INsight/ Making Conscious Connections

Manila, 15 May 2025 — How strong are the connections you are building with people in your network?

Story

It happened last week. In our Grow3Leaders community, we kicked off an exploration of what our superpowers as leaders look like in practice when it comes to building strong connections with people in our networks. We want to find out how we can expand our powers of awareness when we’re engaging in building trust through impactful conversations.

As a start, we’re reviewing the research about gaining advanced levels of consciousness. This is a topic that has kept sages, mystics, and philosophers busy all through human history. In the past hundred years, psychologists have joined in and have added greatly to our knowledge. While the study of human consciousness is ongoing, we already know a lot.

For example, when it comes to expanding our conscious awareness, we can distinguish four states, described as gross, subtle, causal, and nondual consciousness. Along the way, as we practice, the duality between the observer (Subject) and the observed (Object) gradually gets dissolved, bringing us to a nondual consciousness that is often referred to as the state of enlightenment. How can that help us as leaders?

Challenge

Let’s look at three areas where acting from an expanded awareness can make a huge difference in our day-to-day leadership work. The first is what we can call situational intelligence: the ability to read the room, see what is really happening below the surface, and determine what your most helpful contribution will be to bring positive change to the situation.

The second is about seeing assumptions and outdated mental models for what they are. Expanding our awareness helps us to uncover and challenge biases and mental habits in real time, improving our strategic judgment to make better decisions. We learn to apply situational leadership and lead positive change with (executive) presence.

The third is about solving ineffective team dynamics. An expanded awareness helps to correct misalignment, conflict avoidance, and lack of psychological safety. We learn to recognize unspoken tensions or patterns before they escalate. And there is more. Think of spotting and addressing burnout and overwhelm, and tackling change resistance by colleagues who are over-identifying with current roles and systems.

Question

To leaders, a value is something that is important to us. Research shows that it’s important for us to get clear on our values (together with our vision and strengths). When I’m asked about my top 5 values, people are often surprised that my #1 value is Awareness (the quality of consciousness). I have discovered how much difference awareness makes in life and leadership, in better conversations, and in making conscious connections.

On the practical use of awareness, my leadership question for you this week is this: How strong are the connections you are building with people in your network? Making conscious connections as leaders requires that we expand our awareness first. If you spend most of the time in the state of gross awareness, you will miss out on reading the subtle energies at play, and you’re still limited to the duality of subject and object.

Expanding awareness is one of the twelve effective leadership behaviors we practice in the Grow3Leaders community. It is an indispensable ability for making conscious connections with people in your network. You need it to engage them in trust-building for collaboration. If you would like to practice what it takes to lead positive change in your workplace, come and join us in one of our leadership challenges.