Mindfulness & Tension

There are numerous models of leadership and they tend to say the same things in slightly different ways. I just read about the leadership model framed by Gordon Spence, PhD, and Michael Cavanaugh, PhD, from the University of Sydney, and their model struck me in a number of ways. In my model, I talk about self-awareness (Self), understanding and communicating with others (Others), and business knowledge (Business) as the key domains of leadership. They talk about awareness as mindfulness that is a combination of having a combined perspective of self, others and the system. Similar to my model, they talk about self-awareness leading to self-regulation (an aspect of emotional intelligence), and they point out that self-awareness and self-regulation lead to “moments of choice.” They stress that in their choice-making, effective leaders must not only embrace and understand complexity, but must also embrace tension and paradox. Mindfulness, they point out, enables engaging rather than reacting to tension and that engagement enables new perspectives to emerge. Effective leaders, they say, are comfortable with the tension that builds bridges and the ambiguity that comes from diverse perspectives. Leadership calls for “being comfortable with discomfort,” which is why effective leadership is so difficult.