April 2025 List
Election night speeches, an opinion on leadership language, George Clooney and org charts, civility, personality types, self-help, and the ever popular Iceland, Scotland, and BBC Radio 3.
1
Some folks stay up late for New Year’s Eve, or birthdays, or a good movie. Me, I stayed up late to listen to the election night speeches from Jagmeet Singh, Pierre Poilievre, and Mark Carney.
All three leaders were, while staying true to their individual styles, gracious and appreciative. Most importantly they were respectful of the electoral process and results - something we cannot take for granted.
How they showed up at the end of election night is important to note. Their words and their behaviour in front of their supporters and the nation made clear that leadership is a responsibility to others, that it is a longer journey than any single campaign, and is bigger than any given moment, such as a vote count. It was reassuring and inspiring that they each believed in, and chose at the end of the day to not tarnish but to shine, democracy.
I am particularly taken with Mark Carney’s message of humility, ambition, and unity and will be working with courageous leaders across the country to create and find opportunities to make those ideas real for Canada and for all who call this home.
Much appreciation to all of you who ran for office, who supported and worked campaigns, and who voted.
2
Wild Courage: Go After What You Want and Get It, by Jenny Wood
Okay, I have not read this book which was just released on March 25, 2025.
I have included it in this month’s list because of how it is being promoted.
Wild Courage will teach you how to be:
Weird: Win as you or lose as “who?”
Selfish: Be your own champion.
Shameless: Kick impostor syndrome to the curb and self-promote with ease.*
Obsessed: Push, persist, and perform at your highest level.
Nosy: Get curious to network confidently and learn from others.
Manipulative: Build influence with empathy and manage up like a pro.
Brutal: Draw lines and stick to them. Embrace the power of no.
Reckless: Err on the side of action and take healthy risks.
Bossy: Steer others to success, even if you’re not in charge yet.
Chances are that the words chosen for promoting this book will, among the many lazy ways we have of self-identifying and being, show up as thoughtless hashtags on social media and slogans on buttons and t-shirts.
Language shapes our thinking, our intentions, and how we show up. There is a richness, even a gift, in using words that convey and encourage a wise, compassionate, and healthy approach to leadership.
Other than maybe weird and shameless (maybe), the above words, even with their purpose clarified, undermine our building a shared understanding of, and a movement for, the ethical and courageous leadership that we desperately need.
3
How many of us, perhaps thanks to George Clooney in Up in the Air, think of restructuring as a callous slash and burn exercise to trim the organization of unwanted staff, who may or may not be redundant, while boosting the financials to satisfy creditors, shareholders, or funders ?
If you raised your hand, you are not alone.
Below are two quick posts from Korn Ferry that might prompt a rethink of why and how we restructure. For me they raised questions about organizational innovation, productivity, and impact such as:
How are managers acting as enablers or barriers?
Where and how are problems identified and solved?
Where and how are decisions made?
How is or isn’t communication transparent and timely?
What are the paths of communication?
How does trust, responsibility, and accountability work?
How is or isn’t the organizational culture functional, healthy, and transparent?
The Great Flattening Experiment, by Russell Pearlman, March 26, 2025
Potentially, if companies just cut management layers but don’t change culture along the way, they wind up putting themselves into a negative loop.
Stop Thinking About the Org Chart, by Daniel Goleman, April 21, 2025
For many decades there has been a belief—however silent in some circles—that leadership is about having it all figured out.
What we are coming to see in the current landscape is that leadership is about something radically different. Ultimately, it’s about getting curious and collaborative, and daring to build, alongside others, what hasn’t previously been built.
4
The Soul of Civility: Timeless Principles to Heal Society and Ourselves, by Alexandra Hudson
If it is possible to call a book on the importance of civility a light and playful read, then this is it. Hudson weaves together stories and myths, inspiring quotes from ancient texts and modern thinkers, and thoughtful commentary on where we are today, while hitting all the high notes on ethics, curiosity, freedom, polarization, tolerance, and good old democracy.
