Rob Bocchino has authored numerous books and articles on:

• Individual and systems change
• Mind-mapping
• Human learning
• The effects of fostering fundamental motivation and empowerment

Emotional Literacy has become Rob's latest and most successful book: "Emotional Literacy: To Be a Different Kind of Smart" (available at major bookstores and at corwin.com).

Critics hail:

The book provides solid background and real strategies for helping young people (and adults) be more emotionally literate. It helps the reader become more emotionally aware and also more flexible by providing specific tools.

barnesandnoble.com, 1999

"Timely and useful. Provides clear and practical strategies to help young people and adults achieve successful and satisfying lives by understanding and managing emotions"
Robert Garmston, Professor Emeritus – California State University, Sacramento

"Emotional Literacy offers a concise and practical application of the social skills needed to be a productive, fulfilled member of society. This must-read is for everyone concerned about the development of the whole child"
Pat Wolfe, Educational Consultant - Napa, California

Excerpt from the forthcoming Corwrin Press book
Conscious Leadership: by Rob Bocchino

Chapter 1-What is Conscious Leadership?

Overview
We believe that the heart of change is a change of heart. Beneath all the hype, real, meaningful, second-order1Limited perception narrows the field of options. Conscious leaders recognize that their choices are reflections of how aware they were at the moment they made them. And the most remarkable consequence of this understanding is the realization that efficacy­the belief that one’s perceptions and choices make a difference­means accepting responsibility for the quality of those perceptions and choices.

It is this acceptance that compels the leader to pursue greater consciousness. In our effort to understand these introspective patterns, we have identified and organized conscious leadership in a developmental framework that includes three specific attributes:

These three attributes set the conscious leader apart from others. Moreover, these functions constitute a significant focus of their work. One pattern that has emerged while working with thousands of leaders is that these basic leadership attributes are present in every successful leader we have studied.

The Attributes

Leaders are decision-makers.

The first of these attributes is based on the premise that leaders are valued for the quality of the decisions they make. This is sometimes lost on managers who have the title of leader, but not the deeper understanding of what leadership is. Managers are rewarded for performing prescribed behaviors the same way over and ever again. They are acknowledged for their loyalty, and for their adherence to the status quo and to established protocols. And while loyalty and consistency are certainly worthy virtues, when managers begin to inquire about basic assumptions and to challenge the conventional wisdom, their motives, their intentions and even their value are often questioned. Systems that are closed, systems that want to preserve the status quo, systems that are afraid of change do not like to be questioned.

It is natural for systems to be attached to what has worked in the past. Toward this end managers make sure that tried and true practices stay tried and true. People are responsible for doing what they are directed to do. And as important as these responsibilities may be, they are not sufficient markers for creating systems that thrive.

In the extreme, many of the attributes of systemic dysfunction–coercion, dishonesty, unbridled use of power, authority and intimidation–are the natural consequences of a void of real leadership. Instead of fostering consciousness in leaders, unbridled accountability standards require managing people and events so that they stay within fixed boundaries. Scripts, high-stakes testing, inflexible compliance standards breed at best obedience. At worst these tactics break people. Mandated obedience, threat, and unilateral control are symptoms of a lack conscious leadership.

Leaders on the other hand, make choices, sometimes very difficult choices. And they are accountable for the quality of their decisions. Moving quickly, staying the path, committing to a course of action is only useful if it moves the system ecologically in the right direction. Paradoxically, instead of reacting or taking immediate action, conscious leaders are often questioners: they wonder out loud, they initiate collaborative inquiry. As thought-leaders, they question what they know, and they may even question the beliefs that are at the deep structure of the culture. They may be skeptical of traditional boundaries, and even of success itself.

Mindful of the ecology of the larger system, they do this responsibly and with due diligence. They explain their assumptions and presuppositions publicly. They advocate transparently, they inquire honestly. This takes time and skill and faith and yet conscious leaders recognize that they must foster individual and systemic consciousness in order to create the conditions for reflection, for collaboration and for collective commitment. Systemic, conscious behavior whether it results in plans, actions or paths is a manifestation of the root of the first attribute: Leaders are decision-makers.

Leaders are distinction-makers.

To be good at this, the conscious leader must be a mindful, continuous learner and deliberately pursue an evolving system of knowledge. Conscious leaders are mindful of the principles that embody such a dynamic system as well as particular exemplars that connect the theory to practice. In every instance, the conscious leader strives to integrate the particulars of the specific event with the principles that represent acquired wisdom. There is a balance scale—WISDOM – sits on one side—and EVENT on the other. The conscious leader examines both—was this event wise in the light of current wisdom? Is current wisdom sufficient to weigh this event or does this event enlarge, refine, alter and shape wisdom? This examination, this reflective pursuit, leads to the acquisition of skills, strategies and tools. When this occurs, the course of action, or the direction is the deliberate result of sound judgment and expert thinking.

