with Alec Pearson and Jude Jennison.
What does a horse know about leadership? Quite a lot, as it turns out.
Jude Jennison works with senior leaders and executive teams using a herd of horses to expose something that's much harder to see in the meeting room: our default patterns of behaviour.
A horse doesn't care about your job title, experience or intentions. It responds to what you're actually communicating: your confidence, clarity, energy, emotions and behaviour. And when it doesn't want to follow you, the feedback is immediate. There is no carefully worded performance review. The horse simply says no..
In this episode of Beyond Leading, Alec talks with Jude about what happens when experienced leaders are taken outside their comfort zone and can no longer rely on the behaviours that have always worked for them.
They explore:
- why horses reveal leadership blind spots so quickly
- what control, self-doubt and lack of clarity look like under pressure
- why stronger relationships don't mean avoiding challenge or conflict
- what happens when teams work harder but aren't genuinely aligned
- why effective leadership starts with paying attention to yourself and the people around you
Jude also shares some remarkable examples from her work, including an exhausted leadership team whose fatigue was exposed when the horses simply lay down.
Ultimately, this is a conversation about what horses can reveal that the boardroom often cannot: the hidden patterns, blind spots and behaviours that shape how we really lead.
Jude Jennison is the Founder of Leaders by Nature. A former IBM leader, she has developed more than 5,000 leaders, written three books and works with organisations to change how leaders and teams behave under pressure, uncertainty and change.
Find out more about Jude and Leaders by Nature:
- Website: https://www.leadersbynature.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/judejennison/
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