Leaders Learn To See The World

Having taught in the Center for Leadership Formation for nearly 20 years, I have been honored to witness executives go through remarkable, positive changes as they move through the program. These changes are the result of their own hard work. The program provides a liminal space in which executives engage with each other, professors, staff, and coaches in a way that encourages deep and compassionate self-reflection. This deep and compassionate self-reflection leads many to develop and deepen themselves as authentic leaders.?

In my class, Ethical Leadership, I begin with a “bad luck” exercise. I ask the students to share something bad that has happened to them. What we hear together ranges from getting a speeding ticket to revelations of deep traumas.?

I designed the bad luck exercise several years ago and I found it promotes four?important goals. First, leaders bond. Sharing these often intimate stories requires a great level of trust. Second, they realize they all have something in common besides being high-achieving executives. No one gets this far in life without having a trauma or two. Third, they see firsthand the strength and resilience of their fellow students. Even those who seem not to have reconciled their traumas do not see themselves as victims. Finally, they witness the courage of those revealing their traumas as well as the courage they showed in not suppressing them or pretending they never happened.

In my course, and several other courses, students find themselves with assignments and exercises requiring them to face difficult moments in their lives. These situations are structured so students have an opportunity to deal with these difficult moments in a constructive way.?

Why is this so important? We believe that the best leaders- authentic leaders- see the world as it is, not as they wish it to be or how it “should” be. Only by dealing with the world as it is can leaders begin changing it in a way that promotes human dignity, respect, fairness, and justice.?

We also believe the only way individuals can see the world clearly is if they see themselves clearly, not as they wish to be or how they “should” be. Once again, we can only develop if we see ourselves accurately.

In CLF programs, it’s not that we teach the values of human dignity, respect, fairness, and justice. We simply call them out. Together, we examine them, the conflicts they engender, and describe processes for resolving them. And, as T.S. Elliot described, many see these values again for the first time. Also, like the Bourgeois Gentlemen, they realize they have been acting from these values for many years.

Biography

John Dienhart joined Seattle University's Albers School of Business and Economics in 1999 as a Professor of Management and the Frank Shrontz Chair for Professional Ethics. John was the Director of the Center for Business Ethics at Albers and the Director of the Northwest Ethics Network, an independent group of ethics and compliance officers from the Pacific Northwest. He is also an Invited Fellow of the Ethics Resource Center in Washington, DC. He consults with and does ethics training for Bonneville Power Administration, Costco, Holland America, Premera, Russell Investment Group, Starbucks, Weyerhaeuser, and the Russell Family Foundation. He has worked in business ethics since 1980.

John has his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Illinois at Urbana and is a past President of the Society for Business Ethics. The Society for Business Ethics is an international group of philosophers, economists, legal theorists, and business people devoted to the study and communication of business ethics and its role in leadership. His comments on business ethics have appeared in newspapers across the country, including the New York Times, The Washington Post, the LA Times, the Puget Sound Business Journal, the Seattle Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle.

John has published four books, several articles, and made many presentations on ethics and leadership in business. His current focus is on leading organizational cultures to promote ethical behavior and compliance. His approach to the subject is described in his co-authored piece “The Ethical Commitment to Compliance: Building Value-Based Cultures” (With Tom Tyler of New York University and Terry Thomas, Principal, TRT Consulting, California Management Review (Winter 2008).