‘Transpersonal Leadership’ is fundamental to any start-up with an aspiration to build a
world-class company. The day you start a company, you ARE the company. You have
goals for the company and goals for yourself. This is where transpersonal
leadership matters. The more authentic your personal goals are in the context
of the company you are building, the more natural it will be for people to
commit to your leadership. How do people and
organizations become transpersonal, delivering leadership beyond the ego?
Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing themselves.
The idea of transpersonal leadership is based just around this quote. Attempting to suggest a leadership model for 21st century leaders, one word to describe it would be 'awareness’, two words would be ‘emotional intelligence’, three words would be ‘understand your brain’ and four words would be ‘live beyond your ego’.
We, as human beings, are incapable of understanding our emotions when we feel them. Ironically, it is also one of our greatest needs. We feel a need for others to understand our feelings and the ones who can really understand the feelings of others are most likely to become the best leaders of their times. The leaders of today have to be able to lead in any situation. Leadership is a quality that is hidden deep within all of us.Most of us don’t live up to our values with full consciousness. As humans, we tend to make decisions based on our ego. We tend to think that we’re taking decisions for the organization, but in reality, we decide for personal gains on a subconscious level. When we take a decision egoistically, power, prestige, rewards and recognition are a few things we look out for. Yes, we all want to be known for the decisions that we take, but this hardly ever benefits the team or the organization we’re in. This is where transpersonal leadership comes in. It is about raising your level of consciousness and going beyond your ego. Transpersonal leadership teaches you to actively develop and practice your values to the benefit of everybody involved.
There are 6 main styles of leadership and we are usually well versed with one or two types of styles naturally. However, an excellent leader should be able to grasp all six styles in order to be equipped for different circumstances. Now, the only way to get good at all six styles is to learn new behaviors and once that is done, a huge difference in the competence level of a leader can be seen immediately.
In terms of culture, a lot of different organizations have their own definitions of the concept. Power structure and support are the three main aspects of any organizational culture. However, the ideal culture of an organization or a company involves low power, low structure and a lot of support and this is what drives up the achievement.
Decision Making: All of us have been brought up to think rationally. Whenever we pitch an idea, we have to be able to back it up rationally for someone to accept it. But in reality, most decisions come intuitively and we just end up spending a lot of time rationalizing them. As natural as this is, the fact remains that we let our biases and prejudices, which are hardwired in us due to our experiences and insights, interfere with our intuitive decision making skills. The key to tackling this is to determine the source of our decision making skills and to bring it to full consciousness.
Also, we all need to bring in ethical philosophy into our decisions. This aspect of decision making can be broadly divided into three main sub aspects – integrity, social consciousness and a regard for rules. Everyone possesses one or more of these factors innately and uses them in their judgment. However, modern leadership involves balancing all three aspects and bringing our values to full consciousness.
We all have a set of strengths and weaknesses. We can enhance our strengths and work on our weaknesses, but all this can happen only with self-awareness. The human brain hasn’t evolved since the Stone Age and it is possible to hone it to think in a specific way. The brain learns whatever is fed to it and hence, it is important to learn and do productive things at all times. The qualities that we have today depend heavily on what we’ve always been exposed to.
Knowing oneself is the first step to unlock the leader within you.
Leadership , in the 21st century, is a balanced blend of listening, empathy, humility and coaching. A good leader gets his people as excited as him or her. This effectively breeds enthusiasm which is a great quality to have in a team. A good leader must also have a certain level of intellect and a certain set of values and he or she must instill these values in the other members of the organization. A good leader should also have personal conscience, which is required to evaluate and know values.
And lastly, a leader should also have self-determination, which helps the leader in utilizing these values optimally. Like everything else, leadership too has evolved with time. Hence, it is important to constantly find new ways to lead. Learning to lead in a different way is a small revolution in its own way and people have always followed revolutions, be it big or small. The final and the most important piece of advice is to keep on practicing. Like Aristotle once saidExcellence is not an action, it’s a habit.
John Knights, cofounder and chairman of
LeaderShape Ltd, observes the most effective kind of leadership is
transpersonal leadership. John’s professional purpose is to help leaders
develop leadership excellence at the highest level. The word ‘transpersonal’
actually means going beyond the barriers or limitations of egotism and personal
gain. This quality, when clubbed with the quality of leadership, can work
wonders for an individual as well as an organization.
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