A pause to reflect on Community Leadership. It's so easy to get this right!

I’ve been in and around the community “theme” many times in my career. It just seemed natural to hear from peers, learn some things, sometimes share some things and create something “more than”. To aim to have a “more than” positive impact in the world. In the 90's the tech world was huge, and expanding rapidly. By 2023 I think it's the whole world that is huge and expanding even more rapidly.

I read a few books along the way, as I do. Cultivating Communities of Practice is a good one imho - but happy to learn more suggestions in the Comments below so please share if you have any other recommended books, sites, videos and podcasts!

A thing that began and then started to bother me greatly was how quickly these fantastic groups could just stop, disappear, and be gone without a trace.

Thanks to Cultivating Communities of Practice, I realised that there are different kinds of communities for different kinds of needs and purposes. And they have different lifecycles too. 

“community” is a word with many different interpretations and implementations! I had to develop my own comfort with the fact that some communities are going to be temporal. Once the members’ needs have been met, or their needs change, there is no reason to unify the group. It disbands. It’s natural. And sometimes, it’s natural to have only one event - and then the crowd moves on! Like "one hit wonder" pop stars. People are fickle. It's normal.

But there are some communities where new ideas are being discovered, new knowledge is being created, curated, diseminated, improved, and more. Members support each other uniquely. New members keep joining. Old members leave and sometimes return. This kind of community is like an organic creature that grows and shrinks and morphs from one shape to another fluidly. Constantly reorganising based on current members. While the founder remains. And then one day the founder is not there and the community implodes and is gone without a trace. Sometimes reunions are organised but the spirit is not the same. I wanted to make that different if I could.

I began to wonder what it is about church choir groups, charity volunteers who turn out to support no matter the conditions, concert first aiders who have to train a lot and then work for free in their own time, soup kitchens whose exhausted volunteers turn up after working full days and then work a full night. And many more other volunteer led communities. I listened to their stories and pondered.

For a few years, I paused on going around proclaiming “You need a/an agile / product / lean / leadership / improvement / innovation / etc Community of Practice or Interest or Champions or Advocates!” It just seemed a heck of an investment in time and hope forming these groups, sorting out all the logistics, lining up external and internal speakers, implementing websites, newsgroups, email lists, having Plan B’s, and much more. Then, as soon as the wind direction changed, it was like amnesia and these communities and artefacts simply seemed to disappear without a trace. The leaders often left the organisation and were properly recognised in their next organisation. And the people who remained ... did not seem to notice that they were missing something. Group dynamics / systems forces are amazing, and scary (The Stanford University Prisoners and Guards Experiment) too.

So instead of trying to get new communities started, or trying to improve existing communities, or just being a community member, I switched to studying communities and volunteers, listening to people and their stories, and learning anything I could that might help professional communities to thrive once the founder(s) moved away.

Deep democracy, radical inclusion, sociocracy, holocracy, teal organisation, stewardship and other names are frameworks, principles and practices that try to help people within large organisations interact with each other really effectively, maturely and safely. See https://sociocracy30.org/common-sense-framework/ to get started on discussions. BUT read Ricardo Semler’s inspiring stories first: Maverick,  The Seven Day Weekend and Radical. You CAN run a successful global company with almost no rules and some other really interesting points - just watch his TED talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/ricardo_semler_how_to_run_a_company_with_almost_no_rules.

A few years ago, I found myself unintentionally leading a community within a large global organisation. I realised I needed to transfer leadership back to the company's own people. I knew that probably the founder and the community would make the obvious choice and elect the founder to lead them as he had been doing before I showed up. But I foresaw that the community could grow and morph much more dynamically than it was doing under my leadership or under his - that this group to do more if I could just somehow enable it with more self-organisation, more psychological safety, more ... something!!

I forced myself to try a few novelties to see if they would create a more positive future for the community. They did!! A few small changes totally within our power, caused many things to happen beyond my highest hopes! 

I transferred my leading to the founder, and I observed three more successful successions, as the community made it work. In fact, the founder was only there for his own handover, we did not see him again much after that. Happily I’ve heard they’re still succeeding! Every leader is bringing few energy, new ideas and re-invigorated ideas back to life within their term. A key thing for me, because of all the change going on, is how much support they ask for, and give each other. With total trust.

This is the short list of things that made this work:

