Quiet Leadership Research: Grace

The final section of Quiet Leadership explores the notion of ‘Grace’, described as a fluidity of leadership, an agility of style and response.

It’s about constant course correction, to find an individual expression of leadership in the smallest of actions: in this, the fourth of a series, i am sharing the initial narrative from the global research project. This is very early stage work, shared as part of #WorkingOutLoud.

• Nobody thought that Leadership was entirely effortless: most believed that at least some course correction was involved.
• Almost all respondents believed that Leadership could be described as an evolutionary process: one that never stops.
• Most people felt unable to evaluate whether they have a natural rhythm in their Leadership: whilst they found it hard to evaluate it in themselves, they wrote a lot of words about it, which may represent a questing for an answer through narrative.
• Most people believe that their Leadership practice is more reflective than reactive: they did not believe they were buffeted too badly by the storms.
• In general, people found it quite hard to articulate their own leadership.
• People expressed that they were unable to act in harmony with their Organisation when they lacked the knowledge of intent, or when there was a misalignment of core values. This is unsurprising.
• There was a strong agreement that feedback is necessary to ascertain our impact as a Leader.
• People strongly agreed that reflection is important for course correction.
• Trust was identified as a disrupter: the lack of it prevents us from acting in harmony with the Organisation. It was described as the ‘oil’.