Community Is The Answer

Introduction

“The most important thing that we face in the 21st century,” writes William Gaylin, “is a rediscovery of community.” In our fragmented and balkanized world, I think the value and importance of rediscovering community, and the building of community is vitally important. As Parker Palmer notes, “Community doesn’t just create abundance - community is abundance. If we could learn that equation from the world of nature, the human world might be transformed.” And the need for transformation is so powerful and important at this time period. 

I also think one of the current challenges before us is that many people have lost the memory of being a part of a community. They have forgotten what it feels like to be connected by shared interests, location, identity, or goals. They have forgotten what it feels like to have a sense of belonging, mutual support, and collective abundance. 

Now, some of this reflects the massively disrupting impact of a global pandemic that we experienced not too long ago, and, at the same time, the decline in membership of institutional, religious, and civic community groups. But, I believe this problem reflects something much larger than what has taken place in the last five years. This loss reflects an emerging generational problem where individualism is seen as more important than having a sense, and being a part of a community. 

When I reflect on this subject, I am reminded of the research by Brenè Brown in her book, Braving The Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone (Random House, 2017). In it, she shares, “… the research participants described a diminishing sense of shared humanity. Over and over, participants talked about the concern that the only thing that binds us together now is shared fear and disdain, not common humanity, shared trust, respect, or love.” She goes on to state that “we must learn how to trust ourselves and trust others.” I concur with this insight, and call upon us, individually and collectively, to rediscover our common humanity, and our shared trust, respect, and love. But, in order to do this work, we are going to need to repair, rebuild, and reimagine the idea of community. 

We Need To Scale Across In Order To Build Community

In the beginning of this work, I am reminded of the importance of building and maintaining relationships, and a book by Margaret Wheatley and Deborah Frieze called  Walk Out Walk On: A Learning Journey Into Communities Daring to Live the Future Now (Berrett-Koehler, 2011). As they write, “In the context of community change, our work is to foster networks of relationships through which ideas and beliefs can travel, adapt, evolve, and grow. We’re not ignoring scaling up; we’re resisting it because we’ve found that for most communities, it doesn’t work. Scaling across invites communities to learn from one another and solve their own problems in their own particular way.” They then share, “Whatever the problem, community is the answer. There is no power greater than community discovering what it cares about. Only when we turn to one another do we discover the wisdom and wealth that is so abundantly present in us, our traditions and our environment.”

Clearly, based on these insights, building or rebuilding a sense of community is based on connections more than control. It involves discovering what we care about, and how to care for it once we have discovered it. And for this to take place, people need to understand something about becoming a community leader and a community builder.  

We Need to Become A Community Leader

Recognizing the importance of scaling across, Margaret Wheatley points out, “Sane leadership is the unshakable confidence that people can be generous, creative, and kind. The leader’s role is to create the conditions for these qualities to be evoked and utilized to accomplish good work…. other qualities are important, but these three are essential to develop trustworthy relationships free of judgements and biases, and to use everyone’s talents and perspectives in solving problems they care about.” What we often forget in trying to create a sense of abundant community is that leaders create the conditions for people to be generous, creative, and kind at the individual and collective level. They do not create these three essential qualities, but instead foster their growth and utilization. While this is a subtle difference, it also is a significant difference. 

As I learned so long ago, what you feed, grows. Effective leaders grow the conditions for this to take place by building on peoples’ diverse strengths and talents, recognizing when the seeds of community growth have started to sprout, and supporting people and social networks who are moving in the direction of deep and meaningful connections. Again, connections, not control, is the foundation of a healthy community. 

At the same time, these community leaders recognize two things. First, in order to feed the conditions from which community grows, we need to create time and space to share about our individual and collective, life experiences. “We do this by using processes that bring us together to talk to one another, listen to one another's stories, reflect together on what we're learning as we do our work,” writes Wheatley. “We do this by developing relationships of trust, where we do what we say, where we speak truthfully, where we refuse to act from petty self-interest.” By turning to one another, and by being fully present to one another, trust, compassion, and understanding is built.

Second, the best leaders also ask themselves a question suggested by Wheatley: “Am I becoming someone I respect?” Self-reflection is essential to being a community leader and to being a community builder. If we are not willing to reflect on our actions, it is too easy then to just default to judging the actions of others, or to attempt to control the actions of others. The building of trust starts on the inside before it is ever manifested on the outside. 