One paradox of this pursuit is that the most valuable consequence of the leader’s broadening knowledge base is the refinement of perception. As one learns more, she makes more precise observations, and more fully appreciates the importance of subtleties and nuance. Attentional awareness is the self-conscious recognition of perceptual focus. Novices do not pay attention to the same things that experts do. Moreover, they may be developmentally incapable of seeing the minute details that are obvious to an expert.

Gladwell points out the expert food testers use multi-dimensional 15-point scales to analyze and classify the qualities of taste, texture, and appearance of various products. These experts can even distinguish (and have continuums to record) even the slight variations between different batches of the same cookies made on the same day in the same factory! Clearly the ability to detect these delicate differences is beyond most of us. And while some may wonder about the inherent merits of such ability, it has a remarkable mark value. The expert’s ability to apprehend and record distinct instances of multiple variables is a rare, valuable commodity.

Conscious leaders, like all experts, are valued for their ability to know and recognize what factors, forces and dynamics make a difference in a system. Effective communication is as more about perceiving the subtle, non-verbal responses from others than it is about charisma. Effective problem-solving is as much about distinguishing between viable outcomes as it is about action planning. Team building, and developing capacity is more about diagnosis than having a repertoire of team-building activities. Conscious leaders understand this and it is reflected in the way they approach their work.

Over the past 15 years, we have attempted to isolate the cognitive behaviors of conscious leaders. In our work2 we have uncovered six cognitive meta-maps that seem to be correlated not only to conscious leaders. These meta-maps plot the terrain conscious leaders traverse in leading. And the presence of these maps correlates to the ability to craft what some researchers refer to as "elegant solutions."

Other groups also share this ability: those with a high degree of emotional literacy, effective teachers, change agents and coaches. Alison has also proposed a model that examines wisdom and her data suggest a correlative pattern as well.

The research on emotional literacy and on wisdom suggests that conscious leaders are wise and emotionally literate. Moreover, the meta-maps appear to be useful in identifying the wise and emotionally literate. So there is an intersecting of sets. As we studied these leaders, as we observed, talked with, and explored their thinking, insights emerged. In addition to the six meta-maps, a third attribute became apparent: a predisposition to use precise, professional language.

Leaders use a precise professional lexicon.

Conscious leadership and precision of language are inseparable, and to some degree they are a measure of each other. The leaders we have studies are careful about how they express their perceptions and intentions, both to themselves and to those they lead. They know the power of language to shape culture, to build trust, to foster collaborative advocacy and inquiry. Along with cognitive psychologists, and those who study psycho-linguistics leaders share the understanding that language shapes our perception events. How we talk about what happens and they way we frame events has a lot to do with the way we interpret those events short term and long. And while it may be possible to be aware of something for which one has no language, it is impossible to have meaningful language for some thing that is outside of one’s consciousness. And ultimately, it is impossible to move from awareness to understanding without meaningful language of some sort.

In addition to shaping our perception to events, language also shapes our response to events. Words reflect the degree to we are able to make and articulate important distinctions. To the uninitiated a skiff, scow or Boston Whaler are all boats. Likewise to the novice leader, the distinction between consensus and compromise is often vague or nonexistent. And in fact, until she knows the difference between the two, a leader may not even be able to see what the choices for decision-making are for a particular team in a particular instance in that team’s development. Language is how we make meaning. In either case the degree of linguistic precision is a measure of the refinement of perception.

Admission into a professional organization is a process of socialization. Professional language also sets standards for rigor with in a specialized community. The ability to recognize, understand and use the specific syntax and vocabulary of that profession is part of the socialization as well. Beyond mere jargon used to exclude the uninitiated, a professional nomenclature is a reflection of expertise, of both distinction-making and decision-making. As Schoen suggests, reflective practice is one measure that signifies not only deep professional knowledge, but also the ability to think like an expert.

Moreover, conscious leaders use language to help people to see things that they might not have seen otherwise. This shift in perception is both external and internal. In order to do this, the leader must first see with new eyes and then use language to help others see as well. In a recent workshop a participant suggested that for him, this process is like star gazing.

Looking at the night sky, he would of course apprehend everything that is there, but not be able to make meaningful distinctions. On the other hand if he were to look at the sky with the help of an astronomer, he would begin to distinguish stars from planets, to recognize constellations, and to have language to communicate those new perceptions. Now, within the field of stars, planets, asteroids and constellations he would see things differently, and as a result of that new perception his belief about his potential to see would also be altered. This is the work of leaders: enhancing perception and expanding potential.

When the leader opens new perspectives and widens the frame of possibilities then real change can begin. Those possibilities only exist outside current thinking. Yet there are those who do just that.

Kate Thomsen

"Building Resilient Students: Integrating Resiliency Into Everything You Already Know and Do" (2002, Corwin Press)

"Service-Learning in Grades K-8: Experiential Learning That Builds Character and Motivation" (2006, Corwin Press).

She has published two articles: “Positive Youth Development: If Schools Were Like Baseball Teams,” Reclaiming Children and Youth, Summer, 2004, and “Popping the Clutch,” published in Exceptional Parent Magazine, November, 2001. Kate’s books can be purchased online at www.corwinpress.com