7 Questions, a Drawing and a Prayer for Leaders

I recently had the honor of facilitating a leading edge cafe discussion table at the Barrett Values Centre International Conference. Our table topic was our personal leading edge for level 7 values. If you are not familiar with the Barrett values model, level 7 represents the highest spiritual values of humanity; such things as wisdom, ease with uncertainty, ethics and future generations. My task was to distill 3 major themes that came out of our discussions. Well, spirit cannot be contained nor neatly summed up, so instead we offered our fellow conference attendees 7 questions, a drawing and a prayer.

The drawing was the work of Tom Boardman, a wonderful leader and the former CEO of Nedbank South Africa. Tom turned the Barrett model in on itself, offering a spiral rather than the traditional hierarchy of levels, noting that all value levels are present at all times and a true leader knows how to seamlessly shift to what is present and needed in the moment. Below are the seven questions and the prayer.

• Who am I?
• Where do I stand?
• Can I express in fearless humility the beauty, peace and love I wish to be and truly am?
• Can I mirror the wisdom of All-That-Is back to itself?
• How do I call to and inspire my fellow beings to their highest self?
• How do I learn and listen to reveal what is next?
• Can I play in the spiral of consciousness to serve the planet, humanity and future generations?

The level 7 leaders prayer:
May the pain of playing small
inspire me to fearlessly express
who I really am
To boldly proclaim
This is where I stand
and to humbly ask
How may I serve?

What Will be Your Legacy- part 2

After a couple of solid years of regular blogging, my posts have become infrequent due to a personal decision to take care of my sick mother. This was a full-time commitment that took up most of my time for nearly a year. I was able to continue my growth and learning during this time, and I am excited now to return to full-time pursuit of my dual missions:

1. To make the quadruple bottom-line of People, Planet, Profits and Purpose the common measure of business success.
and
2. To help leaders discover and express their deepest values, signature strengths and highest purpose.

I look forward to sharing inspiring ideas to co-create this world so badly in need of values-driven leaders who share this vision of business as an agent of world benefit.

The Missing Link to Successful Change

Our collaboration partners, Cerebyte, discuss in their recent blog that change cannot happen inside an organization unless the change is desired. The link to their blog is posted below. In fact, that concept is central to their successful wisdom capture and dissemination methodology. Their process engages each individual affected by the change at a personal level, so each person makes the change their own.

At Leadership Beyond Limits, we know the same is true for full system cultural transformation. Cultural Transformation typically fails because leaders fail to connect the transformation to the values of the people, who are the organization. Most organizations spend a lot of time building the foundation and structures to support a change, but fail to support their employees' exploration of what this change means to them. This step is scientifically proven as necessary for success. Without it, what organizations will get is resistance to change - something we are all familiar with.

Think about a time when you resisted change yourself and then a time when you embraced it. Chances are, the difference was your involvement with the process and your ability to internalize the change. Change does not have to be difficult, in fact, it can be energizing for everyone involved!

http://www.cerebytejournal.com/?p=324