Emotional Leadership

The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.

The Delegate Couldn't Know How Deeply His Comment Resonated with Me

Just prior to our saying goodbye, one of the IBM Global LGBT Leadership Workshop delegates, remarked to me one on one, "American culture has a different way of public speaking... and the way you facilitated -- I would call it -- 'emotional leadership'."

Is it part of American culture to facilitate warmly, or is it just my style, and I happen to be American?

It's true that I touch participants on the shoulder and back occasionally and also laugh easily as well as hope to move people -- to activate them -- but it's not even fully conscious on my part...until now, as I'm reflecting on what the delegate said.

In terms of emotions themselves, I always feel so many when facilitating learning, and perhaps, more than ever with this series: a summit for openly lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) IBM executives, and a global leadership development workshop for LGBT not-yet-exec. leaders.

For the workshop I co-designed and facilitated last Friday, I felt sad, desirous, anxious, competitive, thrilled, super-invested, touched and loving. And then afterward, while sitting in the hotel bar with a number of delegates, I felt the same emotions, plus exhausted.

Sad: My father of blessed memory died at ~11:20 pm, November 1st, 1982 and had grown up in D.C., 40 minutes from where I was facilitating in Baltimore. Could I do all I did on November 1st and 2nd to honor his memory? Would he be proud of me, or would we be estranged if he did not approve of my lesbian identity?

Desirous: All of the female delegates and even a few of the male ones are attractive to me. It's exciting to know that none of them is heterosexual -- never happens in any other learning arena. Please God, let me remain appropriate and not cause anyone to feel harassed verbally. Please don't let me embarrass myself by leaking any of these feelings, even as I have a pact with Pat never to act on any such feelings, and haven't in the 20 years we've been together. Don't want to express 'em either.

Anxious: Will I be able to be a great agent for their learning and activation? Am I reaching all of them, or am I leaving some behind? Will the timing of the agenda work out? Can I adjust it effectively if need be? Are they finding the exercises meaningful? Are they willingly opting in to one of the teams being formed around the 2013 Vital Few? Is this learning experience one of the best they've ever had or not? And if not, why not?

Competitive: What is it about the execs. that enabled them to lead such huge missions? What would it take for me to be recognized as worthy of leading one? Which one could it be? Will I ever be recognized as meriting the exec. stripe? Do I look as fit as the other women? Why am I one of the only women in the entire room with short hair? Who am I better-/worse-looking than? How can I stay quiet instead of revealing competitiveness by what I say? How can I remain poised and just listen and be happy for others' success?

Thrilled: What a rush to see them enter the ballroom and pick up their name-badges and tent-cards and to know that it's really happening: nearly 50 LGBT IBMers from around the world, together -- just us -- for a whole day. And thrilled by the international panel -- charming, lovely delegates from Bangalore, Moscow, Vienna and Tel Aviv. How lucky am I to get to ask questions that make me curious and to invite questions from participants! What a privilege to be the moderator!

Super-invested: I want these learners to succeed, especially because they are my people. Also, am concerned that being one of them, I will be judged even more strictly by them than I might be if I weren't one of them.

-- Disclaimer -- : I'm sitting in front of a football game on TV because Pat and I want to be together this evening after my having been away for half a week, and so it's harder to focus on my feelings for this blog-entry. By the way, her Green Bay Packers won, so the mood around here is buoyant.

Touched: When one of the executive panelists -- who's responsible this year for 3/4 of a billion dollars of IBM revenue -- responded to my moderator-question about when he first became aware of his gender identity, I was moved because he spoke of how abused he'd been as a kid by peers, since they saw him as effeminate. Most of all, I was touched that the delegates apparently bought in to my upfront premise of the workshop -- that self-awareness leads to authenticity, which leads to premier leadership -- as demonstrated by their willingness to reflect with one another so openly, especially since a good number of them had never met one another prior to the workshop.

Loving: Just before kicking off the workshop, I sat down next to a delegate with whom I wasn't previously acquainted, introduced myself and asked, "How's it going?"

"It's all sort of a whirlwind," she said, "I'm just taking it all in." She looked like I remember feeling in the early days of my coming out: bombarded. I felt flooded with compassion, listening to her. At the end of the day, when she said goodbye, I saw that she had dimples. They were visible, now that she no longer seemed overwhelmed.

And after the international panel was done, I stood and looked at each of the panelists from Austria, India, Israel and Russia, and felt tearful with a rush of affection; it seemed that they were similarly moved when I looked in their eyes.

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I've been sitting on this blog-entry for weeks, wondering why I couldn't write something more perfectly expressive of my feelings post-Baltimore and as self-revealing and honest as I've been above, I didn't post the above prior to now because it was missing the full expression of my most embarrassing feelings of all (though I did leak a bit of it above in the "Competitive" section....) In the spirit of my friend Richard's belief that it's the things about which we're most embarrassed that are most interesting about us, I'll express it finally, 23 days later:

Am I a hypocrite? Am I practicing what I preached, about pursuing our potential? I invested imagination-time x 2, design-time x 2, sponsor-review-time x 2, room-setup-time x 2, facilitation-time x 2 and all-of-the-above-emotions-time x 2 in dedicating sessions to the advancement of IBM, the LGBT community at large, and very specifically to a selected group of LGBT IBMers, but when will I know when I've fully advanced and reached my own potential? What *is* my own potential? What is healthy ambition vs. unhealthy ego? How much ego do I get to have before it's unhealthy?

I am qualified and repeatedly invited to help develop premier leaders, but am I recognized as a leader myself? And if so, why am I not literally leading people again, with a title to match? And is it enough to me if I myself recognize myself as a leader? And when did I gain this craving for outward status? When I joined the company, I did not even aspire to be a first-line people manager, and then did, but for pastoral reasons -- really -- and the people-manager role did satisfy my pastoral bent. And I left management to help start up the LGBT business development mission, and didn't return. Why am I thinking so literally now?

Would it wreck the amazing experience a number of delegates told me they had if they knew that their facilitator had these questions? Or might it paradoxically reinforce my credibility?

And what will I do with these questions? How can I answer them in a way that benefits my work and me altogether? All I can do is make a personal pledge that co-designing and delivering the sessions is rededicating me to further pursue my own potential in addition to having promoted that the delegates pursue theirs. Time for more prayer, too, I think: God, please help me follow your direction. Amen.

Emotion Parade During Our Trip to Israel

The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.

Ultimately, Relief Is the Grand Marshal

This dusty dirt road belies the rows and rows of spry, young avocado trees behind the hoary trees on the left, but doesn't surprise me with the village's cemetery just around the bend. My father's parents, his sister and her husband are buried there (z"l). In reliving the trip here, I'm not sure how orderly I can make the emotion parade, or how much I should try to do so. Here, I'm posting photos and writing about a place of which I have been conscious for more than 40 years, first through Sabta (my grandmother) and Aunt Tovah -- the generations of our family that moved there in 1948 and '47 respectively.

Until reading the name beneath my grandfather's on his side of the gravestone, I do not know or recall that my grandfather was the son of Chaim Mordechai haLevi, and had chosen to name his eldest son (my dad of blessed memory) after his deceased dad (z"l). One grave sits in a moshav in Israel and the other on the outskirts of Stamford, Connecticut. If my dad had stayed in Israel after serving in WWII in the U.S. Navy, rather than leaving and moving to the Village in New York City, I wouldn't be here to blog about standing in awe at the continuity.

This visit with my family, both dead and alive, doesn't happen till our last day in Israel and I am anticipating it the entire time. Instead of being anticlimactic or even somehow disappointing -- which a number of highly-anticipated events are in my experience -- it is marvelous. Relatively, my first cousins Edna and Meishe are two of seven first cousins with whom I'm the closest; siblings Sarit -- aka Sari -- and Yanai are the others with whom I'm closest. Meishe and Edna have worse luck than the rest of us in that their parents Tovah and Lulu both were buried already, and Uncle Lulu died when they were young, in 1967, just weeks after our grandfather died; Saba died of Leukemia and Uncle Lulu of a freakish bathtub fall if I remember correctly -- 50 years, so far, of Edna and Meishe, leaving stones on Uncle Lulu's grave, and Uncle Lulu never got to see his gorgeous, talented grandchildren, Dvori, Lilach, Anat, Eli and Omri. And Meishe's now a grandfather himself, twice already, of Ori and Hilla. What if Aunt Tovah were still living? She would have gotten to know two delightful great-grandchildren so far. What if my father were still alive? He would have gotten to know four beautiful, stellar grandchildren. What if Uncle Vevy (Zev), the father of Yanai and Sari, were still living? He would have gotten to know all four of his precious, brilliant grandchildren, rather than only Yanai's kids.

