How to be a Transformational Leader

You're here because you have already achieved some outer success and reached your current executive leadership position. But growth doesn't have to stop here. There is a thrill and satisfaction in challenging yourself, stretching and seeing how much you can achieve. Have an impact and make a contribution.

The talents, skills and tools that have got you to this point will not necessarily take you further. Or the approaches you've used to achieve this success may have been expensive in terms of time, energy, stress and effect on your relationships. You need new or upgraded power tools to make sure you can sustain or advance your position more easily.

The High-Performance Executive Newsletter introduces these tools, so that you can level up, as video-gamers would say. It draws on many areas of solid research into high-performance in business, including neuroscience, psychology, physiology, trauma therapy and flow-state study.

The three essential areas for high performance are neuro-regulation (to get and stay calm), clear the negative self-talk and the beliefs that create them (including imposter syndrome), and create new success habits.

This week we're looking at transformational leadership.

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The Secret to Being a Transformational Leader

In 2012, the ESADE Business School set out on an ambitious study. They wanted to see if they could predict who, out of all their talented MBA students, would stand out as a remarkable leader.

ESADE already had the ability to track groups of MBA students working together on a case study and assess which ones(s) stood out as what they called a transformational leader.

Now they were looking for the reason why these individuals were?so effective.

The researchers filmed the case study discussion, counting how often people spoke, were responded to, their type of contribution, and the quality of their ideas. They also tracked heart rate and measured brain electrical activity.

What they found was quite surprising.

The transformational leaders were not those that talked most or had the most airtime.

They were not the ones with the most innovative ideas or the smartest insights.

The transformational leaders were the ones who best controlled their nervous systems. That is, their physiology!

“The transformational leaders were those who could best regulate their nervous system, and those of others.” ESADE Study

Regulating Your Own Nervous System

I’ve discussed nervous system regulation more fully in Issue 1 of The High-Performance Executive .

Essentially, it is the ability to remain calm in the face of external (or even internal!) stressors. This is staying in the ‘social engagement state, as defined by neuroscientist Dr Steven Porges’ Polyvagal Model of the nervous system.

In the social engagement state, you are relaxed, more receptive to body language cues, more open to ideas and feel positive about those around you. Your nervous system is telling you that you are safe from physical danger and you can focus on being creative and cooperative.

The opposite of the social engagement state is the nervous?system triggered into fight, flight or freeze states. Here your nervous system is on high alert for physical threats. It signals your body to divert blood flow to the muscles (so you can fight or run away), increase blood pressure ready for action. It’s a primal survival system developed when threats were lurking tigers etc.

This same primal system still works in the modern world, but it responds to threats that are not just physical but also social. In business, this includes discussions, negotiations and presentations.

The problem for high-performance is that a triggered nervous system leads to changes to the blood flow in the prefrontal cortex, the logical thinking and planning part of the brain.

A 2012 Princeton University study shows that this triggered state temporarily lowers your IQ by 13 points. It means you literally do not have access to your full thinking capacity.

This correlates to poorer risk assessment, poorer decision making, emotional reactivity and being more suspicious of others.

So it makes sense that the transformational leaders were the ones who could best regulate their nervous systems. Either by being less triggered, or having the ability to return to the social engagement state quickly if you are triggered.

Regulating Other People’s Nervous System

It’s one thing to regulate your own nervous system. But what about that other result from the ESADE study – the ability to regulate the nervous system of other people?

The mechanism for regulating others’ nervous systems is easily seen in meerkats.

A few Meerkats in the group stand on their hind legs looking out for danger. The rest relax, eat, groom etc. safe in the knowledge that there is no immediate danger. The social engagement state.

The slightest reaction from the guards – a twitch or a sound – alerts the whole group that there is a nearby threat. Every group member’s nervous system gets triggered into fight/flight/freeze ready to do what it takes to survive. They jump up and look for the danger or run into their burrows for safety.

You could say that this is the meerkats' nervous systems communicating directly with each other.

It works the same way in humans. Imagine a group of people sitting quietly in a doctor's waiting room. Suddenly someone gasps. Everyone else is startled and all nervous systems are activated. Heads whip around to find the source of the danger.

Nervous systems 'communicate' because your brain continually monitors the breathing, voice tone, body language and yes even heart rate of those around you.

If one person in a meeting is uncomfortable, worried or afraid, everyone else’s nervous system will pick up on it and be more alert for danger.

On the other hand, if one person remains calm and in the social engagement state, even when others are worried, their nervous system communicates that ‘we’re all safe’.

These are the transformational leaders. Those who keep themselves and others in the most creative, productive, cooperative and high-performing state.

You can see why ESADE identified it as the key indicator of leadership greatness.

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What I've loved this week:

The Human Upgrade Podcast by Dave Asprey

(previously called Bulletproof Radio). This has been my favourite podcast for the last few years and it has recently reached 1000 episodes.

Dave Asprey is a ‘biohacker’ focused on creating the best conditions for peak performance.

He describes biohacking as changing the environment outside of you and inside of you so you have full control of your biology, to allow you to upgrade your body, mind, and your life.

The podcast covers ways to optimise your health and wellness, regulate your nervous system, address mindset, technology for high performance and more.

Some episodes are a bit ‘out there’ but most are excellent deep-dive discussions with leading-edge scientists about the very latest research into how we can optimise our performance, health and happiness.

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An action step you can do today …

Tracking Your nervous System

The first step in neuro-regulation is to become aware of when your nervous system is in a social engagement state or a triggered state.

Physical signs of the triggered fight state include tension, sweating (blood pressure increased), clenching your jaw, grinding your teeth, rapid breathing, squeezing your hands into fists or wanting to throw things. Emotionally you feel anger, irritation and impatience, and feel like intimidating or in the extreme?wanting to hit someone.

Physical signs of the triggered flight state include shaking, sweating, twitchiness especially in your legs, dry mouth, rapid breathing, and clenching or butterflies in your stomach. You feel nervous and want to leave the room (run away) or simply withdraw from the discussion.

Physical signs of the freeze state include the mind going blank, forgetting what you were saying, numbness, feeling like you can’t move and holding your breath. Emotionally you feel overwhelmed and stuck.

This week, notice if and when you feel any of these and which state it was – fight, flight or freeze. You’ll build a pattern of your neuro-regulation patterns.

This information is the starting point for tracking your nervous system and improving your tools to regulate it.

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We'll cover more on high-performance leadership in future issues.

Do subscribe and share!

I'm Dr Tara Halliday, Imposter Syndrome Specialist.

I've been a holistic therapist and high-performance coach for over 21 years.

I'm the creator of the premium Inner Success for Execs programme - the fastest and best solution to imposter syndrome.

My book, Unmasking: The Coach's Guide to Imposter Syndrome was an Amazon #1 bestseller in 2018.

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Check out the Inner Success for Execs programme for fast 'up levelling' of your internal leadership tools.

https://www.completesuccess.co.uk

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Have an excellent, refreshing and recharging weekend!

Tara