Leadership Formation

On Sustainable Organizational Energy

By Daniel Pryfogle

"Using the Energy of the Room": That was the title of a workshop I led earlier this month in Grand Rapids, Mich., for CHHSM's annual meeting. Under the conference theme of sustainability, I claimed that incredible, sustainable resources are always right in front of us, available in any meeting, in any team, in any situation. This is the energy of the people in the room: their experiences, their wisdom, their passions. But strangely, leaders ignore this great resource. Why? I see two reasons.

First, leaders generally regard the people in the room as objects to be acted upon. People must be persuaded. Someone has to light a fire under them. They must be motivated to do things they really don't want to do. To use a gentler yet euphemistic expression, people must be "empowered." So, in this way of thinking, people are powerless until the leader turns them on. Yet even then the power they come into is not their own; it is what the leader has bestowed on them through inspiration or charisma. If I lack charisma as a leader, I won't even try to light a fire under others. Now the people in the room are even more objectified. I just want to get around them - these walls, these obstructions, these sticks in the mud.

Here's the second reason why leaders ignore the energy in the room: the answers always lie outside the room. When leaders are taught that the people in the room are objects, or problems to be solved, leaders naturally look elsewhere for solutions. And everyone in the room seems to sign up for this approach. That's why the management section at Barnes & Noble is bursting. That's why people pay big fees for conferences. That's why there's so much talk about "best practices" and "models." These are the good ideas that are outside the room, and they act like magnets: they keep pulling us past each other.

Going outside the room is not a sustainable approach. Sure, we might be impressed with solutions circulating out there. And we might get a little buzz off an idea that's not our own. But because it's not our own, because the thinking does not spring from our own minds, because the passion does not come from our own hearts - because fundamentally we have ignored our selves - whatever energy is manufactured in the moment won't last. We know this is true. Our trying harder to move people or looking even farther afield for answers just underscores the point: There is no sustainable energy outside the room.

Given this situation, the most revolutionary thing leaders can do is ask the question "What's already here?" That's an appreciative question, which means it assumes value in those to whom the question is asked. When leaders return to the room, and when they see those present as powerful partners, the possibilities of sustainable energy are limitless.

Daniel Pryfogle is CHHSM's director of leadership formation. To learn about CHHSM's leadership offerings, including consulting services, contact Daniel at 919-460-7069 or pryfogled@chhsm.org.