Jim Dethmer - The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership: A New Paradigm for Sustainable Success

Why another book on leadership?

When we asked ourselves this question, we answered, Because most of the current models of leadership arent working.

We want to be clear about what we mean. Todays leadership models can achieve certain desired ends quite effectively, such as creating shareholder value, increasing market share, developing new products, beating the competition, giving certain leaders fortune and fame, and giving business schools useful frameworks for training future leaders.

But we have found that these outcomes are not enough because the models are unsustainable on three critical levels.

Our clients range from the top banks and investment firms in the world to leading healthcare organizations and the most cutting-edge technology firms. We work with entrepreneurial start-ups, small businesses, and Fortune 500 organizations. Weve coached, facilitated, and consulted with thousands of leaders, including the brightest millennials and baby boomers hailed as best in class.

Many of these incredibly gifted, driven, passionate, and purposeful leaders are fraying at the edges. One Fortune 500 CEO reported to us recently that his equally competent physician wife was shocked at the number of wildly successful twentysomethings who were requesting prescriptions for Xanax and Ambien via text messages because they had no time to come in for an appointment. Weve worked with many astounding leaders who enter midlife with broken marriages, fractured families, hardened hearts, and dreamless futures. They can boast many quarters of beating earnings estimates and they have the money to show for it, but theyre struggling to find purpose, satisfaction, happiness, and balance.

Burned-out, stressed-out, and frazzled leaders foster organizations that experience high turnover, low employee engagement, steep healthcare costs, and dysfunctional teams that often work against one another. The current models of leadership require organizations to motivate their people largely with fear and extrinsic rewards. Though no one argues that these forms of motivation can produce short-term results, they are usually accompanied by distrust and cynicism in the workplace, which have long-term negative consequences. In this scenario, leaders must continuously ratchet up the fear and anxiety to raise productivity and then use increased monetary incentives to keep scared, cynical, and fed-up people on board. These models are simply not sustainable if the goal is to build vibrant, creative, and profitable organizations with engaged, productive teams over the long run.

The organizations that follow the conscious leadership model are winning the talent war. Once people recognize that there are companies using higher forms of motivation like intrinsic reward, play, and even love, they gravitate toward them. Further, conscious leadership organizations attract the best and brightest by leveraging each individuals unique genius capacities. They transform average workers into outstanding contributors, who in turn, help create impressive organizational results.

According to the Chicago Tribune and Crains Chicago Business, the two best companies to work at in Chicago are Athletico and Centro. Both companies practice most of the 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership, a model which is proving to be sustainable, self-rejuvenating, and reinforcing. Sandy Weill, former CEO and Chairman of Citigroup, once said, What is culture except something you find in yogurt? We disagree. Culture is the secret sauceor lethal bacteriaof all teams. Conscious leadership cultures build success in real and concrete ways you will read about in this book.

Most current models are built on beliefs of scarcity and win/lose competitiona deeply rooted, flawed mindset found in most cultures and leaders. Like fear, this view motivates people for a while but it doesnt last. The not enough resources belief (money, time, energy, space, and love) and the I/we are not enough belief create a zero-sum game, generating winners and losers, haves and have-nots. Because we are afraid there isnt enough for all of us, we harm the planet and each other, an unworkable approach that wont sustain future generations.

So we offer this book to the great leadership conversation because we believe models like Conscious Leadership are those of present and future pioneers, who will take themselves, their organizations, and the global community to new heights of success. Conscious Leadership presents a radically new and meaningful paradigm that enhances and enriches everyone who embraces it.

We welcome all you pioneers on this journey with us.