Humanity's greatest leaders are those that were able to manifest great, intentional, and inspirational impact. Becoming aware of our perceptions and understanding the influence they have on our choices is paramount to becoming a person of significant impact: whether you are what is traditionally considered a leader or simply someone living.
Reality, in this article, is considered to be what someone experiences in their moment-to-moment living. Reality in this perspective is highly subjective and personal. I am not denying the validity of objective, shared realities, which are agreements we all make about what is real. (Such realities and agreements are generally a part of one's personal experience.) However, since we all respond to the way we individually experience circumstances, this will focus on our individual experiences.
There are infinite methods and perspectives to define and create structure around the mass quantity of individual experience. There are a vast number of systems, some simple and some complex, to generalize and make the infinite amount of personal perspectives graspable and understandable (sort of). I am trying to keep this short, so I will use the simple distinctions first popularized by Lawrence Kohlberg when he studied how people develop morally: pre-conventional, conventional, and post-conventional.
I recognize that people and the world are much more complex than three distinctive stages. Please forgive the generalization. However, generalization allows access to something otherwise impossible to discuss: the complexity of people and reality. There are many different lenses we can apply to each of these levels. I am going to apply just one, and that is the relationship that each level will have with what is going on in their experience; their relationship with reality.
It is important to briefly note that these stages always grow from the ground up in a sequential order. No one has warped from pre to post, without first going through conventional. Just as plants grow and just as the complexity of information grows through school grades, so too do these ways of experiencing and being grow. Late is not better than early. However, it is the perspective of this article that the more one can perceive and respond from higher levels the more effective they will be in intentionally shifting space and time.
It is also important to note these stages do not only consider what is happening on the thinking level of the mind, but also includes emotions, values, sensations, and deeply held beliefs and patterns. One might, for example, have ideas that appear to be very "late" on the pre-con-post continuum, but in actuality they experience and respond at much "earlier" levels. For example, I've heard many people say that they believe they are in a dynamic relationship of co-creation with the world, but generally act and respond in a way that reveals a victimized experience of life.
Pre-conventional: The World is Happening to Me
Last week I stubbed my toe. Honestly, I do this almost every week. I'm a bit klutzy. Whenever I do this, I don't have evolved and complex thoughts about the systemic nature of what just happened. I normally think, "Oh shit," which is then followed by, "damn rock." In this moment, I have perceived and acted based on a pre-conventional understanding of reality. In this moment, reality is happening to me.
It is continuously interesting to me that I observe often well educated, matured, and experienced individuals and leaders fall into the pre-conventional line of thinking. Reality is happening to them and they are simply responding as best they can. In life and leadership, this does not get anyone very far. At best, this leaves one feeling lucky when things go well and feeling discouraged when things go poorly. In its most drastic appearances, one becomes the victim and life isn't fair. "I'm completely helpless," this person might feel.
This isn't bad, and there isn't a value judgment. However, when considering impacting leadership, a pre-conventional response lacks the ease, insight, skill, and vision of a well-developed leader. Again, no one is just one thing. In times of stress, when leadership is normally most needed, people will tend to default to conventional or pre-conventional relationships with the experience they're having. One becomes a victim, and decisions are based on fear and survival instincts. Leaders will resort to and get caught in blaming others and circumstance, losing all ability to inspire a team and move forward with a clear vision and intention. The leadership shuts down, and the group falls apart. In the worst case, the project completely fails, and "Someone is going to pay for it," because in this perspective, reality and life is happening to you.
Pre-conventional awareness isn't only a liability. A lot of really beautiful things arise from this mind structure: big ideas, big risks, and intuition uncluttered by more formal and conventional modes of thinking. A healthy expression pre-conventional perspective can be a great asset within an individual and a team. We access these ways of thinking all the time, and in developing as a leader, it's important to develop and honor the healthy components of each stage.
Conventional: I can Affect the World
The limitations of one stage, always lead to the development of a new methods of perceiving and acting. The limitations of the pre-conventional experience open up the new vista of conventional thinking. When a new stage is realized, the previous stage is not isolated and removed, but still relied on to support the new stage of growth. As mentioned earlier, most when put under stress will step back a stage or two. During times of great inspiration, a stage or two may be realized. All this considered, people generally have a resting place, and the majority of people in the United States rest a conventional level of interpretation and action.
The conventional level is one of my personal favorites. Conventional consciousness wrote the United States Constitution. Conventional consciousness gets stuff done, very well, because it recognizes that it can affect the world it lives in. Conventional consciousness sees the world as malleable and pliable. Conventional consciousness recognizes that each person has great affect, and so it seeks to affect. Conventional consciousness, after stubbing its toe, doesn't think, "Oh shit." It takes some responsibility for itself. It wonders how it can walk better, how to pay more attention, and what to pay attention to. The conventional way of thinking, with its understanding of impact, explores the world in a way that seeks to create change towards its values and ideals.
