Written by: Florence Dambricourt, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Ash* looked through the windows. "The world around us can be exhausting, right?" I know better than jumping onto this opening. It is not really an opening, but rather the process of reflection kicking in, and Ash went on. "There are many words in fashion around as well. Like funny expressions. Future-fit, for instance. What does that mean to be future-fit for someone like me? What would that mean to be future-fit for my company?"
The eyes still lost through the landscape; Ash dropped their shoulders an inch. Relaxation? Sinking deeper into this reflecting moment? Exhaustion? I know how easy it is to burn the candles at both end when running a business. Silence, my old friend, winked at me.
"What would make it easier for you, Ash?"
"I'm not sure Florence. Future ready, I can work it out. It's about being ready to face the future, adaptability, maybe resilience. Future-fit, it's something else. Fit for what? AI? Speed? Climate disaster? Innovating business model? Breaking all these vicious circles? With future-fit, I am like expected to take an action. What do I need to have that capability to take this active stand? What do my company need to remain in action?"
It's my time to pause, take a deep breath. When thinking “creating transformation”, I am always listening for that moment when I feel the person is unaware still and yet waiting for it.
"What about your self-leadership Ash? How can this give you the means to be future-fit?"
“My self-leadership?”
"Yes, your self-leadership. This innate power of autonomy you have in you. This power in deciding what to make of the world around you, in deciding how to influence it."
Ash looked at me, smiling. "Would that be that simple?"
"What if it was?"
"That would be the best news ever!" Ash replied, beaming.
Building capacity for the future through self-leadership
Ash is far from being the only person caught up with these trendy words. Future-fit. Future of work. Future citizen. Future… We feel as if either jumping out of an Asimov or Bradbury novel, or a Start-Trek episode, wondering about this robot-like sensation taking over as we strolled through town.
What does that mean for a person?
What does that mean for an organisation?
How do we get there?
For me, it's about building capacity for it, building capacity for the future, that we can shape it, rather than simply facing it. And this is exactly what self-leadership is helping us with: having the capacity to influence our future by influencing our emotions, communications and behaviours.
Let’s look back at the five disciplines we work on when developing our self-leadership – Body and Mind – Emotions and Behaviours – Identity and Behaviours – Focus and Intention – Us and our System(s). For instance, monitoring this last one “Us and Our system(s)", gives us information on how anything happening within our systems, which includes our work, our family, our friends, our town, our country, etc., can impact or trigger reactions in us. When we see acceleration around us, for example at work, we actually see our systems changing, this can be a change of managers, a change within our team, a change in process. Thanks to this monitoring we have the knowledge that something is happening, and therefore the mean to permanently remain in balance with the situation. The change may create fears or tensions. We can then use the discipline “Emotions and Behaviours” to influence how we respond to the emotions created. It has never been about being just adaptable. Adaptability is a bit passive, like being one step behind. What you want to think of, is keeping in balance with what is happening around you. In balance as keeping okay with the emotions these changes around you may create. Then you can start thinking about influencing your behaviours. Take AI. Or our Cyber Evolution – and by this, I mean the fact that we use more and more technology. When you monitor how they evolve, you can be inspired to keep an eye on their evolution, or start using them. Somewhere, you keep afloat as they develop.
Moving from adaptability to keeping in balance
True, you have to put a minimum of effort in developing your self-leadership. It is soooo worth it though. You will have the joy to discover some key outcomes such as – an increase in your critical thinking – a true capacity to do ongoing learning – some visibility of your own bias and automatic – a much improved resilience – a much improved communication with others and – stronger relationships. And yes, you will know yourself much better, that you will find easier to respond to situations rather than reacting to them. If we go back to AI. Understanding how to use AI is about responding to the context. Understanding a fake from a real news – and AI can create many fake information – is also about responding, engaging actively with behaviours of doubt, scepticism, and pause to choose what to integrate, and what to believe.
What about an organisation then?
So far, we looked at us, individuals, and how developing our self-leadership gives us tools to be future-fit. And we will cover more information with another article looking at some key outcomes we gain from developing our self-leadership.
What about an organisation, now?
What makes self-leadership such an important competence for companies?
To understand where self-leadership fit in, let’s look at innovation, especially innovation culture within companies. For this innovation culture to emerge, two elements are needed. First, trust. With trust, people share information about what they are working on. They also exchange on what works or not. They share insights. They are open to collaborate and to challenge each other with divergent perspectives. And we know, innovation can only flourish when we challenge opinions, and take risks. But to do that, to challenge emotions, to trust each other, to apply critical thinking, we need people with the capacity to manage their emotions. Only when people manage their emotions, and have trust in themselves, they can handle disagreement, failure, challenge, taking risks, and true sharing of information. When people do that, they apply curiosity. In fact, they remain always curious, driven by an ongoing desire to explore and learn. All these cited skills are developed through self-leadership.
Trust and self-leadership are the basis of innovation culture. If we are to represent them with a simple diagram, trust as the horizontal axis, and self-leadership as the vertical one, innovation can only happen within that amazing top right corner where we have high self-leadership and high trust, which can also refer as psychological safety. You can discover more through this paper “How to facilitate the emergence of innovation culture.”
A team with members having worked on their self-leadership, will have, for instance, a high degree of autonomy, a very strong drive, great collaboration mechanisms, and the ability to always be professional. These are the people within teams driving organizations upward where people are having adult to adult relationship.
There are many more tips and changes of perspectives we work on when developing our self-leadership.
When you’re ready to explore fully how you could increase your self-leadership, get my book Swim Like a Fish, an easy guide to developing your self-leadership, or reach out to get information on the next program starting date. There is always a cohort around the corner waiting for you to join that you can learn how to swim like a fish through your life.
*Funny enough, you will soon notice that all my clients have the first name, Ash (Smile).
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Florence Dambricourt, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Passionate about human and their brain. Fanatic (nearly :-)) ultra-trail runner. Florence Dambricourt is an accomplished Speaker, Self-Leadership Coach, Team Coach and Company Culture Change Enabler. Her career, in zig-zag spans over 25 years, navigating through various corporate worlds and entrepreneurship experiences. Driven by curiosity and a very strong intention to “make a difference for the better”, Florence helps her clients finding clarity, so that they can shape their future. With two books published on Self-Leadership, “Swim Like a Fish” and “Speak Like a Fish”, Florence not only champions Self-Leadership, she provides a robust methodology, and with-it tools, to develop or strengthen it. She sees Self-Leadership as a must-have competency for everyone. Her mission? "Unleashing the power of Human Innovation thanks to Self-Leadership”.
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