Experiential Leadership Training
Posted by Adriana Dakin, Communications Strategist and Amy Wachler Communications Associate on July 26, 2007
A major component of organizational leadership is maintaining focused, goal-oriented effort for sustained periods. Figuring out one’s personal style in motivating people to direct their efforts and action in a particular direction is key. In Madera Group’s strategic planning processes with high level social profit executives, we keep asking ourselves the simple question, “What exactly are we working to accomplish?” to keep our eyes on the prize and focus on the real work at hand. The question brings us back to our goals.
I took a week off this summer for professional development at Hollyhock Center in British Columbia to find out what horses could teach me about leadership. My biggest takeaway was about directing my focus with clear intent and an attitude of gratitude. It’s completely commonsense, but useful to practice again and again with horses by relying on body language rather than words.
I’ve grown to appreciate learning new ways of interacting effectively through experiences that complement and ground intellectual logic. This Horses and Authentic Leadership course with facilitators Deborah Marshall, Frances Guthrie, and Oriane Lee Johnston brought home how I feel when I’m at my best and ready to interact with grace and grit.
The facilitators work with humans and horses together, because observing horse behavior reveals parallels to human interactions. Whatever results occur in the horse-human interactions is fascinating because horses are highly sensitive—they’re prey animals who have survived millennia by being able to size up other animals/people (predators) instantly. They are appreciative of truth and authenticity. Pretension and posturing goes nowhere. They’re also hierarchical and social—a fantastic laboratory for leadership training, for developing clear communication, leading by example, and experiencing what it feels like to be truly confident and emotionally congruent. A horse named Lucky (in the photo above with me), for example, would respond by doing what I asked of him when I gave a graceful invitation and communicated a clear purpose and direction. I got little reaction if I didn’t show clearly what I wanted (and he could tell if I didn’t know what I wanted), and reluctant compliance if I didn’t ask with grace.
Horses don’t care about graduate degrees—they care how one behaves and moves around in the world. A little of the right thing can go a long way, building cooperation and momentum over time. So too with clients, who want practical leadership, management resources, and skills that drive the bottom line.
For all the guests at Hollyhock, facilitator Frances Guthrie showed the value of being able to direct her focus and concentration in a demonstration with her strong-willed and stocky Fjord (Scandinavian) horse. She acknowledged that it was largely her deeply loving and clear relationship with him that allowed her to train him to very advanced levels (sidestepping, dancing, riding with no reins, all with the gentlest touch and a clear intention) when other high-level trainers had said that this stubborn Fjord horse just “couldn’t be trained, there was no way he could be trained.” She also learned in the process that she had a great deal of personal development to conduct with herself so that she could bring even more energy and perseverance to the training than the horse brought against the training.
How great that I could gain professional and personal development … with horses, on an island … and become more aware of the incremental change that can profoundly affect long-term leadership development.
