The Alchemy of Leadership: Master the art of transforming leaden thinking into the gold of wisdom

Alchemy is the art of transforming leaden thinking into the gold of wisdom and an artful leader must know how to lead people creatively, especially when confronted by disruptive change.

How do you navigate chaos, complexity, and ambiguity? One of the best ways to learn these skills is through the arts—not to become an artist— but to awaken your senses and open your mind to new possibilities.

The Alchemy of Leadership: Shifting from a Problem-focused Model to Artful Creation

The Alchemy of Leadership Workshop is designed to open your mind, re-kindle your imagination, mine the gold of wisdom in your group and approach the future with optimism.

Take your team on an inspiring interactive online learning adventure to explore business and leadership challenges using the arts.

Art-making has an alchemical effect on the imagination. Artistic processes create a crucible for transforming leaden thinking into the gold of wisdom.

Create a Crucible for Creativity and New Discoveries

One of the biggest barriers to moving forward is the fear of failure. If leaders don’t make it safe to fail, employees will never take risks. The alchemists used the crucible to contain experiments and hold the heat of fire. They accepted failure as part of the process of discovery.

We need crucibles in groups to contain the heat of discussion, experimentation, and failure, to make it safe for people to explore, experiment, delve into conversations that matter, so we can create the conditions for brilliance to emerge.

Explore the arts as an interdisciplinary catalyst for transformation in culture, creativity, identity, and your own personal development as a leader

  • The arts take us on adventures in creative expression that help us safely explore unknown territory, overcome fear, and take conceptual risks.
  • The art experience enhances our abilities to think in new and fresh ways about existing reality through critical reflection, reframing, and context shifting. The blank canvass becomes a metaphor for discovering the white space of opportunities.
  • Visual dialogues help people dig below the surface layer of perception, examine the figure/ground of underlying assumptions and evoke fresh thinking.
  • Theatre improvisation gives leaders rehearsal space to try out new ideas. Through Improv, we can observe the importance of trust, reliance, and individual contribution, as well as the vitality of learning from mistakes.
  • We can discover creative insights by building, shaping and sculpting ideas into prototypes to test concepts.

Alchemy of Leadership Workshops give participants the opportunity to practice these skills:

  • Inquiry that provokes new insights, connections, possibilities, and directions
  • Visual Literacy and Observation: The ability to observe, think critically and make meaning from images and information presented
  • Cross-pollinating ideas: Thinking together, across cultures, networks and disciplines
  • Connecting: Linking ideas that aren’t obviously related. Connecting the unconnected to produce new ideas
  • Experimenting intellectually and experientially. Learning by doing. Rehearsing “what if” options that lead to meaningful insights
  • Active Listening: Listening to learn, rather than gather ammunition for an argument
  • Reflecting through painting, contemplation, journal writing and dialogue to integrate theory with practice, and enhance learning, including learning from mistakes
  • Creating crucibles of discovery and experimentation to mine the gold of wisdom in the group
  • Designing strategies, actions and viable solutions.

Each activity is tied to an organizational objective/challenge to stimulate fresh ideas about real-world challenges.

Alchemy of Leadership: Learning Outcomes & Benefits:

  • How to use art as a catalyst for creativity, insights, communication and connection
  • Create conditions to think outside the box and disrupt habitual ways of thinking
  • Use arts-based activities to inspire, engage, destress, and re-energize  your team
  • How to decode complexity
  • Draw on artistic sensibilities to gain new insights
  • Insights about navigating chaos, ambiguity, and complexity
  • Practical creativity techniques for individuals and groups
  • Creativity and innovation skills development
  • Improve communications and foster an appreciation for diverse and pluralistic points of view.
  • Paint a compelling vision of the future, and design a plan for action

Programs are customized to suit your organizational requirements.

You may also be interested in these workshops

Ask us how the Alchemy of Leadership can help your employees