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Examine any list of issues facing leaders today, from the World Economic Forum to polls of leaders themselves, and a theme that rises to the top is steering their businesses and people through nonstop uncertainty and volatility. Fueling this uncertainty and volatility are the political and economic environments, the disruption of AI, the increased risks of not addressing the climate crisis, some combination of which show up in workplace after workplace as increased burnout, low levels of engagement and declining trust.
What is a leader to do? Among the preponderance of good advice are suggestions like: restore economic optimism, train people to use AI, foster inclusion and flexible work arrangements, and prioritize psychological safety. What behavioral advice such as this can miss is the resonant quality of leaders themselves. Do they authentically feel and express what's behind these behaviors, respectively: optimism, curiosity, inclusivity, flexibility and safety? If they don't, people will sense it and discordant behaviors will fall flat. But when leaders do feel optimistic, safe and so forth, the walk and talk of these restorative behaviors will match, that is, add up to a coherent signal that others trust. Such leaders become the signal that settles the noise in this turbulent time. The science of resonance and Zen Leadership offer immediate and longer-term practices for cultivating such presence.
Resonance, which is to vibrate with, is the principle of all change. It is also highly specific in that not everything resonates with everything else. When waves of matching energy come together -- meaning each can use what the other offers -- they can cancel, interfere or add up to a bigger signal. This last possibility, called coherence, is of particular significance, because these bigger signals can register above the background of noise. Scaled up to the realm of leadership, examples of such bigger signals might be when something in us lights up with a signal from the Zeitgeist, whereby we sense a possible future with inspiration and clarity. A bigger signal might be stronger executive presence, whereby we bring calm and safety to other people through co-regulation.
Co-regulation, or the ability of one nervous system to match or entrain another, is not magical, accidental or dependent on conscious effort. Rather it is the way biological and physical systems naturally move toward the most stable available energy state. If a bunch of grandfather clocks are put in room together, for example, the biggest amplitude signal will entrain the others. Why? Because the friction caused by waves that slightly interfere is slightly less stable than the coherent state when waves seamlessly add up. Likewise, if two infants are laid side-by-side, the stronger breather will entrain the breathing of the weaker. If a leader of strong, calm executive presence enters a room of jangled nerves, people will settle down and feel safer.
Leaders who exude this kind of presence, sometimes called resonant leaders, function with high emotional intelligence (EQ) and have been shown to improve performance, resilience and psychological capital in their organizations. EQ is built on self-awareness and self-regulation and demonstrates empathy, social skills and positivity. A mechanism for how positivity can lead to these positive effects can be found in the research of Rollin McCraty at the HeartMath Institute. He's found that positive emotions -- even if consciously self-induced -- increase heart coherence and enable coherence between heart and brain waves. The heart is primarily responsible for the electromagnetic field around a person. The signature of a happy heart is a smooth sine wave of heart rate variability. This strengthens and organizes one's electromagnetic field, which can be sensed at a distance.
Moreover, coherence leads to more coherence. A coherent heart is better able to sense and synchronize with brain waves and breathing rates, enabling a coherent mind-body being. A coherent being is better able to read and mirror others -- getting on the same wavelength, as it were -- and entrain others toward a similarly positive, coherent state. To come full circle to the elements of EQ, while entrainment requires no conscious effort, self-awareness and self-regulation to maintain a coherent state may well require intentionality and practice, especially under difficult conditions.
Coherence not only enables leaders to be a co-regulating force and better read of others, it also helps them better sense and match signals from the environment. Coherence brings a quality of quietude to listening, clarity to perception and graceful power to action. Without extra noise in our system -- e.g., chattering thoughts, triggered emotions, bodily tensions -- we can more readily resonate with signals that match our capacity to act. Coherence is like tuning the dial of an analog radio that moves through patches of static until it matches the frequency of a nearby station that suddenly comes in clearly. This same clarity flows not only through our perceptions, but also through our actions and ability to bring others along. When others are unsure or unsettled -- which rampant uncertainty can bring about -- caring clarity can be the strongest, most trustworthy signal in the room.
As Rollin McCraty observes, "We are always feeding the field," whether through our being (presence) or our doing (actions). We are always emanating a signal. If we want to be a strong caring signal that settles the noise around us, here are two ways Zen can support us. The first is long term and foundational, the second is immediate and practice-able.
At its core, Zen is not a philosophy or religion but rather a way to use the physical body to set the mind free. What it frees us from is exactly what gets in the way of coherence, namely an ego concerned with its own needs and survival that we have mistaken as our identity. Zen meditation induces a flow state called samadhi where we experience ourself as the whole picture -- a wholly connected human being. We start to see through the ego and its conditioned tendencies from useful habits to trauma-induced neuroses. Increasingly we dis-identify from the ego as the totality of who we are and evolve into living the paradox of a wholly connected selfless-self with a local self portal into the here and now. The ego, which was once a master, becomes a tool in service of others and a better world.
What especially supports coherence is that as we dis-identify from the ego, the dualism of life and death resolves to a higher level, embracing both, and the sense of safety becomes unconditional. This makes leaders fearless and caring for the bigger picture, which is exactly the resonant signal that settles others and builds trust. Hence, a saying in Zen is that the highest form of an art -- and this applies to leadership -- is to take away fear. With boundless safety, tensions relax and flexibility grows. Inclusivity is natural as nothing is threatened. Curiosity abounds as the fear of failure evaporates. The ups and downs of life are borne with equanimity and optimism prevails. Such embodied signals will, without effort, resonate in others.
The cultivation of samadhi develops over months and years and deepens over decades. Here is a practice that can be done here and now based on the HeartMath protocol for entering head-heart coherence. The following adaptation adds elements from Zen training to enable a state that is more grounded and brings the power center, hara, into coherence with the head and heart.
After 2-3 minutes of this deep, positive breathing, you're likely to sense one or more of the signs of coherence: more quietude, calm, and receptivity, as if mirroring life like a calm pond. In such a state, leaders can better read the environment for directional clarity and be a stronger source of co-regulation for more coherent, collective action. More than restoring economic optimism, training people to use AI or any other behavior, such leaders become living proof of Thich Nhat Hanh's Zen wisdom: "The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence."