The skinheads moved into Billings, Montana, during the holiday season and began throwing bricks through the windows of Jewish families who displayed menorahs. The community was horrified at this show of violence and felt powerless, at first, to do anything about it. Members of the religious community and business leaders met, talked over the alternatives and decided to say no to the violence in a way that required courage from the whole community. They all started putting menorahs in their windows, too. The skinheads stopped throwing bricks.

The CEO of a successful business stood by helplessly as his daughter almost died of anorexia. This experience forced him to face his own overly controlling behavior and fear of failure. Later, an economic downturn gave him a chance to put his newfound insights to work in the business. He asked his employees what they would suggest he do in lieu of layoffs. They crafted a successful part-time policy that saved the company money and increased productivity and morale.

These are just two examples of persons "leading from their souls." Although we don't usually talk about soul in the business world, many people long for that dimension in their lives. They would like to lead from their souls.

Learning this generally develops in the second half of the leadership journey after the first half has played itself out. The first half consists of marshaling resources, meeting goals, managing people, making things happen, achieving cultural success. The second half of this leadership journey involves finding meaning and a sense of calling in our work, exploring our inner passion, and creating long-lasting effects. It is rooted in spirituality, community, and connectedness. It is not just about making a living; it is about making a living work.

Profiles in Courage

Soul leadership requires courage because it asks you to let go, face your deepest fears, and relinquish your ego. Having done these things, soul leaders are no longer limited by their own minds and imaginations, and they have the courage to significantly change the world for the better.

How can you become such a leader? To begin exploring this inner process, ask yourself three questions:

1. Other than your parents, who made you feel worthwhile before you were 25? What effect did that have on you? In making you feel worthwhile, that person was leading from the soul.

One executive told a story about a high school coach of his who knew that he was not talented in the requisite football skills. Still he let the youth play because he had a lot of heart and encouraged the other players. He was so grateful to be part of the team he worked harder and became one of the co-captains, because of his leadership, not his skills. To this day, this executive looks beyond the obvious skills to the other factors that people bring to the job and then he gives them incentives to reach their potential.

Another person tells the story of walking out of her high school creative writing class on the last day her senior year, fearful of what grade she'd gotten on her final story. The teacher handed her the paper as the student was leaving the room and said, in passing, "You might want to consider writing more stories like this." This student had never been told she was good at anything, and it was so powerful to hear that from a teacher she ended up pursuing English as a college major, went on to obtain an MA in English and runs an editing business now.

Anytime you make another person feel worthwhile in a sincere way, you are leading from your soul. It doesn't cost anything, does not require positions or degrees and makes a significant difference in another person's life.

2. What was the moment of keenest insight in your life, and what did you do about it? Acting with courage on life-changing insights is a mark of soul leadership.

A brilliant engineer remembers the fateful day when he made a difficult decision that saved his professional life. He had moved into management at a young age in his company because of his reputation as an outstanding engineer. A few years later, with several successful performance reviews under his belt, he had a startling and troubling insight. He hated managing other people and felt he had lost his passion at work. After a lot of advice to the contrary, he decided to give up a lucrative and powerful career in management and return to the ranks of engineering. It was a difficult move because his whole culture deemed it career suicide to move away from management and take what was considered by many a demotion. As part of his new career principles, he decided to work only on projects he loved, no matter what the consequences. He went on to be an award winning engineer several times over. It all started with his moment of keenest insight.

3. What is your one characteristic that is dangerous to others if you are not fully conscious of it? Soul leaders identify their own shadows and do not project them onto other people.

One such characteristic occurs frequently in people who are fast paced, results oriented and chronically stressed. It is an addiction to anger and it infects not only the person but all who work around him. It consists of uncontrollable, unpredictable hot anger flashes that cause the person to lash out at others, blame others for the anger, and set up an atmosphere of tension, in which others are walking on eggs to keep from "setting off the anger." The person justifies his behavior by saying he just "lost it" or by blaming others. The underlying cause of the anger is untouched deep hurts that the person cannot feel and is afraid of feeling. But this hot anger is one of the most demoralizing behaviors in the workplace and is lethal when it shows up in someone who leads others.

Taking Soul Leadership Seriously

The process of developing soul leadership is challenging, but here are a few guidelines: (A summary of all the disciplines is available at the end of this article).

