Laura Berland and Evan Harrel of the Center for Compassionate Leadership recently sat down with Chris Whitehead for his podcast, The Compassionate Leader Interview. Chris Whitehead is a global leader in compassionate leadership, having written the book, Compassionate Leadership: Creating Places of Belonging.
The podcast, which is released fortnightly, has an exceptional roster of interviews including Michael West, Head of Thought Leadership at The King’s Fund, London, as well as a leading researcher in the effectiveness of teams, especially in healthcare, and Dame Julia Unwin, former chief executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, and author for the Carnegie UK Trust of Kindness, Emotions and Human Relationships: The Blind Spot in Public Policy.
Following are selected highlights of the podcast show notes and an audio player to listen to the full 32-minute interview. You can also find the podcast on Apple Music, Google Play, Spotify, and Stitcher, in addition to other podcast platforms. Please note that the show was recorded prior to COVID galvanizing everyone’s focus, and therefore does not touch on the global pandemic.
Show note highlights:
The Center for Compassionate Leadership looks to integrate evidence-based practices (and there is a growing body of evidence) with contemplative wisdom. There are four elements to their work: building community, research to develop the understanding of compassionate leadership, thought leadership, and education and training. Their main goal at present is to provide a global hub for what are often isolated pockets of leaders who want to connect with their peers and grow together.
Laura and Evan see compassion as a process that is embedded into the everyday rather than something you keep in reserve to respond to specific events. Listening is a foundational skill for compassionate leaders. But awareness, connection, empathy, understanding, and a desire to take action are all essential and need to be practiced on a daily basis: research on the companies that responded to the Brisbane floods of 2011 showed that the most effective responses emanated from those that had engaged in compassion training in advance.
The Center’s model for compassionate leadership conceives of it as an “inside out” process. It starts with self-compassion, then compassion for others, and finally for the greater whole. The Center integrates a number of different practices into their training. Self-compassion practice examples include breath attention, posture and mindfulness. A practice called “Just Like Me” designed to help individuals appreciate their common humanity, and address unconscious bias, is used in the work on compassion for others, while a practice called “Interconnectedness” is an example of a practice to help develop compassion for the greater whole.
Laura and Evan are working hard on the question of how organizations become communities of compassionate practice.
Compassionate leadership differs from our normal understanding of the ‘heroic leader’, but Evan would argue that compassionate leaders are authentic heroes. Traditional ‘heroic leaders’ tend to be rescuers or saviors, but the vulnerability, empathy, and willingness to relinquish control required to work compassionately demand heroic courage. Additionally, part of the bravery of a compassionate leader lies in her preparedness to surrender status and pride for humility.
Some businesses within the tech industry have bought into Compassionate Leadership, for example Google with Project Aristotle, and in the UK the NHS has a Compassionate Leadership initiative led by NHS Improvement and The Kings Fund. Many manufacturers have taken to it, however other industries have a long way to go. Laura’s view is that there are pockets of beautiful work happening but maybe “0.1 percent” of US businesses practice compassionate leadership.
Evan describes the first barrier to compassionate leadership as “our lizard brain,” our natural propensity for flight, fight, or freeze when we are under duress. We have the ability to think differently courtesy of our mammalian brain but it’s only through mindfulness practice that we can find the space to intercept and calm our more primitive instincts and respond rather than react. The same lizard brain is responsible for the alarm we feel when we encounter people who are “different from us.”
Laura has been inspired on her leadership journey by her grandparents, her father’s family having emigrated from Russia at the turn of 19th century and her mother’s family fleeing Europe during World War II. Both voyages demanded the ability to keep going in the face of considerable adversity. Evan’s inspiration has been Professor Richie Davidson from the University of Wisconsin, who, Evan says, has undertaken his research in an integrated and humane way.
Both Laura and Evan exemplify the self-care that they encourage others to engage in. Both practice meditation and yoga, and Evan also runs. They both reflect and journal, and make self-care a priority.
The books that Laura and Evan would commend to aspiring leaders are Sharon Salzberg’s Real Love and Jim Collins’ Good to Great. Jim Collins’ Level 5 leader (professional will in service of the organization and personal humility) captures much of what it takes to lead with compassion.
Laura’s advice to her 20-year-old self would be, “Be awake, pay attention, be content with what is, and be present to the moment that you’re in.” Evan would tell himself to “Question everything… most of what I thought I knew [at 20] has turned out not to be right.”
Both Evan and Laura are optimistic about the future. Evan says the only way for us to survive as a species is “by recognizing our interconnectedness, and dealing with each other compassionately. It is the only choice.” All of the existential threats that we now face “can be overcome by understanding consciously what our condition is, and then responding in a way that recognizes that every choice I make affects everyone else, and every choice they make affects me.”