Charles Feltman describes trust as “choosing to risk making something you value vulnerable to another person’s actions,” and he describes distrust as deciding that “what is important to me is not safe with this person in this situation (or any situation).” The root of that trust is our willingness to do the internal work of figuring out what is important to us, and being willing to trust ourselves as much as to trust others. For it is the combination of co-creating the external conditions for community, plus the internal work of becoming a person of respect that we turn to one another, and discover the wisdom and wealth that is so abundantly present in us, our traditions, and our community.  

The outcome of this convergence is the generation of an adaptive nexus, a term first coined by Dr. Scott Atwood. Here, we create, and experience processes that enables us to be adaptable, and to create adaptive solutions to challenges that call into question fundamental assumptions and beliefs. Over time, this adaptive nexus generates new ways of thinking, perspectives, and solutions. It changes how we relate to ourselves and others by challenging dysfunctional norms and by letting this dysfunctionality be challenged. 

We Need To Recognize Paradigm Blindness

One major problem as we create and engage an adaptive nexus is to recognize that we are encountering, inside ourself and others, paradigm blindness, namely an inability to recognize or accept new or different ideas outside our entrenched unconscious world view. This cognitive barrier creates an unwillingness and inability to accept any challenge to one’s core ways of making sense of the world, and thus causes an inability to create something new. 

As part of this problem of paradigm blindness, we need to discern the difference between perception and paradigm. Perception refers to the ways in which people interpret and make sense of information. Paradigms, on the other hand, are the mental frameworks that we use to organize and interpret that information. When we encounter paradigm blindness, we may need to help people at the perception level and/or the paradigm level. Because, in the end, the mental frameworks that people carry become the story they tell themselves about the information they are receiving. 

Therefore, if we seek to build an abundant and inclusive sense of community, we need to change the story people are telling themselves so that we can change the culture and the systems that support their paradigm blindness. Part of this work is the creation and sharing of new stories, i.e. new mental frameworks, and the resurrection of older stories that have transcended time. All of this takes deep listening, discipline and patience because we are reconnecting, rebuilding, and reimagining the definition of community. In short, we are restoring relationships that have been damaged, and, at the same time period, building new relationships.

We Need To Go On An Inward Migration

Yet, if we are committed to changing paradigm blindness, we have to go on an inward migration, a term coined by Alexis Wright, an aboriginal writer from Australia. As she explains, “When you move into the realm of your own sovereignty of mind by shielding yourself from the kinds of interferences that rob you of the ability to think straight, that sap your spirit, or block you from seeking and making your own judgement, then you are able to govern your own spirit and imagination.” This inward migration begins with a deep and profound level of reflection and contemplation, all focused on what needs to change about us more than what needs to change about those around us, i.e namely our community. 

As part of this work, we need to confront our unconscious defaults and biasses to new ideas and new paradigms. For example, if we truly seek to build a healthy level of community where we live and work, then we can no longer embrace the mythology of rugged individualism. Instead, we need to embrace the abundance found within community. The former is focused on independence and, to a degree, a scarcity mentality, namely there is not enough resources, time, space, etc. for everyone. On the other hand, the later is focused on interdependence and an abundance mentality, i.e. we are stronger working together, and we are better able to generate adaptive solutions to challenging problems. 

For this shift to an inclusive and interdependent sense of self within the context of community, our inward migration has three different levels. First, we must reconnect with our true self. Second, we need to connect with others. And third, we need to connect with the whole of our community.

John Paul Lederach in his book, The Moral Imagination: The Art And Soul Of Building Peace (Oxford University Press, 2005), writes: “How do we transcend the cycles of violence that bewitch our human community while still living in them? …. Transcending violence is forced by the capacity to generate, mobilize, and build moral imagination. The kind of imagination to which I refer is mobilized when four disciplines and capacities are held together and practiced by those who find their way to rise above violence. Stated simply, the moral imagination requires the capacity to imagine ourselves in a web of relationships that includes our enemies; the ability to sustain a paradoxical curiosity that embraces complexity without reliance on dualistic polarity; the fundamental belief in and pursuit of the creative act; and the acceptance of the inherent risk of stepping into the mystery of the unknown that lies beyond the far too familiar landscape of violence.” With the acknowledgment of our interdependency, Lederach explains that “Who we have been, are, and will be emerges and shapes itself in a context of relational interdependency.” In short, we can choose to “… demonstrate a capacity to envision and give birth to that which already exists, a wider set of interdependent relationships.” Then, when we take personal and conscious  responsibility for our choices and acknowledge our shared humanity, we build the internal, and subsequently, the external capacity to create and sustain community. 