There is a wide movement of growth in the conventional domain. In early conventional consciousness, a great deal of emphasis is placed on the group of association. Stepping from pre-conventional to conventional, there is the recognition that groups provide stability and expertise, and inspire with value and identity to something larger. The group becomes an asset and group membership becomes vital. In early conventional leadership, the group and greater experience will be overly deferred to. In its healthy expressions, the value of group and circumstantial experience is recognized and for the first time honored. In unhealthy expressions, it can create stagnation, and will lack direction.
Mid-level conventional consciousness will begin to recognize the importance and strength of their own individual power and perspective. Greater responsibility is owned here. Because it's a level of great responsibility, the strength of deference and the recognition that life is big and inspirational is lost, and one becomes limited by their own responsibility. In mid-conventional leadership, the individual will be overly considered. This person has now recognized the impact they have on the world, and has begun to take responsibility for it. They become strong actors wherever they are showing up. In unhealthy expressions, leaders become siloed and can loose touch with the group and the greater experience, missing circumstantial and individual feedback. This leader can no longer effectively create and deliver the intended results, as they are completely self-dependant, without a greater regard.
In later conventional perspectives, there is a balancing between the group, individual, and a deeper intuition arises. An understanding that unfolds from this "late" area of conventional consciousness is "co-creation." One is working in harmony with self, a larger group, and the depth of passion within. One is co-creating: affecting reality with a wide consideration of what is present with a vision for the future, while allowing themselves to also be affected. With late conventional thinking, there is not only responsibility, but there is also sensitivity. In many systems of development and leadership development, this is considered the last stage, and for good reason, it's really effective. Most successful managers and leaders worldwide operate at this level.
Post-conventional: The World is Unfolding
The huge majority of the world's population spends the majority of their time in conventional modes of being, but the post-conventional container is big and vast. It covers a greater span of human territory than the previous two combined. There are many significant nuances, as post-conventional consciousness continues to evolve, that cannot be contained in the frame of this article. There is one specific aspect of the reality relationship I would like to discuss: the world is unfolding.
The post-conventional mind experiences the world in a very complex, layered, and interactive way, but the hallmark of this perception is that the world is very simply and very profoundly unfolding. Individuals can and will affect the way things unfold, but they do so as a part of the entirety of reality, all co-creating. There is indeed a deeper intuition of co-creation as post-conventional awareness grows.
In post-conventional awareness, there is a freer spontaneity than the earlier two stages, and yet this spontaneity holds a great vision and an understanding of layered and rippling impact. A butterfly flapping its wings in Africa will affect the weather in Kansas, and everything has to do with the price of tea in China.
Post-conventional leaders are the world's great leaders; leaders of massive impact. Some of these leaders are very public and some of these leaders we will never know. But the level of impact these people create is intentional and systemic. These leaders have the space and capacity to manage multiple streams of information and many levels and layers of feedback. They understand that the process is just as important as the product, and yet they can deliver and create with ease, because they can manage complex situations, events, and people.
There is a great ease in the post-conventional relationship with reality, because things are seen and understood in the simultaneity of complexity and simplicity. Life is unfolding, and this is a very simply and very complex thing. Intentional affect is an aspect of unfolding, and allowing is an aspect of unfolding. The post-conventional leader knows when to affect and knows when to allow, and as a result these leaders carry great impact.
Like the previous two levels of development, there are growth opportunities at this stage as well. The post-conventional domain can sometimes become very visionary, and can lose its foundation and grounding. Earlier levels, especially conventional, can perceive the post-conventional leader as ambiguous and slow to deliver. In working through these stresses, post conventional leaders learn to ground vision in practical methods, use ambiguity to develop other leadership within the organization, and work towards creating quick and effective results with the complexity of interaction.
The post-conventional leader sees all challenges as an opportunity for growth, and they recognize that growth is always in process. Post-conventional leadership isn't the ending of the developing leader story. It's simply another beginning.
Conclusion
No one is ever one thing. I find myself up and down the pre, con, and post line all day. Certain circumstances evoke different perceptions and responses. In refining intentional impact, the most important cultivation is the availability of choices and the clarity to choose the most intentional impact. Pre-conventional consciousness has a very limited range of choices, whereas post-conventional consciousness has great access to many different ways of showing up allowing for future potentials.
In developing as a leader, one of the most essential things you can do is to notice your default settings. What are the various ways you respond to the variety of circumstances you encounter? Is there space for you to see things a bit differently? Do you ever play a victim, completely limited by circumstance? Do you ever default to the wishes of a group lacking clear direction and leadership? Are you too individually minded? Are you responding from a place of deeper intuition and passion, almost effortlessly? Do you respond with trust knowing that whatever you do and whatever unfolds - not a victim, not solely responsible, but fully and effortlessly participating in leadership - is simply reality and the world doing its thing?
By simply beginning to notice your tendencies, you are already cultivating greater leadership capacities. Practicing leadership is an expression of leadership. You are already a leader, as you strive towards greater leadership.
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