by Elmer S Soriano
After running a number of leadership development workshops in different sectors and trying to help leaders grapple with their adaptive challenges, I see more and more how leadership development involves helping and individuals or groups cross boundaries. Below is a summary of types of boundaries I've seen:
Blind spots - spaces that are beyond the leaders sphere of awareness. If the leader isn't equipped with competencies to see the bigger picture, she remains trapped in her own worldview.
Identity divides - spaces that are perceived by the leader as beyond her own individual identities or worldviews. In these spaces, the leader feels that he is different and therefore has trouble empathizing with those beyond the fence. These can be race, class, school, or other forms of boundaries that divide one group from another.
Organizational or community boundaries - boundaries set by mandates, organizational budgets, program scopes. These also include turfs of others that are respected and not encroached upon. A leader usually operates within these boundaries unless she deliberately takes a risk and operates beyond these boundaries.
Agency scope and scale - leadership imagine their agency and influence within a certain scale (e.g. organization, federation, national, transnational) and operate within these psychological boundaries.
Leadership development often involves creating a holding environment and inviting the leaders into this space which overlaps with their current space, but provides them a gateway to new spaces where they can do the adaptive work needed of them.
Image credit:
https://drexelnewsblog.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/frog-in-well.jpeg?w=283&h=290&crop=1
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