1. The community agreed that its leadership should be a burden. It should be a good experience for the leader and the community. 
2. To ensure it would never become too burdensome, the community agreed to limit the term to shorter than one year, to give extra opportunities for more people to practice being a leader in a safe context. And that the previous leader would ensure a smooth transition and mentor as required, but not lead.
3. The consensus formed that a term should be 12 weeks. Essentially 6x1 hour community meetings.
4. I never like single points of failure, and after a mis-step with a primary-deputy pattern (essentially the primary bossed the deputy around like a personal assistant), we settled into a co-leader / pair pattern which was much better.
5. On the sixth meeting, they follow these steps:
1. Everyone has the right of Veto. Preferably with a reason, but not mandatory.
2. Nominations. Members can nominate themselves. All nominations must have a business justification / why. Every member is asked to nominate two people, but they can opt out if they don’t want to.
3. After all nominations are in, the community reviews all of them
4. Check - do any of the nominated candidates, now they can see the full picture, wish to withdraw?
5. Then, starting with the least number of “votes” person, we hear from that person why they would be a good candidate to lead. One-by-one the people in the candidate pool state their perspective
6. Check again - do any of the candidates wish to withdraw at this point?
7. If there are still more than two candidates, the members are asked if there are any objections to any of the candidates - for instance - does anyone know something about a candidate’s availability in the coming three months that may hamper the candidate / stress the candidate if they were to be leading at the same time. Like a three week holiday, or a course, or project milestone date.
8. If there are still more than two candidates, the candidates are again checked, based on all the information now available to everyone, does anyone want to withdraw
9. It only happened once while I was there, but even at this stage there may still be more than two candidates. The three candidates then discussed among themselves and made a decision.
10. Then the two new leaders step forward, and take their new roles, thank the previous leaders, thank the community for the trust they have received, etc. It’s quite an emotional moment, really. How often do you get elected, with full support, from a group of people who you care about somewhat, and who somewhat care about you?

It really was this simple. What I did not know, as the books never mentioned, but Ricardo’s works did… treating people with respect, giving them trust, having adult to adult conversations no matter what the pressures and the “norms” are, really grow strength of character. And that in turn grows the strength of the community.

I could write pages about what those folks did whilst I was there, but I think the most profound moment for me, and for the community, was when senior management had heard so many good things about it from their directs attending, that a manager was told or volunteered to join the community as a silent observer. And basically report back. 

The community discussed, and rejected the idea as they believed unanimously that such a change would destroy their incredibly safe space. It would break the boundary and thus destroy the psychological safety that had evolved and they believed they needed to perform their roles increasingly bigger and better. The young 22 year old leader at the time, reluctant to take the role when nominated but had felt duty-bound to do so after receiving overwhelming support, stood up for her community, had a frank respectful conversation with a senior manager 30 years older, much more senior and experienced, and successfully defended the boundary, protected her community. Life changing for both the two people in that conversation, and for the senior managers, and for the community members. Much more was / is possible than they had previously believed.

I will be delighted to hear your experiences, and thoughts, in the Comment box below. And even more delighted if you try some of these ideas in your own space! Maybe even write your own blog post about it!

A pause to reflect on Psychological Safety. It is not safe just because someone says or we say or wrote so!

This is some of what I've learned about psychological safety from a few different expert sources over the years, and mixing in some of my own experiences and my coachees' experiences.

We’re terrible at having our best and most creative ideas (Note: plural!) when lions jump out of a bush unexpectedly and want to eat us. Situations of perceived high stress trigger us to our survival instincts. 

The most commonly known model of what happens to us when we're in a stressful situation is the Fight-Flight response. Over the years of research, this theory and model have evolved to include additional instinctual possibilities such as Freeze and Surrender. We’ll likely see more versions of this as the incredibly young school of “psychology” continues to expand our knowledge of how we are the way we are, and why, and how we can change. Peter Levine's "Waking The Tiger" was and still is one of the most influential books, based on research, in this area.

Every perceived (we don’t notice everything!) change in our environment, causes a physiological response within us, beyond the control of our mind. This instinctual response is critical to our survival - it operates subconsciously (ie, under the level of our awareness, like digestion). We receive a little or a lot of several biochemicals that are very helpful in bad situations, and frequently over-the-top (OTT) in not-so-bad situations. 

Biochemicals such as: 

- adrenaline (a stimulant to make us quicker and have more stamina; unfortunately also addictive);

- testosterone (an aggressiveness enhancer); 

- cortisol (an incredibly effective painkiller, which you’d want a lot of if a lion was actually eating you alive, but not if you’re in dancing in a debate with someone you care about - not a fight to the death)

The quantity of the biochemical “hit” varies between tiny and huge. Think about the last time something happened to you and you were suddenly hot, sweaty, and shaking, with your heart pounding away - that’s huge! What happens to you when you nearly knock over a glass of milk? Or when a noisy lorry goes past your house while you’re eating dinner with your family? Heavy rain catches you outside unexpectedly several seconds away from nearest shelter?

Relative Quantity of Biochemical Response to Perceived Changes

Changes that are …	Expected	Unexpected
Desired	tiny response (“Yay!”)	medium response (“Wow!”)
Undesired	big response (“Darn!”)	huge response (“$£%$£!”)

Just through ordinary everyday living, we are continuously receiving response “hits” that we’re usually unaware of. The effects accumulate as the volume of the biochemicals increases with each “hit”. 

There is another model of “Top 10 Life Stressors”, which by this time after more research and studies, resembles more like a “Top More Than 10 Life Stressors”. Any of these are usually a “high tide” level for the individual - and unfortunately we can experience more than one at the same time. When there's more than one "in play" those effects and experiences are more akin to “spring high tide” or … “tsunami” / “freak wave” type stress peaks. This grim list includes:

1. Death of child
2. Death of spouse
3. Death of parent
4. Death of close friend, relative or family friend
5. Divorce
6. Being fired
7. Redundancy
8. Bankruptcy
9. Emigrating
10. Moving house
11. Getting married
12. Having a baby
13. Starting a new job
14. Terminal illness
15. Close person diagnosed with terminal illness

… and this list changes from time to time. Personally strange things happen to me when I am filling in my tax forms, or emigration forms, landing in a foreign country and having my luggage not appear on the conveyor in a timely manner. I think it’s a totally subjective experience - what stresses me does not stress everyone else around, and vice-versa. 