We Need to Grieve While We Work For Change

As we move through this inward migration, we will need to “grieve while working for change,” as senior pastor Ottis Moss III notes in his book, Dancing In The Darkness: Spiritual Lessons for Thriving in Turbulent Times (Simon & Schuster, 2023). We need to acknowledge the pain, the loss, and the suffering that has taken place in the past, and that is taking place right now. We also need to acknowledge that grieving is happening at the individual and the collective level. Therefore, it is personal and complex. It also involves sorrow, shock, anger, and distress, all of which leads us to recognizing the importance of living and working within the context of a supportive and loving community. 

Margaret Wheatley understands this perspective when she writes: “Nothing in the universe exists as an isolated or independent entity. Everything takes the form of relationships, be it subatomic particles sharing energy or the ecosystem sharing food. In the web of life, nothing living, lives alone.” The key then is to create and maintain relational spaces where we can remember, share, and re-experience our interdependence in a positive and healthy manner

For at the core of this space, this vital adaptive nexus, is the sharing of our stories, our journeys, and our lessons learned. For me, the best place where this can happen is when we gather together around a campfire, a kitchen table, or a good pot of coffee or tea. Here, in this space where all are equal and all are respected, we can share our stories of challenge, transformation, and loss. Here, we can share our stories of resilience, goodness, and beauty. Here, we can share where we want to go in life, and the purpose behind these choices. Here, we can rediscover our shared humanity, and the foundation of love, respect, and trust upon which it is built. Here, we can give birth to that which does not yet exist, and nurture it for the days, months, and years to come. For it is in this special time and space that we remember and embrace the wisdom shared by John Paul Lederach, namely “You are part of something greater than you, even if it is not visible.”

In our fragmented and balkanized world, we must repair, rebuild, and reimagine the idea of abundant community. We must discover again what we care about, namely the people, wisdom, and love of living in community, and then commit ourselves to create the conditions for it to grow and to be maintained. This will require discipline, patience, and hard work, but, in the end, the journey and the outcome will be worth it. Because, as Wheatley and Frieze pointed out, “Whatever the problem, community is the answer.”

© Geery Howe 2026

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change

The Delusional Hope Of A Troubled Organization

Introduction

“Most often what gets organizations into trouble,” writes Richard Farson in his book Management of the Absurd: Paradoxes In Leadership  (Simon & Schuster, 1996), “are faulty leadership styles, poor internal relationships, and managerial blind spots. The delusional hope of a troubled organization is that it will be saved without having to make changes in these highly personal areas.”

Time and time again, I have seen troubled organizations fail to address issues related to faulty leadership styles, poor internal relationships, and managerial blind spots. Instead, they focus on creating new strategic plans, rolling out a major reorganization, and then doing in-depth system redesign work. However, like a house of cards, it all falls apart, and generates minimal, if any, difference in moving the organization out of it’s troubled pattern of execution. 

I think this happens, because troubled organizations don’t know actually how to deal with these highly personal areas. Instead, they default to past choices, thinking they will generate different outcomes. And yet, truth be told, this is rarely ever the case. Still, all is not lost, if a troubled organization chooses to deal with the three, aforementioned problems.

Dealing With Faulty Leadership Styles

First, from my perspective, faulty leadership styles reflects a faulty understanding of leadership. For many troubled organizations, leadership is defined by being competent in three basic areas: character competency, technical or functional competency related to the job, and positional competency, i.e. the number of years of experience in that position or line of work. Positional competency can also include some level of team competency, i.e. number of years and experience of building and maintaining teams, and customer competency, i.e. knowing how to work with internal partners and external customers. And, for the most part, all of these are critical skills to have when it comes to being a leader. 

However, faulty leadership styles rarely reflect problems in these three areas. Instead, they reflect problems in other areas that are especially important and significant over time. When I have been called in to coach a positional leader who is struggling, I often discover two overlapping problems. The first problem relates to communication, and the second problem relates to building and maintaining relationships, not just teams. 

In the area of communication, the problem is bigger than issues related to speaking and writing. What I have observed is a problem that revolves around poor listening skills in combination with a leader feeling like they always need to add their two cents to every conversation. The result is a form of communication that ends up being nothing more than two intersecting monologues with little, if any level of shared clarity, understanding and perspective. 

