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    The Conscious Lifestyle: The Soulof Leadership

    Deepak Chopra MD (official)December 27, 2012

    In almost every situation someone is called upon to lead.Taking up the call involves a conscious choice, and yet formany leaders, even those who are very experienced, notmuch consciousness is applied. If you ask a roomful of CEOshow they got where they are today -I've done this dozens oftimes when teaching a course on leadership for businesspeople - the top answer is always "I was lucky." Looking back,CEOs and other top executives mainly recognize that theywound up in the right place at the right time.

    There are courses in leadership everywhere, and most ofthem, so far as I can tell, use case studies. The performanceof successful leaders is analyzed, with comparisons to lesssuccessful leaders. These courses no doubt produce a set ofskills, but the tendency is for these skills to be technical andmanagerial - human skills are far harder to teach and pass on.

    Yet they are the key to persuading other people to follow you.

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    I've taken a different tack, arguing thatleadershipis all aboutconsciousness. It has to be, since the response that a greatleader inspires (loyalty, respect, emulation, love) is life-changing. Such responses are not evoked by well-trained

    managers. Skills can be developed in consciousness. Thisisn't a mystical area, although we must go beyond practicalpsychology. A successful leader isn't a psychologicalmanipulator, power grabber, bully, or public relations hack.Success, as it is practiced consciously, brings a better life,inner and outer, to both the leader and the group he leads.

    We'll focus on seven skills that fit a conscious leader,

    organized into the acronymsLEADERS. Below is a thumbnailsketch of these skills, which will be discussed one by one inthe next seven posts.

    L = Look and listen. Do this with your senses, being anunbiased observer who has not judged anything in advance.Do this with your heart, obeying your truest feelings. Finally,do this with your soul, responding with vision and deeppurpose.

    E = Emotional bonding. Leading from the soul means goingbeyond melodrama and crisis mode, getting rid of emotionaltoxicity to understand the specific needs of your followers.

    A =Awareness. This means being aware of the followingquestions that underlie every challenge: Who am I? What do Iwant? What does the situation demand?A leader must askthese questions of himself and inspire his team to ask forthemselves.

    D = Doing. A leader must be action-oriented. In whatever hedoes he must serve as a role model, held responsible for thepromises he has made. This requires persistence but also theability to view any situation with flexibility and humor.

    E = Empowerment. The souls power comes from self-

    awareness, which is responsive to feedback but independentof the good or bad opinion of others. Empowerment isnt

    http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/execed/Programs/SOUL.aspxhttp://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/execed/Programs/SOUL.aspxhttp://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/execed/Programs/SOUL.aspxhttp://www.amazon.com/Soul-Leadership-Unlocking-Potential-Greatness/dp/030740806X/deepakchcom07-20http://www.amazon.com/Soul-Leadership-Unlocking-Potential-Greatness/dp/030740806X/deepakchcom07-20http://www.amazon.com/Soul-Leadership-Unlocking-Potential-Greatness/dp/030740806X/deepakchcom07-20http://www.amazon.com/Soul-Leadership-Unlocking-Potential-Greatness/dp/030740806X/deepakchcom07-20http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/execed/Programs/SOUL.aspx
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    selfish. It raises the status of leader and follower together.

    R = Responsibility. This means showing initiative, takingmature risks rather than reckless ones, walking the talk,

    having integrity, and living up to your inner values. Seen fromthe level of the soul, a leaders greatest responsibility is tolead the group on the path of higher consciousness.

    S = Synchronicity. This is a mysterious ingredient from theunconscious that all great leaders harness. Synchronicity isthe ability to create good luck and find invisible support thatcarries a leader beyond predicted outcomes to a higher plane.In spiritual terms, synchronicity is the ultimate ability to

    connect any need with an answer from the soul.

