Savoir-Être & Savoir-Faire: The 4 factors of personal mastery!

eadership begins within, with being, and then its controlled expression. Only those capable of leading themselves can set others in motion.

These people touch and inspire us with their words, gestures or positive energy. Humans like Mahatma Gandhi, Greta Thunberg, Michelle Obama, or even a friend, some are world-famous throughout time and history, others are not, with no particular status or re-recognized media position. Do you know Jacinda Ardern, after the Christchurch terrorist attack, with her scarf for harmony to pay tribute to the victims? An example of how a personal gesture can have a profound effect on both the immediate environment and the entire planet. These leaders have one thing in common. They are extremelycredible and authentic.Deeply connected to their environment and at the service of others, they are driven by a strength they draw from within themselves.

Christophe Berton, Managing Director at W&H France is convinced: the W&H FranceManagement Committeealso needs to develop these attitudes to inspire teams to grow in the quest for a balance of the 3 Ps: People, Planet, Profit.To this end, it called on ARC innovation facilitators at the end of 2017. Since then, Petra Bleschke and Pascal Papillon, consultants and trainers, have been accompanying 9 remarkable people on their journey towards themselves, supported from time to time by an actor, a film director, a painter-sociologist or a master of chivalry.

The 4 factors of Personal Mastery 

Four of the eight 2-day modules have already taken place, with remarkable progress made by the nine experienced managers. Self-reflection is undoubtedly the gateway to leadership. From there, during this course, beyondcognition, the team turns to new dimensions that are gradually gaining legitimacy in the corporate world:intuition,emotionandexperiential learning.In this way, emotional and spiritualquotientsor intelligences come to strongly support the intellectual quotient alone, so useful but often outdated or caught off-guard!

The time is ripe for more Zen, harmonious management, as cognition is clearly reaching its limits in our complex, chaotic world. This does not mean that cognition has no place in management! On the contrary - it's a question of enriching our'mindfulness'with'heartfulness' -mindfulness in a spirit of compassion - so as to take into account all human intelligences and not limit ourselves to a small part of our wisdom, via our mental models. Often, the individual is deeply motivated by the desire to contribute something useful and important to others, in the near and/or distant world. By connecting with our intuition and emotions, we access the senses - sensations and directions - and subtle energies, expressing our uniqueness and authenticity.

Learning from experience means learning with emotions

This Wednesday in September, to validate the skills acquired in the first 4 modules of the"savoir-être" course, and to continue to discover (themselves), the W&H Committee is ready for the EQUI'SENS experience with Cora Albrecht, rider, riding instructor for over thirty years and certified Horse Coaching. In the arena, each pair seeks first to create ashared trustwith the horse, enabling the horse to move, take up space, change directions and gaits, in magnificent harmony and total respect. A true expert in non-verbal communication, the horse is the mirror of our leadership. It provides an immediate response to the behaviors encountered during the experience. It then challenges and provides W&H leaders with a fresh perspective on their human relationships.

Enriched by this in-depth information and a follow-up session a month later, each leader identifies personal avenues for improvement, with the aim of better tuning/harmonizing the 4 factors of "Personal Mastery": cognition, intuition, emotion and the application of new skills. Having learned from this experiential learning module, the next 4 training modules take on their full meaning and importance: practice and training to perpetuate what has been learned and create new routines/habits.

So, the path through the history of management, including leadership, leads us, in synthesis, to integrate joie de vivre, as a criterion of success and performance, in organizations, in teams and in each individual, while respecting diversity and differences. It's not a question of establishing a new 2.0, 3.0 or n.0 standard, but of exercising our co-responsibility as human beings, professionals and citizens!

Inspired by 'Personal Mastery 2.0 - Mut zum Zen', J. Culen, C. Mayhofer, article published in ManagerSeminare, Heft 259, Oktober 2019.