Make yourself accountable to someone who is beyond you on the soul leadership journey.

Meet with that person regularly and talk about what you are really up to and why and regularly assess your leadership journey.

A few questions you can start with, to assess your journey, are these: What is the most important question you were asking 10 years ago? What's the most important question today? What do you consider success? What are you most proud of? Sorry about? Whom have you made feel worthwhile?

You can choose someone inside your profession (not your boss) or outside of work but pick someone you can be totally candid with and who will challenge you. A couple examples of people who have taken accountability seriously may help to illustrate the journey.

One young fast-track manager decided to meet regularly with a more experienced professional colleague from another company. In the next year a series of crises rocked her company to its core. She was able not only to weather the crises but emerge as a solid leader because she thought through carefully with her colleague how she could take the high road with each decision she made during the year. For example, when pressured from above to push through a product that was not ready for market, she quickly assembled a small team of people to find the glitches. They worked incredibly hard for two months, set the product back on course, got it to market on time. More importantly, they felt they had done the best work they could do under incredible pressure. She rewarded them well, but more incredibly she had built a strong, trusting and competent team that she could count on in the future. It had been a career risk for her and they all knew it, but that made the work and the team bonding even more important.

Another corporate executive met regularly with a trained spiritual director to help him find out his deepest heart's desires. He found out his heart was deeply connected to issues unrelated to his corporate functions and he was less and less compelled by his work with each passing year. After mulling this over for several years with his director, he took a big risk, left his company after twelve years, and started a consulting practice. The main reason he left was so he could spend more of his time on community projects which were his passion. Now he could work 75% time making a living and the other 25% time making a living work. He found his life's work and the balance he needed.

Have a fringe experience

A more difficult part of the soul leadership process entails letting go of your ego as a leader. To do this, try getting to know someone who is on the fringe of our culture-- a homeless person, an inmate, a prostitute, a retarded person, a 90 year old. Let that person be your mentor for a year. You will learn where you are retarded, what prison you are in, how you prostitute yourself. This is one of the best ways to put yourself out of your comfort zone so you are able to learn things you could learn in no other way. And what you learn in these ventures on the fringe are life-changing and permanent. Movies that illustrate this are Rainman, Fisher King, Forrest Gump, and Children of a Lesser God.

Face your shadows

A daunting task for soul leaders is facing their shadows, the parts of themselves that are hidden and which they project onto other people, as illustrated in the anger addiction example earlier. William Miller has developed a simple exercise to help you find out what your shadows are. First, think of three people whom you don't like. List their negative qualities on the left side of a sheet of paper. Of these, select the most despicable and write them in capital letters on the right side. The list in capitals on the right hand side is your shadow--the traits you most despise in others but cannot see in yourself. You are not to dismiss these traits but embrace them and learn what they have to teach you. For instance, arrogance (a trait of many leaders) is a sign of insecurity. If you see it in yourself, do not try to get rid of it with bravado or false humility. Listen to it. The next time you feel arrogant, ask why you are insecure about the situation, or what you are afraid to learn and your arrogance will teach you wisdom.

Take your spirituality seriously

To be a soul leader you must take your spirituality seriously. Unfortunately, many people use their spirituality as another form of power. As Henri Nouwen said, "Maybe power offers an easy substitute for the hard work of love. It seems easier to be God than to love God. Easier to control people than to love people, easier to own life than to love life." Finding intimacy with the Holy is the surest way to let go of your ego and transform your life. It requires you to face your fears with courage.

Listen to your calling, find your passion

The outcome of facing your fears with courage is discovering your calling and passion in life. You will find yourself doing things you never dreamed were possible before. People with passion and calling transform the world. Frederick Buechner defines calling as "the place where my deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." That could mean everything from making one person feel worthwhile to starting a campaign to rid the world of pollution.

Vaclav Havel summed up the essence of soul leadership well when he said, "The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart... Without a global revolution in the sphere of human consciousness, nothing will change for the better...and the catastrophe toward which this world is headed--be it ecological, demographic, or a general breakdown of civilization--will be unavoidable."

Following is a summary is of the soul leadership development process, the disciplines that make for transformation and the behaviors that result. Those listed below the dotted line are more difficult and lead to greater transformation.

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