Why is sourcing leadership from the wisdom of Being important?   The world today is the most populated, the most diverse and the most complex in history.  Three billion people face poverty, illness and lack of access to education, employment and opportunity.  A recent study entitled, Measure of America: American Human Development Report, 2008-2009, modeled on the United Nations Development Program’s Global Human Development Report, provides rankings for the United States on health, education and other social factors.  This report, published by Columbia University Press and The Social Science Research Council, states that of the world’s 30 richest nations, the United States has the highest proportion of children living in poverty and the most people in prison.   Other statistics in the report are equally of great concern and serve to demonstrate the need for a new approach to addressing community and global issues.

In her article  “Personal to Planetary Transformation,” Dr. Monica Sharma (2008), former director of Leadership Development at the UN, writes that the world crisis cannot be resolved only through economics, military, politics or business as usual but through a shift in consciousness.  The source of leadership has to shift from conditioned mind to Wisdom:  “The crisis is in our individual and shared mindsets…Emerging new leaders will enhance their own personal awareness, realizing that this is the most critical element in social transformation” (p. 33). We need a new consciousness, a new vision and a new paradigm of leadership that can address major issues in this new way.

The Earth Charter offers potential leaders such a vision and a world-centric philosophy for global change.  It states in its Preamble:  “As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise.  To move forward, we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms, we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny.  We must join together to bring a global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice and a culture of peace.”

Cultivating access to Being

Developing the consciousness vital for manifesting Earth Charter principles requires profound commitment.  Daily self-inquiry, reflection, meditation and other practices access greater inner peace, wisdom, integrity and courage, which in turn awaken us to deeper levels of love and appreciation for all life.  From here we can see and feel our own suffering and the suffering of others more deeply and respond more compassionately.   Accessing Being as a source for action also requires that we become more aware of shadow aspects of our personality: those unconscious beliefs, past experiences and hidden aspects of self, that keep us from expressing our highest values.   This inner work creates the space for what C. Otto Scharmer (2009) calls Co-Presencing or “the movement…that helps us connect to our deepest sources of inspiration and stillness” (p. 464).   In this place, seeds of new possibilities arise that are able to respond more authentically to future needs.     

Visionary leaders for sustainable change who are willing to do this inner work of self-knowledge and self-development and who commit to being conscious co-creators of social and planetary transformation will inspire and enroll others as partners in their vision for the world.   Through daily practice, they become more authentic, sincere, transparent and trustworthy.  Their goals, plans and directives create a field of possibility that is real, grounded, relevant and achievable.  Because of their presence and wise example, they are able to sustain momentum and support others when morale weakens or change becomes difficult.   This is not magical or idealistic thinking.  This is realistic leadership that is possible when practiced with courage, strength, insight, and continuous accountability, and when leaders walk their talk.

At a recent gathering, I shared these views with someone in a leadership position who replied, “That sounds great but I don’t have time to do all that inner work in my office.”  When I answered that the inner work begins at home, he said, “But I have even less time at home!”    Many of us can relate to this feeling.   Life in the modern world is often hectic and fast moving.  However, assumptions such as “I don’t have time; I cannot make the time; making the time for this isn’t as important as other activities” can be questioned and reframed.   In the midst of so much change and complexity, leaders of the 21^st century will need to choose to create the time and space for inner reflection in order to clearly discern what is factual and what is opinion, what is essential and what is optional, what is healing and what is hurtful, what is meaningful and what is trivial, what sustains life and opportunity and what destroys life and possibility.  This is especially necessary with issues such as education, ecology, business, politics, health, war, and other areas of great concern.

Being-in-Action

Assessing leadership development through Integral Inquiry

Twenty first century leadership for sustainable change requires a new level of accountability, a new alignment of interior values with external measureable results. Too often cognitive dissonance or psychological defense mechanisms obscure or distort our intentions and motivations, and justify actions that are not ethical, lack integrity and which benefit the few at the expense of the many.  How then do we assess the inner potential and outer results of our leadership?   How do we evaluate our Being-in-Action?

