What is regenerative leadership?

Designing an exploration of how we might embody regenerative leadership in a degenerative world

On 13th November, the day before Meaning Conference, I'm running a workshop exploring regenerative leadership with highly knowledgeable colleagues, incuding author Laura Storm, Anneloes Smitsman (who will both be joining via live link from Denmark and Mauritius) and Nicola Millsom, founder of She Leads Change. We'll be exploring how we can find new qualities within ourselves and our sense of leadership, which take inspiration from nature, mythology and collective intelligence.

In my work helping organisations to make a shift from 'just' sustainability to a more regenerative path for people and planet, I frequently support CEOs and teams transition away from their historical idea of what leadership is to a much more emergent, collaboration and co-creative approach. And so I have developed a deep interest in how our notions about leadership need to change. As you may have noticed by now, I also have a deep interest in re-designing systems and organisations based on the principles of the feminine psychological development journey, instead of the masculine patriarchical design on which we have based much of our modern world.

It takes a lot of different ingredients to make a successful workshop. It's a bit like looking at a Moroccan market full of spices and colourful fruits. As I start to think about designing and shaping any workshop, I always imagine myself in the place of the people who are coming to join me. What are their questions? What do we need to think about? What's the 'right' flow for building community, sharing insights and developing co-creative learning? I would like to share those with you and see if we can co-create together here on Linked In. Here are some of the questions I'm thinking about:-

Why does regenerative really mean? What does it mean in the context of leadership?

Why do we need a different kind of leadership today? How is our existing idea of leadership failing us in a rapid, complex world? What do we mean by regenerative as a word itself? What are the implications for how we show up, have an impact on other people, the places we live and work, and on our planet? What does it mean to be a regenerative leader? What are the qualities and skills that need to emerge within us?

What models and frameworks can we take inspiration from to guide more regenerative leadership?

How can we take inspiration from nature's patterns, which have evolved continuously evolve over billions of years? What can we learn from nature that might inspire a new and different sense of leadership within us? How can we learn to creative the conditions conducive to life? What does it mean to embody the qualities of a guardian of life? What does nature teach us about collaboration and competition?

Does psycho-mythology have anything to share with us about feminine-inspired leadership? Does the pathway of feminine psychological development offer us any inspiration for a different kind of leadership? What does the story of Psyche tells us about the qualities and skills that balance out the masculine narrative on which we have built leadership and systems? How do we embody those qualities in our everyday lives and work?

I'm also thinking the workshop will be an opportunity to learn from your peers about other leadership ideals and practices you use in your work. Perhaps we will compile a list of source inspirations?

How do we name ourselves as regenerative practitioners? What different roles can we take?

Anneloes Smitsman has spent many years looking at emergent models of regenerative leadership? Are we Wholeness Coders, Future Creators, Evolutionary Catalysts, Pattern Weavers or New Paradigm Storytellers? Or are we multi-talented polymaths for the future, embodying many different roles as we journey towards the future?

Ecologist and philosopher Joanna Macy and Margaret Wheatley both speak of the importance of naming yourself and the ground on which you stand. Executive leadership coach Helena Clayton also reminded me recently that ‘we need to be able to name what ground we’re standing on and name the models or philosophy that inform or underpin our work and the decisions we make when we intervene’. Can you name yours?

Where is the opportunity for regenerative leadership in your life and work?

I'm thinking that we'll need to take a look at how regenerative and degenerative patterns and behaviours show up in your world and work. Where does the organisation you work for or lead have an impact on people, place and planet that is less than conducive to life, and are places in which humans cannot thrive?

What are you seeing right now in your organisations that make you think that regenerative culture could be emerging? If more regenerative leadership were present, what difference might it make? Where does regenerative culture already have a strong presence in our organisations and how can we build on that?

How do we bring our collective intelligence and responsibility into regenerative leadership?

Solving wicked, tough and intractable problems in the world, in our organisations and in our lives can no longer be done with lone wolf leadership strategies. Increasingly departments are being asked to collaborate than seem unusual and unlikely partners. Can HR and Sustainability come together as key representatives of people and planet to provide a new form of leadership for example?

How can we bring an approach to collective intelligence - as we will do in our workshop - to the boundaries of our roles? What would it be like (sound like, look like …) if, we actively and proactively worked from a sound regenerative base?

We can start to get practical here. What does regenerative look like in practice? Let's explore regenerative-as-a-verb ...what are the things we do and could do that would be regenerative and yet still be a considered part of our work? What would a regenerative-based practice involve? What would be in a regenerative-based practitioner field guide?

This is the stage when I'm designing a workshop where everything goes into the melting pot and gets stirred into a beautiful soup of experience (well, hopefully it does!). I would love to hear what you think of these questions - whether you have booked yet or not. So let me know what you think is essential to include, and what else you'd like to explore if you were to come along. And please share if you know of others who might benefit from joining us in this workshop.

If you're going to Meaning Conference and you want to get your meaningful experience off to a regenerative start, why not join us on 13th November between 3-6pm in Brighton? You can register here.

And don't worry if you can't come to Brighton and Meaning Conference. I'll be announcing another full day exploration in London very shortly! If it sounds interesting and you'ld like to explore running this internally in your organisation, do get in touch. I'm particularly interested in supporting previously marginalised groups in the workplace, especially women.

You can read many of the articles I've written on nature-based inspiration and the importance of feminine psychology in designing a regenerative future here on Linked In but also on our Activate The Future blog on Medium where I'm joined by other regenerative thinkers like Anna Pollock, Michelle Holliday, Carol Sanford and Daniel Christian Wahl.