Towards Leadership #2

Welcome to Towards Leadership from Leadership Letters For me, an effective, curious, compassionate, decisive, resilient and successful leader is able to serve the needs of their organisation, their community, themselves and indeed the wider world in a way that is about thriving and about sustainability in both the individual energy sense, and a global sense. It is leaders that are equipped to go towards anything and everything their world of work presents to them with that will contribute to better, happier, sustainable and empowered workplaces and it’s our mission to help you do that. We promised you more on ADHD at the end of last month. In our most recent Leadership Letter, Katie Friedman wrote to the leader she was before she was aware of her ADHD, and the leader she is now post diagnosis. It’s a letter that offers layers and layers of experience, insight and food for thought for all of us listening. In this episode of Towards Leadership I reflect on my own experiences of preparing for Katie’s episode in which I catch myself being less inclusive than I would hope to be, share some of my own experiences of ADHD and offer an exercise I, and clients, have found useful time and again as a way of reflecting on conversations, and noticing what we could be doing differently when it comes to meeting needs, including our own. “I had been a leader who unconsciously saw need as negative because I didn't understand my own.” I also share some of my own recent lived experience of ADHD as an insight for leaders around the moment when someone discloses something about themselves, and share an exercise that is useful for reflecting on any aspect of conversation, including our levels of inclusiveness. You can find the corresponding blog post here. In our resources section I reflect on the distinction between ‘the truth’ and ‘a truth’ when talking about ADHD and share a great TED talk offering insight and questions reflection on the intersection of ADHD with other characteristics. RECOMMENDATION LINKS: The Talk Yes, Black women have ADHD too and need your attention! by Abigail Agyei The Post Kelly Morris’ response post on LinkedIn (Make sure you’re signed in to your LinkedIn account to view this post.)