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    The Conscious Lifestyle: A LeaderMust Look and Listen

    Deepak Chopra MD (official)January 02, 2013

    In the first post of this series on leadership, I divided the topicinto seven headings using the acronym L-E-A-D-E-R-S. In thispost we'll discuss L = Look and Listen. In the past, whenleaders were more authoritarian, the people who wereexpected to listen - and obey - were the followers. Leadershad a monopoly on giving orders, laying down plans, and

    making all the crucial decisions.

    To some extent this imbalance is built into the system. Butleadership has shifted dramatically, because leaders and

    followers create each other. Followers have needs that

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    leaders fulfill. "Look and listen" comes first in the list of skillsneeded by a successful leader, since only by looking andlistening can he keep with an ever-shifting situation.

    The greatest leaders are visionaries, but no vision is createdin a vacuum. It emerges from the situation at hand. Thesituation can be a crisis or a routine project, a managementproblem or a financial emergency anything that requires aleader to offer guidance. The leader is someone who canassess the situation by looking and listening at the deepestlevel possible.

    When you are a conscious leader, you look and listen to the

    situation around you, but you also look and listen inside. Foursteps are involved:

    Impartial observation Look and listen with your senses

    Analysis Look and listen with your mind

    Feeling Look and listen with your heart

    Incubation Look and listen with your soul

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    As a potential leader, you must develop your awareness on allfour levels long before you win your right to lead. Imagine

    three people, partners in a start-up company, seated on acouch in an outer office. The office belongs to a venturecapitalist who has agreed to give them half an hour to presenta proposal for a start-up company. Success or failure dependsupon this meeting; their whole future might ride on it. Whoamong the three will emerge as the leader of the group, theone with the best chance of persuading the venture capitalist?

    The first person feels so nervous his palms are sweaty. He

    tries to make casual conversation but realizes that hesbabbling, so he grows quiet. He closes his eyes, repeatingone last time the speech he is going to make. He got very littlesleep the night before, because he spent hours perfectingevery word of his speech. He keeps thinking one thing: Nowor never. Its do or die.

    The second person looks much calmer. Hes quite confident,in fact. He believes in their idea; hes certain their new

    business will succeed once they find a backer. Tall and clear-

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    eyed, hes used to being looked up to. In the back of his mind,he wonders if he can talk the venture capitalist into going outfor a round of golf or a pickup basketball game. One-on-onehas always been his best mode of persuasion.

    The third person is scanning the room with open curiosity. Shenotices the rich Oriental rug and fresh flowers on the receptiondesk, but shes more interested in the employees going in andout of the venture capitalists inner office. Theyre dressed in

    jeans and shirt, not suits. They come out looking morefocused and intent than when they went in, but they dont lookstressed. Their talk is excited; they seem to be discussingthings with real focus. Checking inside, the third person feelsexpectant but not stressed. Whatever happens, shes open tothe outcome. She can be one of those excited people shesees emerging from the office. Once she sets eyes on theventure capitalist, shell know what kind of personality shesdealing with.

    Of these three people, the first one isnt perceiving anythingoutside his own mood, which is tense and closed off. Hes not

    responding to his environment. With his eyes he may noticethe expensive room with its trappings of success, but eventhat registers very little. The second man is more comfortableand is beginning to see from the heart. He assesses peopleand situations by how they feel. The third person goes a stepfarther, however. She is entirely open to her surroundings andkeeps picking up clues wherever she can find them. Fromthese clues, which involve looking and listening, she begins tobuild a scenario. She can envision herself in the scenario, and

    as it unfolds, she will adapt. If it turns out that she doesnt fitin, she wont make the mistake of taking the venturecapitalists money the compatibility isnt there.

    An everyday situation, yet you can see that the potentialleader is the one who can look and listen from the deepestlevel. Leadership requires a sound basis inside yourself. If youcan arrive at the point where looking and listening comes fromyour entire being, you are likely to be the leader in any

    situation, because you have set the groundwork even before

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    you had the first follower.

    (To be cont.)

