creativity in leadership

Don’t get your head stuck inside of a barrel

by amiel · Dec 22, 2015

For once, my “don’t do this at home” advice isn’t based on my own experience.

At least not directly.

Recently, I happened upon this scene at the Oregon Zoo.

It wasn’t immediately obvious why the lion’s head was in the barrel or how it got there.

So I waited to see what would happen. Maybe the answers would reveal themselves.

Five minutes later, I started to wonder something else: will the lion ever get its head out?

That’s the thing about getting your head stuck inside of a barrel. It’s a vulnerable position. Your eyes can’t see what’s happening to your torso. And if someone or something decides to attack your skull, your arms and legs are powerless to stop it.

This is why most of us don’t voluntarily get our heads stuck inside of barrels.

We’re pretty smart about that.

But we’re not smart about everything body-related. All too often we forget that we even have bodies. Sure, we employ them for sports and sex. But otherwise our level of body intelligence is relatively low.

We might as well have our heads in a barrel.

One time years ago, I got steamed at someone for telling me “Amiel, you’re in your head.” What bothered me is that I like being in my head. It has served me well. And it has served our species well (for the most part).

What’s wrong with being in your head?

Nothing. But that wasn’t this person’s point. What she meant is that I was out of touch with my body. That I was speaking only from my head. And she was right.

How did I know this? Not long after, I was telling someone how frustrated I was about a particular aspect of my life. (OK, it was dating. You forced it out of me.) He said to me, “OK, how does this frustration show up in your body?”

I had no idea.

These days as a coach, I ask people the same question.

“How does this feeling show up in your body?”

Half the time, people have an answer. “Tight shoulders,” they reply. Or “my jaw is clenched” or “knots in my stomach.”

That’s a lot better than I used to be able to do.

But the other half of the time, people are as clueless as I was. They give me that sincere yet pained looked that says, “I have no f__ing idea what you are talking about.”

And for good reason. They’re not as connected with their bodies as they could be. Nor are most of us in modern western organizations. Bodies are a great source of wisdom, but you wouldn’t know this by studying the leadership literature or reading the list of competencies that companies consider significant. Emotions have broken into those clubs, but the body is still on the outside looking in.

Just like that lion at the Oregon Zoo.

Episode 24: Amy Jen Su On Owning The Room [The Amiel Show]

by amiel · Jul 21, 2015

Leadership presence. In some organizations, you hear the phrase all the time. Sounds impressive, but does anyone know what it actually means?

Do you?

Now, you’re a smart person, so let’s assume you have a definition ready at hand. Leadership presence is about how other people perceive you. And power.

Through this lens, the greater your presence, the more powerfully you show up in others’ assessments. Most of us want to be perceived as powerful. So leadership presence is a good thing, right?

Yes, but only if it means showing up powerfully as ourselves. Not imitating someone else, but expressing the highest and most authentic version of who we are.

When you do this, you’re not renting someone else’s space or personality.

You own the room.
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Episode 21: Ba Luvmour On Parenting 8-12 Year-Olds [The Amiel Show]

by amiel · Jun 16, 2015

When you’re with 8-12 year-olds, ask yourself, ‘Am I building trust in this moment?’

–Ba Luvmour, headmaster of Summa Academy in Portland, OR Tweet this quote

[Update: in July 2017, Ba’s school, Summa Academy, suddenly closed. It was a shock to our family and others. The way Ba and the other administrators handled the ending fell short of what we wanted and expected given the closeness of our relationship the prior four years. It hurt. Still—and this is the main point I want to make—our family continues using the parenting practices we learned at Summa and continue to see positive results from them. There’s good stuff in here!]

Leadership is about your life as a human being. It encompasses all of you. That’s why I’ve chosen this week to focus the podcast on parenting.

In particular, parenting 8-12 year-olds.

This is a crucial stage in children’s lives, yet almost nobody talks about it with wisdom and rigor.

That’s why I reached out to Ba Luvmour. A pioneering educator and author, Ba is a man of big ideas and enormous practical experience. He talks a big game–and delivers. I know this because our older son is a student at Summa Academy, an independent school in Portland, Oregon for kids ages 4-14 where Ba serves as headmaster.

One big reason we chose Summa Academy is that it knows children’s interpersonal lives inside and out. To give a simple example, what do you do when your child refuses to do something you ask? According to Ba, it’s not helpful to answer that question in a vacuum. First, you ask: what stage of development is this child in the midst of–and what are the nourishments and toxins of this stage?In two years, our older son will turn 8.

So I asked Ba to give me a sneak preview of what to expect at this stage, which Ba calls FeelingBeing. What’s specific challenges do kids this age face socially and emotionally? What kind of relationship do they need with you to thrive? What mistakes do many parents make–and how can you avoid them?

Ba bring enormous enthusiasm, wisdom, and love to this interview. He offers specific tips for handling common situations–what I call conversational practices.

I promise that you will learn something new from this conversation. And I hope you’ll share it with friends.

Highlights

4:15 What a camping trip can do for an 8-12 year old’s social bonds and feelings of adventure
14:00 How to help an 8-12 year old identify what they think is unfair and understand why
20:00 What to say–and not say–about divorce to children at this age
23:00 Why losing friendships at this age can produce grief and loneliness–and how to work with this
27:00 Why it’s not helpful to tell a child, “Hey, it’s OK. You’ll make new friends.”
33:00 The long term cost of using rewards and punishments
42:00 Stop talking about winning and losing. Start asking kids to describe their experiences in detail
46:45 How watching Star Wars can subvert a 5-year-old’s imagination

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Episode 16: Julie Daley on creativity in leadership [The Amiel Show]

by amiel · Apr 27, 2015

Imagine that:

Creativity isn’t something “other” people have
Creativity is much broader than art–or even new ideas and products
Creativity isn’t just about you. It’s about what you create with other people
Creativity isn’t even just about creativity. It’s about being skilled in emotions, difficult conversations, and leadership

Many people consider these a stretch. Not Julie Daley, who teaches Creativity in Leadership at Stanford and helps women become a force of nature through her company, Unabashedly Female. Julie sees these as starting points for guiding people to access their creativity in leadership and the rest of life.

Episode Highlights

6:00 Julie guides me to access my own creativity–live
15:00 The man who used Julie’s class to decide whether to propose marriage
23:00 How judging others keeps their ideas from coming forth fully
28:00 What you can do to work with your inner critic
32:00 How to see with your heart…or your toe
35:00 How a single conversation can ignite you to feel more alive
37:00 What creativity teaches us about difficult conversations
51:30 What leadership from a place of love is like
55:00 What Julie is personally practicing to grow as a human being

creativity in leadership

Highlights

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Episode Highlights

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http://traffic.libsyn.com/amielhandelsman/TAS_016_Julie_Daley.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | Download | EmbedSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS