Modes: A New Model for Leadership Development by Daniel Goleman

An executive told me he was sobered by some performance feedback: he shut down empathy the instant he felt let down by someone’s performance.

He would flip into micro-managing, just dictating to the person what to do in a cool, sometimes even mean, way. That flip into a negative leadership style signifies that a self-defeating mode has triggered.

Modes are orchestrations of how we feel, think and act. They dictate how we perceive and react. Each mode has its own behavioral repertoire – we are, literally, a different person in our different modes. Modes are usually invisible to us – though everyone we interact with while in them senses what’s going on.

The good news: our modes are sets of learned habits. Because the brain is plastic, we can unlearn the negative ones and replace them with more effective habits.

Daniel Goleman

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