I’m not encouraging fighting in the workspace - I’m proposing another way of relating to pressure, conflict, innovation and growth. I call it Executive Judo.
These ‘forces’ playing against leaders will never cease throughout their career. So the seasoned modern warrior trains for them. How? Every opportunity they get.
They have been thrown again and again by errors in judgement but this leads to wisdom. If you’ve witnessed the calm presence and authority of a mentor or leader in your space, you’ll know exactly what I mean. They didn’t get there by chance. It was their willingness to grapple with the situation with emotional intelligence and humility.
The word Judo is a combination of two Japanese characters 柔道 comprising ju, which means “soft”, and do, which means “the way”. This translates to “the soft way” or “the gentle way”.
Executive Judo is therefore the ‘leadership gently way’. This way of showing up leads to Executive Presence. Here's how one might describe someone playing at this level:
- It’s holding the standard whilst being patient as other’s rise
- It’s integrity and the ability to speak truth to power whilst being tactful and flexible to other perspectives
- It’s decisiveness and showing teeth whilst being approachable and open to challenge
If you’ve ever been metaphorically thrown in the executive space reflect if you held too tight to a perspective, a value or an emotion.
This is called ‘the hard way’.
In judo (and other martial arts), when a person stiffens up or over-corrects, it’s the ideal time to throw them. And it’s effortless to do so because rigidity reduces responsiveness. Hence the ‘gentleness’ with which their feet can be taken from beneath them. They become victim of their own psycho-sclerosis: a hardening of the attitude.
The deeper truth behind Executive Judo is that the opponent is always within.
This has been a teaching I’ve come to experience first-hand in the decades of martial arts training and in the conversations I have with executives. What makes them progressive professionally, is their willingness to face that opponent and expose the real enemy. Usually, it’s just a thought.
When they expose the thought, they access their Black Belt leadership potential.
What’s the internal stance you need to ease up on?