Mindful Leadership

By Michelle Maldonado, guest contributor

With the groundbreaking work of researchers such as Brené Brown and others, we have learned much about the power of empathy at work, at home, and in life as fuel for us to heal, connect, set healthy boundaries, and create psychological safety.

While empathy is a critical element needed to transform leaders and organizations, it (along with sympathy) form the foundation for us to take wise action. Empathy is the building block to develop compassion, thro…

By John Davisi, guest contributor

As a life and mindfulness coach and HR leader who also happens to be gay, the subject of unconscious bias is part of my everyday experience. I believe that my ability to lead others is contingent upon my ability to lead myself, and I can’t do that unless I have awareness of my thoughts and emotions. So the continuous journey to be aware of my own unconscious bias is incredibly important to me.

Here’s the thing: we all have unconscious bias. Every single one of us.…

By Kristin Neff, guest contributor

What keeps us from being kinder to ourselves?

Most people don’t have any problem with seeing compassion as a thoroughly commendable quality. It seems to refer to an amalgam of unquestionably good qualities: kindness, mercy, tenderness, benevolence, understanding, empathy, sympathy, and fellow-feeling, along with an impulse to help other living creatures, human or animal, in distress. But we seem less sure about self-compassion. For many, it carries the whif…

By Michael Bunting, guest contributor

What character trait is most valued in leaders?

To find the answer to this question, leadership experts Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner surveyed well over 100,000 people to ask which personal traits, characteristics, and attributes they looked for and admired in leaders. Their findings have relevance to every leader today.

At the top of the list by a long shot (89 per cent) is honesty. More than anything else, people want honesty from their leaders. But de…

By Wendy Quan, guest contributor

In the corporate world, many of us struggle with the relentless changes that happen at work that often disrupt our lives and increase our stress.

The responsibility of helping people through change, or ‘change management,’ tends to fall upon leaders, change managers, project managers or human resources. However, generally whatever little time there is to perform change management is usually spent delivering communications and maybe the occasional employee surv…

By Elisha Goldstein, guest contributor

Imagine being able to show up at work feeling more self-confidence and less worry. What impact would that have on your energy level and what you can achieve that day? As humans, we will always struggle with worry and fear. But when we allow them to take control of our thoughts, actions and consequences follow. We might find ourselves procrastinating more often, being less creative, taking fewer risks—all of which affects our level of growth and success.

W…

By Gayle Van Gils, guest contributor

There’s a common expression: We know it when we see it. But in actuality, we know it when we feel it. The person in front of you is radiating energy, excitement, and enthusiasm, and at the same time is calm, grounded, and self-possessed. The confident individual is magnetic to us. We want to get to know her, and may be curious about what she does and how she became that way.

Unconditional confidence is distinguishable from feigned confidence or arrogance. …

By Mo Edjlali, Mindful Leader President and Chief Community Organizer

The billionaire Ray Dalio founded Bridgewater Associates, the largest hedge-fund, in 1975. His net worth is $18.4 billion.  In 2017 tweeted:  “Transcendental Meditation has probably been the single most important reason for whatever success I’ve had...”. 

On May 7th, Dalio hosted a candid Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything), during which people on Reddit could ask him any questions they’d like. He began the Q&A by posting: “I’m Ray…

By Richard Miller, PhD, guest contributor

We experience ourselves and the world around us through our body, as every inner and outer perception that we experience is registered within as sensation. It is our ability to be aware of and respond to our internal somatic sensations, as messengers, that enables us to successfully navigate the ins and outs of everyday life and relationships, and embody our fullest potential to be an integrated, self-regulated, individuated, and fully awake human being.

I…

By Cara Bradley, Host of Embodiment @ Work Summit 2019, guest contributor

“The holy grail of today’s workplace is high employee engagement.” - Harvard Business Review, February 16, 2017

Top leaders know that high engagement leads to high performance. Engaged employees are happier and work harder on the job. Low engagement, on the other hand, cost US companies a cool $550 billion in lost revenue per year.

So how do you make your people more engaged? Well we all know telling them to be more en…