In the area of building and maintaining relationships, many leaders think leadership is a call to action. In reality, it is a call to enter into relationships that generate action. Furthermore, the best leaders grasp that it also is more than just an individual relationship. In essence, faulty leadership styles reflects a complete lack of understanding of the social networks within the organization. It also reflects a total lack of clarity that successful execution related to major change efforts requires an individual to grasp that a company is the sum of it’s relationships. And if the relationships are unhealthy, then execution is unhealthy. 

Improving Poor Internal Relationships

Second, poor internal relationships contribute to this problem. When coaching people who struggle in this area, I often discover leaders who know very few people within the organization, and even fewer people who know them. As William Oncken III wrote, “What you know will not get off the ground without active support of who you know.” And the interesting thing is that very few leaders actually engage in an on-going relationship building strategy. Instead, they focus on getting things done, and do not build and/or expand their own network of relationships. 

Herminia Ibarra in her book, Act Like A Leader, Think Like A Leader, (Harvard Business Review Press, 2015), explains that leaders use networks as an essential leadership tool. They help them with “sensing trends and seeing opportunities, building ties to opinion leaders and talent in diverse areas, working collaboratively across boundaries to create more value, avoiding groupthink, generating breakthrough ideas, [and] obtaining career opportunities.” 

Given the importance of networks, Ibarra recommends leaders build and maintain three different kinds of networks, namely operational, personal, and strategic . As she writes, “the first [operational] helps you manage current internal responsibilities, the second [personal] boosts personal development, and the third [strategic] focuses on new business directions and the stakeholders you must get on board to pursue these directions.” She also notes that “your strategic network is made up of relationships that help you to envision the future, sell your ideas, and get the information and resources you need to exploit these ideas….A good strategic network gives you connective advantage: the ability to marshal information, support, or other resources from one of your networks to obtain results in another.” From my perspective, the root cause of poor internal relationships reflects poor network management. 

There is one other factor in poor internal relationships, namely accountability. In the workplace, accountability is about taking ownership of your actions, responsibilities, and results without blaming others. Therefore, many leaders will hold their direct reports accountable for their actions, responsibilities and results. The interesting thing for me is that very few leaders will hold themselves accountable for their own actions, responsibilities, or results. Typically, the ones who are struggling will blame others rather than acknowledge their own role, and even fewer will admit their own mistakes. 

On a parallel track, the best leaders not only hold themselves accountable for their words and our actions, but they also engage in lateral accountability, namely holding their peers accountable for their actions, responsibilities, and results. And as Patrick Lencioni notes in his book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team (Jossey-Bass, 2002), holding one another accountable for delivering against the decisions and plans that the team agreed to is one of the defining characteristics of a team that moves from being a dysfunctional team to a healthy and functional team. In short, it is the combination of personal accountability, vertical accountability, and lateral accountability that makes a major difference when moving from being a troubled organization to a resilient and healthy organization. 

Correcting Managerial Blind Spots

Third, from my perspective, managerial blind spots are common, but can be corrected with timely and on-going coaching. In the beginning, we need to determine what blind spot or spots are taking place. Then, we can come up with a coaching plan. 

There are four common, managerial blind spots. The first is temporal blindness, where an individual sees what is happening today, but does not understand how the past is influencing current choices. The second is relationship blindness, where an individual does not see themselves as being in relationship with others, or understanding the social networks within the company. The third is spatial blindness, where an individual may see parts of a system, but not understand the whole system. The fourth is strategic blindness, where an individual sees part of the company’s strategy, but does not comprehend the whole strategy for the entire company. Connected to this last form of blindness is when an individual does not understand that having a strategy and executing a strategic plan are not the same thing. 

Once a form of blindness have been identified, an experienced coach can help an individual change their perspective over time. Still, as the coach does this work, I am reminded of the wise counsel of Margaret Wheatley who wrote: “People don’t support things that are forced on them. We don’t act responsibly on behalf of plans and programs created without us. We resist being changed, not change itself.” Helping people with managerial blind spots is a co-creative process where an individual moves from being unaware to aware, and ultimately to understanding. This depth of personal change does take time, patience, and support, because we are changing how people think and how they see the world around them. 