An excellent assessment tool is Ken Wilber’s Integral Model, a framework in which the whole and the parts of any experience or situation can be understood. The integral model is made up of quadrants, levels, lines, states and types, and is a resourceful guide for inquiring into and aligning our inner experience with measureable external results. For example, in A Theory of Everything, Wilber (2001) mentions two presentations given by consultants of UNICEF.   In working with global issues, the consultants found that an integral approach is essential “to ensure that evolution and the state of children, humanity, culture and society returns to a state of sustainable process…(and) that actions we attempt…have a chance of being part of a sustainable, directional, transformative change process” (p. 99/102).   The four quadrants can become a lens to highlight and bring forth a leader’s multiple dimensions of Being and evaluate the relationship of inner qualities, capacities and outer expression.  This helps leaders to see the alignment between their thoughts and actions, their walk and their talk.

All of the elements of the four quadrants arise simultaneously. The Upper Left quadrant of the integral model reflects the interior of an individual where feelings, intentions, values, meaning, perception, interpretations and qualities of Being arise.  The Lower Left is the interior of the collective where shared cultural values, beliefs, assumptions and worldviews arise.  These are the I AM and WE ARE aspects of experience.  The Upper Right reflects the exterior of the individual as expressed through physical behavior, professional skills, measureable achievements and observable results. The Lower Right is the exterior of the collective which expresses as social action systems that include forces of production, organizational institutions (religious, political, economic etc.), and other concrete social structures (Wilber, 2001).

The following diagram of the four quadrants can be used as a tool for assessing one’s capacity for Leadership for Sustainable Change:

In the beginning of this exploration, we imagined the kind of leader who would create sustainable change in today’s society.  Now imagine yourself as this leader and ask, as Hillel did, “If not I, who?  If not now, when?”  As we cultivate our access to Being, and manifest this Being-in-Action in service of the world, we “convince by our presence” as Whitman said, and we embody the change we wish to see in our lives, in our organizations and in the world.  Here there is no separation.  Here we are the world.

In summary, 21^st century Leadership for Sustainable Change requires that leaders:

• Proactively explore and apply new methodologies for designing and leading change sourced from Being.
• Walk their talk and act from the wisdom of Being
• Serve from a deep connection with the Earth and all creation
• Commit to daily practices that cultivate the qualities, values and behaviors they wish to see in the world
• Are willing to face and feel personal and global suffering
• Are willing to commit to facing and transforming their shadow
• Embody their vision, are proactive and accountable for results
• Enroll others as co-creators of personal and planetary transformation
• Sustain momentum and emotional support in the midst of change
• Integrate inner and outer dimensions of personal growth and development
• Commit to the integration of inner values and outer worldly expression

References

Cashman, K.  (2008).  Leadership from the inside out. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler.

Harvey, A.  (2009).  The hope:  A guide to sacred activism. Carlsbad, CA:  Hay House.

MacLaughlin, C.  (2010).  The practical visionary:  A new world guide to spiritual growth and social change. Unity Village, MO:  Unity House.

Scharmer, C. (2008).  Theory u: Leading from the future as it emerges. San Francisco:  Berrett-Koehler.

Senge, P. (1999).  Dance of change:  The challenge of sustaining momentum in learning organizations. New York:  Crown Business.

Sharma, M.  (2007, Fall/Winter). From personal to planetary transformation.  Kosmos, 31-35.

Social Science Research Council. (2009). Measure of America: American human development report. Retrieved from http://www.measureofamerica.org/human-development/.

Wilber, K.  (2001). A theory of everything. Berkeley:  Shambhala.

About the Author

Vernice Solimar, PhD,  is director of the Leadership  for Sustainable Change certificate and chair of the Integral Psychology Department in the School of Graduate and Professional Studies at John F. Kennedy.  She has also taught at the California Institute of Integral Studies and the Graduate Theological Union at Berkeley.  Her main interests include the integration of psychology, philosophy, spirituality, transformative education and leadership in service of social and global change.