The Inner Work of Leaders : Leadership as a Habit of Mind.(Review)

The Inner Work of Leaders Leadership as a Habit of Mind Barbara Mackoff and Gary Wenet New York, NY: Amacom, 2000 226 pp., $24.95 Hardcover

Dr. Barbara Mackoff is a prominent consulting psychologist and management educator, who conducts leadership seminars for Nestle, Coldwell Banker, Arco and other organizations around the world. She is the author of four books, including The Art of Self-Renewal and Growing a Girl. She provides seminars and keynote speeches about leadership, work, and family life issues.

Dr. Gary Wenet is a clinical psychologist with more than twenty years' experience in counseling business and civic leaders. As a therapist, lecturer, and consultant, he specializes in interpreting the complex, lifelong factors involved in the making of a leader, as well as the pressures and challenges facing men and women in leadership positions.

The book is divided into two parts, which cover topics related to the thinking processes of individual leaders. The processes involve reframing models from an individual's past, reflecting on present experiences, and mental mapping for future events. In Part One, "The Legacy of Leaders", the authors provide discussion that targets internal learning and meaning processes within the individual. The first chapter is devoted to consideration of childhood and early adult development models for the purpose of transforming the influence of family experiences into patterns for reaching human potential. In the next chapter, the authors present the practice of using worldly experiences as learning opportunities. This chapter identifies examples of guiding metaphors and lessons learned from exemplars that are used to enhance levels of personal awareness. The final chapter in this Part outlines processes used to make sense of the world from internal states of mind. The authors describe the power associated with inner authority and mental clarity, which prepares the leader to move forward with the information provided in Part Two.

Part Two, "Habits of Mind: The Resources to Inform and Invigorate Leadership" takes the reader through five habits used by leaders to maintain levels of continuous personal development. The author begins with discussion in the area of reflection (Chapter 4) as a means for enhancing self-awareness through meta-cognition, which is defined as the knowledge of personal thought and mood processes on a conscious level. The Socratic premise of "know thyself" serves as the basis for the elimination of defensive thoughts to facilitate the process of inward integrity and trust, which results in an evolved sense of self-awareness (p. 96). In Chapter 5, "Framing: Creating an Optimistic Narrative", the authors present a proactive approach to processing external information through self-talk.

They recommend a reframing approach used to convert negative perceptions into positive thoughts by focusing on how those experiences will be of service to the individual. The authors cite the term, "inner narrative" (p. 110) to describe the inner process of reframing through self-talk. The anchor for this internal dialogue is based in the frame of who the individual is and who the individual will become. In a section entitled "Theories of Relativity", the authors suggest that leaders who practice reframing on a continuous basis eventually complete the process on an unconscious level (p. 117). These two chapters provide the reader with mental processes aimed at overcoming limitations for the purpose of leadership development.

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