Making Room Inside Your Head

“You cannot manage for the long term,” writes former editor of the Harvard Business Review, Thomas A. Stewart, “unless you can make room in your head, and your company's collective head, to think, plan, and execute over a multiyear time span, even while tending to inevitable (and important) distractions.” This is a key perspective when a troubled organizations wants to deal with faulty leadership styles, poor internal relationships, and managerial blind spots. The work to transform these three elements is a multiyear process, and will need to happen even in the midst of inevitable, and important distractions. 

As Jim Collins in his book, How The Mighty Fall and Why Some Companies Never Give In (HarperCollins, 2009), points out: “The signature of the truly great versus the merely successful is not the absence of difficulty, but the ability to come back from setbacks, even cataclysmic catastrophes, stronger than before. Great companies can fall and recover. Great social institutions can fall and recover. And great individuals can fall and recover. As long as you never get entirely knocked out of the game, there remains always hope.” And the hope for troubled organizations is to commit the time and resources to make changes in the three aforementioned areas. Then, they can recover and, in due time, can come back stronger than they were before. 

© Geery Howe 2026

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change

A Way Forward

Introduction

“To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic,” writes historian Howard Zinn. “It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places - and there are many - where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” 

History is vast and complex. And depending on who is telling the story of what happened, and depending on when they start telling the story within the historical timeline of events, our understanding of what took place can vary greatly. Nevertheless, there have been people who behaved magnificently during the course of history, and they have made a big difference. Likewise, we can behaved magnificently, and we can make a big difference, too. 

When I contemplate this big and powerful quote, I am reminded of the work of Tim Brown, the CEO of IDEO, a global design and innovation firm that pioneered human-centered design and design thinking, who said that there are five characteristics of design thinkers, namely empathy, integrative thinking, optimism, experimentalism, and collaboration. For those who want to act magnificently right now, I think embracing these five characteristics is important. 

Embrace Integrative Thinking When Looking At The Big Picture

Today, I want to focus on three of these characteristics. First, we need to embrace integrative thinking. This is a problem-solving approach to complex issues, moving beyond simple “either/or” choices in order to find creative solutions. It involves seeing the whole picture, understanding the interaction of different social networks, and understanding conflicting perspectives within these networks. 

An example of integrative thinking turned into action would be a cancer patient using acupuncture to manage nausea caused by their chemotherapy program. This way of thinking breaks down organizational or mental silos while fostering holistic solutions. It is the “genius of AND” rather than the “tyranny of OR,” as Jim Collins noted so many years ago. 

One element of integrative thinking involves seeing the whole picture. I think this is very hard to do. Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen in their book, Great By Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck - Why Some Thrive Despite Them All (HarperCollins, 2011) write that we are to zoom out before we zoom in. The goal is to sense a change in conditions within which we operate. It is not merely seeing the big picture; it is understanding how the big picture is changing. And if we see that there are changes in the environment around us, we then need to assess the time frame of these changes, i.e. How much time before the risk profile changes? We also need to ask two questions: Do the new conditions call for disrupting plans? If so, how? Then, we are to zoom in, and focus on the execution of plans and objectives.

On the surface, this all sounds pretty straight forward. But, from my perspective, there are two problems. First, this level of work requires people in leadership positions to be hyper-vigilant at all times in order to sense changing conditions, and then to respond effectively. This degree of vigilance comes at a high price, professionally and personally, and it is not sustainable over time. Second, even if we can maintain hyper-vigilance over time, it assumes that we can actually see the changing conditions as they are happening. As prominent author and theologian, Brian McLaren writes: “Seeing may be easy, but learning to see with clarity and insight is not. It takes time and practice.” And from my perspective, seeing with clarity and insight takes time, practice, and discipline. 

Nevertheless, I think there is a solution to these two challenges. First, we need time and space in our schedules where we can meet with allies, confidants, coaches, and mentors, who will ask us questions as well as share insights about what they are seeing and learning. Rather than defining hyper-vigilance as a solo practice, it needs to become a collective endeavor with a multitude of people keeping their eyes and ears open to changes taking place. Then, the burden of seeing the big picture is more widely owned and understood by the people who have to ask the aforementioned questions related to a change in risk profiles and time. 

Second, we need to dig deeper into the writings of Collins and Hansen about this concept of zooming out before zooming in. As they explain, leaders “understand that they cannot reliably and consistently predict future events, so they prepare obsessively - ahead of time, all the time - for what they cannot possibly predict. They assume that a series of bad events can wallop them in quick succession, unexpectedly and at any time…. It’s what you do before the storm hits - the decisions and disciplines and buffers and shock absorbers already in place - that matters most in determining whether your enterprise pulls ahead, falls behind or dies when the storm hits.” 