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    The Conscious Lifestyle: A LeaderMust Look and Listen and Know

    How to Resolve Conflicts (Part 2)Deepak Chopra MD (official)January 10, 2013

    If you examine the rise of a typical leader, the ability to lookand listen decreases as power increases. That's a trend youneed to be aware of. At the outset, a future leader often risesout of a group to present a grievance or to offer a new idea or

    way of doing things. Hands-on experience motivates him (orher), and the group supports his efforts because theyrecognize a need to be fulfilled.

    But leaders at the top are often enmeshed in corporate politicsand insulated by immediate aides. The notorious White House

    bubble that isolates presidents also encloses any leader wholives inside a small circle. Here are some pointers about

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    looking and listening all the way up the ladder.

    1. Keep your feedback loop large. Leaders and followers co-create each other. There is constant input and output. If you

    get input only from your closest circle, you won't be in touchwith the whole picture.

    2. Stay flexible. It's not hard to detect when a leader wants tohear only praise and support for his own ideas. Be flexibleenough to allow your core beliefs to be challenged.

    3. Welcome criticism and know our opposition. Leaders whorise high often feel insecure about their position. They are

    prominent targets for jealousy and attack. So start early on toembrace other points of view, accommodating them when youcan and at the very least listening to them and taking themseriously.

    4. Be good at giving feedback. No matter what face they puton it, people notice praise and blame. No one is indifferent.Make sure your feedback doesn't demean anyone, and if youare in doubt about hurt feelings, see the person privately. "Arewe okay?" isn't enough. Look and listen to their personalreactions.

    5. Don't claim a monopoly on the truth. Keep in mind that youdo not see the whole picture. This will instill a desire to hearas many perspectives as possible.

    6. In any meeting, never lose sight of the central question,"What do these people need?" Never leave the room feelingconfused about this. Behind every discussion, somebodyneeds something.

    7. Know the difference between what somebody needs andwhat they want. We all want more of anything that is available.But most of the time, what we need isn't clear. Ego andemotions stand in the way.

    This is such an important point that it deserves beingexpanded. In relation to a leader, a group of people has

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    individual and collective needs. They tend to overlap, and yeta successful leader tends to both. Sometimes you have toreach down to one person to provide a specific need (e.g.,President Lyndon Johnson hated baseball, but he went to

    every game with a prominent Southern senator because thesenator, who chaired a key committee, was a devotedbaseball fan).

    Most of the time, however, what counts the most is being ableto analyze a groups need.

    1. All groups respond to hope. They need to be told thattomorrow will be better.

    2. All groups need to be inspired about what they are doing.This is different from offer external motivations like money andraises. Feeling worthy is far more important.

    3. All groups need to know that their leader is loyal andsupportive. If a leader is just passing through on his way upthe ladder, the group responds accordingly. The best leaderstake their cohorts with them as they rise to the top.

    4. Insecure groups need to be reassured that they are safe.Any threat such as layoffs, salary cuts, losing market share,being bought out, etc. must be addressed. The solution thatcomes out of the discussion should benefit everyone in thegroup if possible (as when companies hard hit by therecession lay off no one but instead provide part-time work toeveryone).

    5. Groups that are doing well competitively need greaterchallenges. Their motivation is to keep proving themselves.

    6. Creative groups need new, innovative ideas. Here theleader functions as a sounding board for any and allsuggestions. Suppressing the creativity of any member sendsa signal that creativity isn't valued for its own sake. Such anattitude quickly kills the spirit of innovation.

    7. All groups need morale. You need to be open and honest

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    about any person or behavior - including our own - that ishurting morale.

    As you can see, the so-called born leader isn't what a group

    needs. They need a leader who presides over a healthy,open, expansive feedback loop.

    (To be cont.)

    Deepak Chopra, MD is the author of more than 70 books withtwenty-one New York Times bestsellers. FINS - Wall StreetJournal, stated that The Soul of Leadership, as one of fivebest business books to read for your career. Co-author withRudolph E. Tanzi, their latest New York Times bestseller,Super Brain: Unleashing The Explosive Power of Your Mind toMaximize Health, Happiness, and Spiritual Well-being(Harmony, November 6, 2012) is a new PBS special.

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