What if you couldn't even lead the horse to water? Pretty dumb horse, right?
Wrong, says Nancy Lowery, who a year ago began an intriguing program that uses horses to help participants improve their leadership skills.
"I've worked with horses all my life, and the one thing I've learned is that it's never their fault when something goes wrong," Lowery says. "If something becomes a challenge for the horse, you are the one who is causing that result."
The same principle holds true in the workplace, says Lowery, a contract project manager for the past 15 years.
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| Dave Olecko, Business Edge |
| Nancy Lowery and Chaz, her 11-year-old paint, teach business communication skills |
If a horse understands the leader's language, receives clear direction, and trusts and respects the leader, it will happily do what's asked, she says.
But if a horse balks, or something's not working quite right, the person has to question what he or she hasn't done properly.
Lowery owns seven horses and jokingly calls herself a slow learner. It was only five years ago she made the connection that the skills she uses training horses mirror what she needed to use in the business world.
Once she started to focus on those skills - using her horse sense, so to speak - she achieved better results from her business teams.
That was the genesis for her Lead to Succeed program launched last February. Based in Balzac, just north of Calgary's city limits, the program offers leaders a hands-on lesson in getting horses to accomplish increasingly complicated tasks during a one-day session. (In the morning, for example, one task involves having a horse follow the person while the horse is on a lead and halter. In the afternoon the horse must follow untethered; or later it is asked to walk across a bridge.)
As the day progresses, participants begin to understand the parallels with the workplace, Lowery explains.
"Each participant is paired with a suitable horse partner who will in turn become inspired, resistant or aloof, depending on the leadership and communication of the handler."
The program is taught to a small group of men and women in a heated arena. Participants don't ride the horses and don't require any previous experience with horses.
In the sessions, Lowery focuses on a few key leadership skills such as developing awareness, precise language, and creating trust and respect. In each phase, she links the exercise to the workplace.
As an illustration, Lowery says that learning to talk to a horse in clear, consistent language is critical.
"The common language we share with horses is body language. Horses read body language 100 per cent. Humans may be only aware of their body language for 10 per cent of their communication.
"But it (body language) may be up to 80 per cent of what somebody else is hearing from you."
Lowery says to think about how humans may use the same hand gesture when they're happy, sad, excited or angry. One gesture might express 10 different things and may be interpreted differently by various people.
With a horse the potential for confusion is clear-cut: Use a gesture that might convey even two different things and the horse is baffled.
Learning about hand gestures gives leaders more self-awareness about body language. How often, she asks, have we seen a leader enter an emotional meeting with the intention of calming the situation but in fact does the opposite with his or her body language?
If that person walks in with arms crossed and shoulders tensed, that tension might be the only thing another person sees - which only worsens the situation.
Jana Sider, a director of finance and information technology for the City of Airdrie, says the program confirmed one of her main weaknesses.
"As an individual I know I do things at a fast pace," Sider says. "I like to process things quickly. So when I was working in the morning and Nancy was teaching a specific task, I said (to myself), 'Yeah, yeah, I've got it. I've practised enough.' " But later in the day, she paid for her impatience. When it came time to combine a number of lessons in order to put her horse through a complicated task, all she got was a confused look from her equine partner.
Her earlier practice wasn't perfect. Sider was frustrated. So was the horse.
"I could have blamed the horse, but the horse isn't stupid," Sider says.
"I had to look at how my hurry-up kind of attitude, or impatience level, showed up with the horse. I had to ask, 'What happened here?' " Back in the workplace, Sider now says she must recognize that not everybody wants to work at her pace.
"If I'm in a hurry I may not be giving all the information I need to give. If somebody goes away and is unclear (on what I want), they can potentially come back with something I didn't ask for."
Lowery says the horses teach many lessons that can surface in the workplace. One issue is clarifying and confirming.
In her morning sessions, if a person isn't sure what they are being taught to do with a horse, they have to ask, or they'll face problems in the afternoon, Lowery says.
"Often we get ourselves into situations where everyone seems to agree and understand what's going on.
"We get nervous and don't say anything because we don't want to look like we're dumb. But if it impacts you, confirmation is the most important thing that you can do."
The simple act of having a horse follow on a lead and halter teaches another lesson.
Whenever people start this task, they keep wanting to look back to see if the horse is following, she says. Making a link to the workplace, she asks participants to think about leading people.
"If you have a direction you need to go, you need to be looking where you are going so you don't trip and fall. If you are constantly looking back over your shoulder people will wonder why."
Lowery tells participants to think of the battle scenes in the movie The Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers. "When the leader charges the enemy, he doesn't keep looking over his shoulder saying, 'C'mon, c'mon,' " she says.
"It's the whole idea of starting the concept of you as a leader having a vision, being clear on it.
"You may have to stop and check once in a while. But if you are constantly looking over your shoulder you won't have the respect nor the trust of the animal, or the people in the workplace."
A fairly simple task, it delivers an important lesson.
And it's also how you'd lead a horse to water.
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(Mike Dempster can be reached at miked@businessedge.ca)