I think the point that many people miss about seeing the big picture is that the parallel track to this level of work is to be obsessively preparing for the unpredictable, i.e. the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns which are often called “black swan events” (think COVID). This combination of systemic, and collective vigilance rather than individual vigilance in combination with systematic, and collective preparation creates the capacity to find holistic solutions instead of either/or solutions. And all of this takes disciplined thought, reflection, and listening before engaging in disciplined action. 

Utilize Experimentalism When Confronting Complexity

Second, in order to act magnificently right now, we need to utilize experimentalism when confronting complexity. Experimentalism is a method of solving problems through experimentation, experience, and empirical evidence. It emphasizes learning by doing, testing ideas in real-world contexts, and adapting these ideas based on experience and observed outcomes, rather than just theories. 

One of the problems within our current operating environment is that the problems we are trying to solve keep evolving faster than the solutions to them can be created. Therefore, we need to do two things. First, we need to define our solutions as experiments, recognizing that no singular solution may be possible given the dynamic nature of our current problems. Second, the current problems we are dealing with have multiple issues, not just singular issues that are making them evolve quickly. 

Now, the difficulty of solving such adaptive problems is that we, as leaders, assume our solutions have a degree of permanency. However, current events does not support this conclusion. Thus, permanency is found in the processes that will create the solution, not within the solution itself. 

And this is where the experimentalism approach to problem solving enters the picture.   Through experimentation, i.e. testing ideas in real-world contexts, and then adapting these ideas based on experience and observed outcomes, we create adaptable solutions to adaptive problems. When the space where this happens, the union of integrative thinking and experimentalism, is created, the process creates relationships based on trust, clarity, and understanding, all of which generates the capacity to see, define, and solve problems. 

Commit to Love, Compassion, and Empathy

Third, in order to act magnificently right now, we need to commit to love, compassion, and empathy. “When our prime motive is love, a different logic comes into play,” writes Brian McLaren. “We find courage and confidence, not in the likelihood of a good outcome, but in our commitment to love. Love may or may not provide a way through to a solution to our predicament, but it will provide a way forward in our predicament, one step into the unknown at a time. Sustained by this fierce love (as my friend [pastor] Jacqui Lewis calls it), we may persevere long enough that, to our surprise, a new way may appear where there had been no way. At that point, we will have reasons for hope again. But even if hope never returns, we will live by love through our final breath. To put it differently, even if we lose hope for a good outcome, we need not lose hope of being good people, as we are able: courageous, wise, kind, loving, ‘in defiance of all that is bad around us’.” 

The interesting thing about leaders is that very few of them choose love, compassion, and empathy as mission critical characteristics of being an effective leader. Most would choose charisma, control, and micromanagement. For them, this is the pathway to getting results. 

However, I have spent a career engaging with leaders, and from this experience, I have learned from the best that love, compassion, and empathy defines how they lead, not just what they do. For them, these three characteristics are not a way through their problems and their people, but instead a way to move forward with their problems and their people. By being good leaders who role model love, compassion and empathy, they are able to then be kind, courageous, and wise in the midst of their problems and challenges. And their direct reports notice this difference and respond with trust, commitment, and focus. 

Recognize That Differences Maximize Understanding

“Complex issues demand difference to find solutions,” writes consultant and organizational theorist, Margaret Wheatley. “Complex problems (what’s not complex these days?) require multiple perspectives. Complexity only comes into focus from many unique perceptions. To understand an issue, crisis, or complex problem, difference maximizes understanding. No single person, expert, or group sees sufficiently. We each see the world differently - real solutions emerge when we honor this fact.” 

And if we are to act magnificently, we need multiple perspectives and adequate time and space to think, share, and explore these different perspectives in order to generate real solutions. Along the way, we need to embrace integrative thinking, utilize experimentalism, and commit to love, compassion, and empathy as we engage with others in this important work. For if we seek to send this “spinning top of a world in a different direction,” then we need to live into these infinite succession of present moments with courage and kindness. In essence, we need to be good people who move forward step by step through the complexity of current events. 

© Geery Howe 2026

Geery Howe, M.A. Executive Coach in Leadership, Strategic Planning, and Organizational Change