and how can our leaders guide this?
The modern-day workplace is the perfect environment for people to react rather than respond. With all the deadlines, delicate interactions, and possibility of public failure, instead of becoming more conscious through our work, many of us only have the energy to get through the day and survive. As our brain circuitry for avoiding threat is so much stronger than our newer brain abilities like thinking logically in the present moment, on default, cultures of blame, defence and distraction build. And once these organisational habits set in, they can be tricky to undo.
If there were a magic bullet to help leaders build the kind of organisation they would be proud of, it would be self awareness. Self awareness is being conscious of how our internal world impacts our external world. It is a combination of self reflection and growth, and receiving feedback from the people around us. When people have an opportunity to develop proficiency over how they think, what they feel and what they do, not only do they feel empowered as individuals, they feel more responsibility in how they work with others. Recent research shows that high self awareness in leaders is the strongest predictor for overall organisation success. We have found that leaders who develop their own self awareness and then learn the skills to raise self awareness throughout the organisation have the biggest traction in creating remarkable workplace cultures.
Comments