Issue 15: Finding the space between systems and sensing

Consider the leaders you have been managed by, mentored by, developed by, or perhaps - if we’re being honest - tortured by. It’s not ideal, but we all know someone who has been detrimentally affected by the people who were supposed to lead them.

Now think of the best of them.
The one who truly saw you. The one who invested in you. The leader who took a risk on you, had faith in you, or challenged you to be better, to reach your potential.

Think about what you learned about yourself under their leadership. Think about what you achieved in that moment, but also everything that happened afterwards as a result of their belief in you.

Now ask yourself: what was their standout attribute?

I can almost imagine the reverent expressions as you confirm what I suspect is the answer… they were a rigid, militant stickler for systems. Perhaps you sigh in nostalgia as you recall how they upheld historic ways of operating, no matter what you thought or what happened around them.

No?

Then perhaps your trailblazer was the opposite. The mentor who taught you the delicate tightrope of leadership—changing for the better, but not simply for the sake of change, was actually a rebel, a disrupter. Someone who threw the rules away with contempt.

Not that either?

I realise I’m talking in extremes here, but I suspect you can see the point I’m edging toward. Great leaders do not sit neatly in one camp, nor are they all the same. This is hyperbole to entice you into my train of thought.

Because I doubt the request to consider successful leaders was a novel one. You will have been asked to reflect on their skills before. You have probably been on leadership courses about listening, coaching, making people feel valued, ensuring systems are followed, and communicating in ways that lead to measurable outcomes.

Leadership development programmes attempt to systemise the individual components that make up these almost mythical managers. After all, if we can teach these skills, then profit should improve, employee satisfaction should stabilise, and organisations should thrive.

But while I jest about sighing in reverence, I do acknowledge the power of a truly great leader. Their impact can be profound, both professionally and personally. So yes, the attempt to develop great leaders is admirable. It also makes logical business sense.

And yet the research tells a different story.

Less than 20% of employees trust their leaders, and only 16% feel their leaders make them excited about the future.

These statistics have been lingering in my mind since I was sent an article from Forbes: Leadership Development Is Training Absence, Not Presence.

At The Excitable Soul, we do not aim to be another system to install or a paint-by-numbers leadership programme.

There are several reasons for this. One is that it places too much emphasis on the how or the what of leadership, rather than the why. But another, more uncomfortable reason is that the research increasingly suggests this approach simply doesn’t work.

I was going to summarise the arguments of the Forbes article I mentioned earlier, but I would actually encourage you to read it for yourself. My word count is rarely what you would describe as brief, and the author is far more articulate than I am. It is well worth your time.

What struck me most was that it was sent to me with no explanation, almost as if to say: this… it’s this.

Because the argument resonates deeply with what we already know to be true.

It aligns with the work of Lisa Feldman Barrett, whose research suggests that emotions are not fixed reactions but interpretations our brains construct from the sensory signals of our bodies and the world around us.

If that is the case, then awareness matters. Sensing matters. And the courage to stay present - to pay attention, even and perhaps most importantly when uncertainty appears, matters.

Assuming you have done the hard work to find out your why, to understand what matters most to you as an individual or as an organisation, the next question inevitably becomes: how do we move forward with that? How do we make sure everyone lives it?

Then yes…

• Tell us about your systems.

• Tell us what you measure.

• Tell us what success looks like.

• Explain the challenges you are facing.

But before we rush to solve the same problems with the same ideas, to drag in new frameworks and use them as progress-measuring tools… let’s feel some things and notice what you're feeling.

Let’s learn to step into the arena, to borrow a phrase from Brené Brown. Let’s notice what is happening in our systems and be brave enough to consider what the next best step might be -even if it isn’t written in the company playbook.

Let’s also pay attention to whether our systems themselves reinforce presencing or absencing- two concepts I could only guess at before reading the article and doing some research.

Shakespeare famously wrote that some people are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them.

He did not add:

“And by the way, here is a conference on how to systematise greatness and measure progress against it.”

So before we finish, travel back in time with me for a moment.

Not quite as far as Shakespeare, I won’t push my luck again, but back to the leaders you remembered so fondly at the beginning of this piece.

The ones who saw you.
Who invested in you?
Who challenged you to be better?

Could it be that what made them exceptional was not that they belonged neatly in one camp or the other?

Not rigid system enforcers.
Not reckless rule breakers.

But something more nuanced.

Perhaps they understood the value of systems, the structure they provide, the fairness they protect, the clarity they bring.

And yet they were also open enough to notice when the system needed questioning. Brave enough to take a risk. Honest enough to challenge the status quo when integrity demanded it. And grounded enough to hold you to account along the way.

In other words, perhaps what made them remarkable was their ability to dance in the space between the two.

To stay aware.

To notice the signals around them.

To pay attention to the human experience unfolding within the system, not just the system itself.

Because if the research of Lisa Feldman Barrett is right, then our emotions are not irrational distractions from good decision-making. They are interpretations of the sensory signals our brains receive from the world around us.

Little messengers, constantly reporting from the front line.

Signals that something matters.
Signals that something feels off.
Signals that something is full of potential.

And perhaps leadership, at its best, is not about ignoring those signals in favour of certainty.

Perhaps it is about learning to listen to them well enough to decide what to do next.

Not change for the sake of change.

But change in service of what truly matters.