With experience your own personal list moves around a bit. For example, a “first time” redundancy is a lot worse, I’ve heard, than a “second time” or “tenth time”. We’re all different, and it’s good to know yourself in this area and know what to look out for. Because, sadly, difficult changes, undesired changes, are going to happen to you, and those around you too. Awareness, simply, really is 9/10's of the solution.

Sometimes, when our body’s systems get around to actually processing these biochemicals out of our bodies, we may wake up at night for no reason at all that we can identify. “Everything is normal, I don’t know why I can’t sleep”. (btw, if this sounds familiar, search for and practice “Box Breathing” every day, several times during the day - it only takes a few minutes and you can do it while doing other things)

The more of these biochemicals we have in our bodies, the more likely and quickly we will trigger all the way into a Fight-Flight-Freeze-Surrender response SUBCONSCIOUSLY. Subconsciously means that we are not aware of the change - that we are suddenly in an altered state. From our inner inside experience, in our own minds/heads, everything seems normal, until afterwards, when we reflect or when we keep remembering but do not know why we keep remembering the scene. Which we may be numb about when we recall. Or we get feedback from someone, or some people, that we just cannot understand. It makes no sense. Maybe even we dismiss it as "pure nonsense" - because from our experience and our perspective it is non-sensical. But, from others' who observed, it was real.

For example, these states can feel/notice that you think/you say/you behave like (and there are many many more!): 

1. FIGHT: “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!”, “I WILL STOP YOU!” Short thoughts. Simple moves. Small words. No arguing or listening. Defiant or totally justifiable action-speech-actions. I win, you lose. End.
2. FLIGHT: “I’m feeling extremely ill / suffering from a lot of abdominal or head pain suddenly, and must leave right now!”. “I MUST GO, NOW!”. “I need to read and respond to urgent emails/messages, and disengage myself from this conversation/group/event”. Sophisticated ways of escaping from the situation. Conscious awareness moves away by any means it can, to stay alive.
3. FREEZE: “BLANK”. Total blank mind. “CONFUSION”. Defensive body postures. No verbal responses. Listening but unable to think at all. Just hearing. No ideas, no questions, just “blank”. Like being anaesthetised. Awake but not home.
4. SURRENDER: “Okay, it’s fine, I will take this for the team” “Trust me, I can handle this, blame me, I’ll be fine” No logic. Just “fine”. Self sacrifice. I’ll volunteer to do that thing, don’t worry, I can manage! Appeasing. Anything to get past the event “Live, to fight another day, err… maybe! Hopefully!!”

It's all present tense type / in the moment logical but it's a false logic as soon as it is scrutinised.

 

Now what?

Prevention of these physiological responses are better than cure. Developing your own coping strategies as well as preventative strategies to bring your total biochemical state down to “low tide” is extremely beneficial.

When we as individuals are perpetually in, or close to being in, a triggered state, there is no psychological safety for us. A group striving for a “safe space” to openly talk, think freely, listen deeply, create together, create a shared vision, align, act as one … if there is even one person in the group who is not substantially below their “High Tide” mark, it is very likely that even the very best of group dynamics will cause this person to experience unexpected change (desirable or not) and their biochemical mix will rise over their “high tide” level triggering their FIGHT-FLIGHT-FREEZE-SURRENDER responses. No response from one or more people on a decision, or for inputs to a complex problem, is not the same as consent, really! And thus the group cohesively will not be able to achieve “psychological safety”. 

Of course, better outcomes to result if the group is mature and know that this is exactly what is happening to one of the group members who is momentarily unable to fully access all of their psyche / their inner world. The individual's psyche is restricted and limited, subconsciously, and they’re not aware of it - they feel "fine". Communicating between those who can see and know what is going on with the triggered person, and the triggered person with restricted psyche is extremely difficult, and requires a great deal of training. Their body is present, but the “reality” they are living in temporarily is not the same as the rest of the group who are untriggered. This is far more difficult than people speaking different languages at each other, not able to understand each other at all. Add in the confusion that just moments before everyone was speaking and understanding together just like "normal".

So… you want psychological safety? Get on top of your stress, your stressors, the group’s stress, and the group’s stressors. Develop your methods of hygiene and practice them, when you don't need them, so that in the moment when you need to be your best self, you have the best chance of doing so.

A declaration, a crowd sourced meeting agreement, including a brief discussion on “psychological safety” or “vulnerability”, or knowing 3 “private life facts” about someone, will not give you (or them) what you’re looking for. It’s much bigger than a simple transactional conversation between people - it is a relationship that accepts and supports everyone in that relationship. And it's only 1 of the conditions identified by Google that need to be present for a team to be highly performant. Which means they're having some really great, innovative, creative ideas, and selecting well, and implementing really well also.