Na’aleh’s 28 Core Skills of Leadership – Chavruta

Chavruta: Nurture relationships of mutual respect, constructive self-reflection, and shared discovery.

Self-Awareness: Know your personal biases.

Leadership may begin with ourselves, but it always engages others.  Thus, it’s important to see the value that others bring to any situation, as well as their capacity for growth.  Yet, we are often blinded to this by the biases we bring with us.  We make assumptions about others based on our past, which may be neither accurate nor helpful.  Knowing our personal biases is the first step toward nurturing positive and supportive relationships.

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Being with Others: Be fully present for others.

Too often we run through our days barely noticing those around us, consumed by tasks and targets.  We may treat others as simply tools to get our jobs done.  This is the mindset of management, while leadership seeks to understand and elevate others.  To do so, we must pause and become fully present for another. 

Action Toward Change: Engage in dialogue.

Dialogue begins by listening deeply to another.  In dialogue, we seek to understand before being understood.  We inquire by asking open-ended questions, and we reflect back to the other what we think we are hearing.  Through dialogue, we get to know the other person – their unique perspectives, values, and the character strengths they bring to the relationship.  In this way, we begin together a journey of shared discovery.

Advanced Skill: Gain comfort with uncertainty.

Deep dialogue opens us up to alternative ideas and “truths,” which may not be our own.  Thus, the practice of dialogue can be discomforting, as we are expected to entertain another’s ideas as potentially as valuable as our own.  Often, we must hold in our minds two contradictory ideas without automatically choosing one over the other.  This asks us to gain comfort with cognitive uncertainty.  The benefit is that by exposing ourselves deeply to the ideas of others, we can improve on our own, perhaps conclude that their perspective is better, or chart a third path.

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