More of Hudson’s work can be found at Civic Renaissance with Alexandra Hudson.
You may want to take a look at one of my favourite Canadian civility and civic thinkers, Diane Kalen-Sukra.
5
Personality Types Are So Yesterday. Do You Know About The 'Big 5' Personality Traits?, by Jillian Wilson, HuffPost, April 2, 2025
As part of my work, I have the honour of clients sharing with me their leadership or personality assessment results (Enneagram, DISC, CliftonStrengths, Myers-Briggs, Leadership Circle and so on). This experience has, despite its methodological shortcomings, confirmed my belief that at their best assessments can support self-awareness and reveal patterns in our behaviour, and that at their worst they become armour and support limiting beliefs.
I feel a “Reflections on Leadership and Personality Assessments” coming on.
6
Laura Kennedy has much to say, but I’ll just leave you with this from her bookclub post.
And yet. Yet. There is undeniably a fetid underbelly to the self-help industry, wherein bloviating, slightly-too-loud-for-some-reason content creators and writers roll into town with their brightly coloured cart and sell snake oil cures to precisely the people who are at a low enough ebb to buy. ‘ARE YOU SAD AND POOR AND UNSUCCESSFULl!?’ the schtick goes. “THEN TRY MY EASY FIXALL TONIC!’ Because the lure of a quick, simple, clear solution is timeless and holy shit, couldn’t we all use one of those? Sometimes the ideas within self help books are so far adrift from their philosophical and psychological origins that they become bastardised, butchered or bent, and sometimes they’re simplified and repackaged in a way that, while stripping them of nuance, can still turn them into useful tools.
And
We’re not reading the enormously viral self-help book du jour The Let Them Theory because it’s deep. I’ve read it and it makes a strenuous effort to avoid spooking anyone by assuring you that it’s not. What it promises is simplicity and ease. For context, it sold 2.7 million copies within ten weeks of publication. We’re reading it because so many people think it’s deep, and that tells us something about our culture, and about ourselves. I’m not suggesting that Robbins has written a work of philosophy and neither is she.
7
Extras
Why Icelanders are Happier than Ever, by Lindsey Galloway, BBC, April 12, 2025
Regardless of the external factors, it may be an internal sense of adaptability and resilience that leads to Icelanders' ultimate happiness. Gunnsteinsdóttir points to the ancient Icelandic word for intuition, innsæi, which translates to the "the sea within".
"It's the world beyond words – of vision, feelings, imagination and things that brew before they come to the surface of our attention," she explains. "It also means 'to see from the inside out', which refers to having a strong inner compass that enables us to navigate the ocean of life and the world we live in."
And speaking of Iceland, I finally saw Touch. Reviews of the film tend to focus on the love between the characters of Miko and Kristófer and while their love story is beautifully portrayed, it is the film’s quieter story of the complexity of parental love that makes the film, in my view, extraordinary.
Wild for Scotland. There’s a whole lot to like about this slow travel podcast and the host Kathi Kamleitner. She calls it an “immersive travel podcast” and that works for me as I’ve travelled alongside her and learned about crofting, weaving, hiking and survival, trad music, and the natural and historic wonders of Scotland. One of my favourites captured the sounds of thousands of storm petrels to their nests on the island of Mousa.
BBC Radio 3. I finally figured out how to have the vibe of owning a used bookstore without the worry of a lease, insurance, and unmovable stock.
Why work with me as your coach?
Because leadership is a demanding journey that requires attention and care.
I help clients expand and hone their self awareness and awareness of others, their expertise, and their wise and ethical behaviours while celebrating their resilience and courage for what is before them.
You can find out more about the Courageous Leaders Project and my work as a coach and facilitator at courageousleaders.ca.
*I recently finished training to work with imposter syndrome and inner critics. You most likely won’t hear me use Wood’s phrase, “Kick impostor syndrome to the curb and self-promote with ease”, but if imposter syndrome, and its minions the inner critics, are holding back your confidence and enjoyment in leadership, I’m full on here for you.
Photo by Museums of History New South Wales on Unsplash