation, and

perhaps a little about how the person

would play the part (send in private

chat)

■ Feedback

■ Switch roles

■ Group

revision/construction

Enacting the four parts of speechHow might you begin using this as a

practice of mindful leadership?

Vertical & Horizontal Capacity Mindfulness Practice

Dialogue Systems

Mindful Leader Formation

Thank you for learning with and from each other and inviting me to learning with and from you.

May I never not be frisky,

May I never not be risqué.

May my ashes, when you have them,

friend, and give them to the ocean,

Leap in the froth of the waves,

Still loving movement,

Still ready, beyond all else,

To dance for the world.

Prayer, Mary Oliver