Jul 26, 2017
Nina Simons, co-founder of Bioneers and director of
Everywoman’s Leadership program, talks about her passion for
leadership and the power of diversity. Nina exposes the biases that
hinder us from realizing the full spectrum of human
contribution. In
all her work, Nina aims to reveal deep, insidious imbalances, or
‘stories,’ that underlie our leadership. Cultural values form
biases within us. Revealing those biases can offer a greater array
of leadership choices.
Key Takeaways
[3:12] “Cultivating Women’s Leadership” workshop
participants are selected from diverse women who are purposeful and
motivated to effect change. They clarify their leadership
motivation. They explore gifts of women’s leadership and growing
each other’s leadership skills. “Regenerative Leadership” workshops
are for all. Participants improve their effectiveness and ability
to recharge and regenerate.
[6:55] In all her work, Nina aims to reveal deep,
insidious imbalances, or ‘stories,’ that underlie our leadership.
Cultural values form biases within us. Revealing those biases can
offer a greater array of leadership choices.
[10:47] Nina’s career has been informed by a passion
for diversity — of agricultural seeds, of the ecology, and of
society. Diversity is nature’s safeguard against extinction.
Bioneers involves 13 constituencies for global change. WDN involves
women philanthropists to effect progressive change. Everywoman’s
Leadership features diverse women as leadership models.
[17:41] Nina gives advice for leaders to build
diverse teams. Cultivate a deep valuing of the multiplicity of ways
that human beings show up. Recognize our own lenses and blinders,
so we create a work environment that invites and includes all.
[20:23] Nina worked at Bioneers with Dawna
Markova, author of numerous leadership books, who said,
“One of our most common mistakes as leaders is that we think that
people who think like us are smart, and people who don’t think like
us are not.” This taught Nina that Bioneers needed to draft people
who did not all think alike, for a system that represents the whole
of human capacities.
[23:29] As leaders, one of our greatest assets is our
vulnerability. Owning our mistakes cultivates us as learning
organisms and organizations. We need diversity of mind, heart,
spirit, and body. Nina says we all have masculine and feminine
within us, and as leaders, we want to be able to pull from that
spectrum traits that are needed at any given time.
[26:06] Nina discusses the confidence gap between
women and men. It starts when girls are trained not to boast, not
to assert themselves, and to hold themselves back. Girls orient
more toward service for other people. Boys tend to orient more
toward achievement for themselves. We need many more role models of
women in STEM and other technical fields. Self-assurance is
needed.
[29:29] The Iroquois Six Nations were inspirational
to the suffragettes, as a culture where women’s wisdom was valued.
Women select Chiefs based on their observations of young boys’
behaviors, seeing which of them are most attuned to the needs of
the whole. The drafters of the Constitution drew upon elements of
the Six Nations, but they did not adopt gender equality.
[32:00] Moonrise features 38 women and 2
men. Common themes were leaders responding to internal motivation,
not external authority. It was the work of their hearts spirits to
respond. They led with their whole person; body, spirit and mind.
Vulnerability was a strength. They were collaborative, using
relational intelligence, modeling respect and dignity for all
living things.
[38:40] Nina notes leaders who inspired her:
Terry Tempest Williams, who led her to imagine
herself in multiple roles, Nalini Nadkarni,
creating social innovation to save rainforest canopies, and
Judy Wicks, co-founder of the business alliance
for local-living communities.
Website: Bioneers.org
Look for the Bioneers Conference in October.
Website: CultivatingWomensLeadership.org
Website: WomenDonors.org
Website: NinaSimons.com
Facebook: Nina
Simons
Facebook: Bioneers.org
Twitter: @ninabioneers
LinkedIn: Nina Simons
Bio
Nina Simons, co-founder of Bioneers and director of
its Everywoman’s Leadership program, is a social entrepreneur
passionate about reinventing leadership and restoring the feminine
in us all.
Nina’s work currently focuses on writing, speaking,
and teaching about women, leadership, diversity, nature, and
systems thinking. Nina’s career has spanned several decades and has
traversed working within the corporate sector, and working within
the nonprofit sector. Nina has a bird’s-eye view around leadership
and how it manifests in those different realms.
Books Mentioned in this Episode
Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the
Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, by
Margot Lee Shetterly
Moonrise: The Power of Women Leading from the Heart,
Edited by Nina Simons
Also mentioned on the show:
http://www.ucodegirl.org/ourstory/