Sustainable Leadership
There is a paradox embedded in sustainable leadership that needs to be unearthed for a conversation; how do leaders work to create a thriving workplace culture that results in productivity and effectiveness without destroying themselves in the process?
This is a conversation worth exploring.
With today’s world moving at an unprecedented pace, the speed of change is prompting some of us to work harder and longer. This all feels urgent and important. It’s costing us our emotional, physical and relational health. Does this create more productivity and effectiveness? Hardly.
AND there is a siren call from the wings for us to take care of ourselves; “self-care,” they call it.
What is self-care? Is self-care for those people who like pedicures or bubble baths. Do wine, chocolate, bubble baths, fishing trips, luxurious vacations, expensive toys all add up to self care? Perhaps and perhaps not.
“We are the most in-debt, obese, addicted and medicated adult cohort in US history.”
Brené Brown
It’s time to start a new conversation…. a conversation about a paradox that some people have learned how to manage and leverage.
The paradox is found embedded within two concepts that appear to be at odds with each other; Servant Leadership and Self Care.
For twenty five years I explored the ins and outs of servant leadership. I had the privilege and responsibility of loving and serving people through their most vulnerable moments, from birth to death.
There were many lessons learned… and some that were learned too late.
What is Servant Leadership?
Servant leadership turns a power pyramid upside down; the leader exists to serve the people. This is an ancient philosophy that is embedded in many religious traditions. Robert Greenleaf, championed the idea of servant leadership for business and organizations in the 1970’s.
The more I spend understanding successful business practices, the more I see that a servant leadership model is at the heart of many incredible organizations.
Servant leadership is a mindset that is embedded in each of the management styles of Situational Leadership. (Paul Hersey, Ken Blanchard)
What is Self-care?
Self-care is many things to many people. The kind of self-care that I am a proponent of is really more like soul care. It’s about mindfully choosing thoughts, attitudes and behaviours that align with the very best person I want to be. Guy Winch, in his TEDx talk, refers to it as emotional first aid.
It requires having difficult conversations.
It requires boundaries.
It requires trust and self-trust.
It requires vulnerability.
It requires self compassion.
It requires mindfulness.
Sometimes this requires the self-care that most of us recognize, like the bubble bath…. but so much more!
In short, self-care is difficult, gritty and extremely important. Why? We cannot give what we do not have.
I still remember when I understood the truth that Dr. Brené Brown shares in her work: “The most compassionate people are also the most boundaried people.”
Do you read the tension in that statement? It’s counterintuitive.
Sustainable Leadership
Set aside platitudes, memes or cliches; sustainable leadership requires the determination to master oneself. Is not for the faint of heart.
It takes grit, contemplation, and personal responsibility.
When you do the work to get real about the internal conversation you’re having AND offer the most generous interpretation possible to the intentions, words and actions of others, that’s when you will be working from a sustainable place.
The paradox of servant leadership coupled with self-care is a balance of the “me” and the “we”. Living and leading from this place embraces all of the deepest nuances of another word that many of us do not truly understand…. love.
Peter Senge calls it Personal Mastery.
Dan Siegel calls it Whole Brain Thinking
David Rock calls it the Neuroscience of Leadership
Brené Brown calls it Wholehearted Living
When we can hold these tensions in our hands and see the beauty and the value of the parts and the whole, relationships flourish, problems can be solved and money becomes a natural byproduct of the culture.
Servant Leadership and self-care aren’t in opposition with each other, they compliment each other and empower leadership and personal health to flourish in ways that wouldn’t be possible otherwise.
They are partners. They need to be.
What are your next steps to embrace your sustainable leadership journey? I’d love explore this with you. Contact me today.