So much envy to trudge through: I envy Sari and Yanai for getting to have both of their parents for much longer than I did, and perhaps Edna and Meishe envy Sari and Yanai, too, as well as how my dad lasted a few more years than theirs, till 56, and how my mom, so far, has lasted 20 years longer than theirs. Or maybe I'm the only one who thinks this way. And how does it serve me? In this case, I think, envy is just another type of mourning. This family in Israel is a thick link to my father, who I miss practically continuously, no matter that this November, he'll already have been gone corporeally for 30 years. The ache doesn't lessen. The couple of random memories that Edna and I share about him in the car from Tel Aviv to Beit Herut are incalculably dear to me, including how he used to read her stories in Hebrew and then when he was done, asked her what they were about. "The difference was that your father could read, but couldn't speak, and Uncle Vevy could speak, but couldn't read as well." We leave the cemetery, which had been Meishe's and Edna's profound idea to visit. The white slabs of my lost relatives serve as a peaceful, sad contrast to all of the hopeful colors to come during the rest of my visit.

My one priority other than seeing all of my available relatives is first to stop at the community pool, where I had spent significant times at 15, during the Summer of '80, when I lived with my second cousins, Gila, Shmuel (z"l), Moti, Ron and Nitza. It is a bit out of the way and it is definitely a youngest-child-syndrome moment, where just like my older sisters Deb and Kayla had done for me my whole early life, and perhaps they think they do still, Meishe and Edna are proxies and indulge me. This is the only time Pat intervenes and says, "Sarah, the rest of your relatives are waiting to see you." In response, I feel less guilty than determined to peek at the pool.

Probably, I could pause here to wonder what else Pat was thinking of all of this -- a dimension of my history to which she hasn't had direct access prior -- but the reality is that I am fully self-absorbed and unconsciously taking for granted that Pat can be self-sufficient during the visit, beyond my making initial introductions, where I consciously refer to her as my wife; I follow our dear friends David & Gerard's advice to use the term "wife" as often as possible to make up for all of the years that we couldn't. My cousins prove to be completely, naturally, genuinely welcoming to us. Their warmth makes me feel proudly beloved.

My dad of blessed memory always talked about the *Pirkei Avot*/*Ethics of the Fathers* statement, "K'neh l'chah chaver," which was the concept that friendship is so precious, we should be willing to pay for it. With that in mind -- not knowing how warmly we'd be received -- I bring gifts for family of all ages. Though I am not satisfied that they are amazing enough -- bunches of IBM logo'ed items...a cup, toddler T-shirts, mini golf umbrellas and rebus notebooks, plus a couple of Mickey Mouse paint-sets from my mother, a child's puzzle from the Jewish Museum in New York, and a Beijing Olympics key-ring for Dvori, since I remember that she is a champion swimmer and instructor -- I hand them out quickly upon our arrival, which helps me channel my nervous excitement at being met by known and new faces.

Of course, I need to bring gifts because they always give us gifts, even when we are visiting them in their home-country. Maybe they are similarly familiar with the *Pirkei Avot* saying, or maybe they're just generous. They give Pat & me each some special Dead Sea revitalizing products as well as a fantastic 2012-2013 Israeli art calendar. The thing is, in choosing gifts for them, I can't think of anything American that they don't already have access to, and the IBM-logo'ed products, at least, are not generally, publicly available, and they really are a reflection of how I've spent nearly the past two decades in the States and and India. In fact, my IBM service counts for 22 years this month. We also wish we could have brought them bottles of the New Jersey State Fair-winning Iris honey from the Presby Memorial Iris Gardens, where Pat serves as Treasurer of the Board, here in Montclair, but we figure that it could be a Security challenge, or else disastrous if the bottles break in our luggage.

Also, I'm hoping that some of my memories are bonus gifts for them; theirs are to me, certainly. I've got an aerogramme from Aunt Tovah, dated November, 1980, that refers to Anat's precociousness as a toddler. And as I'm sitting here, reflecting now, I'm recalling how when Dvori was an infant and I was 11, I blew at her eyes to watch her long eyelashes wave at the wind and no one stopped me. Probably, no one other than Dvori saw me do it. She was smiling, or at least, not crying during my experiment, so I don't think I did any lasting harm.

And I've got a nice photo of my oldest cousin Gila with her husband, Shmuel and her parents, if I remember correctly, and me at 15, which I show to Gila and which she asks Meishe to photocopy. Of course, this being 2012, he has a photocopier in his home. And Gila's daughter Nitza recalls two memories that I had forgotten: She took me to school with her during my first or second visit, when I was eight or 11, and she remembers that I ran the 60 meter dash really fast. (It was not a trend.) Nitza also remembers how exciting it was to receive a package from me, from the United States: "You sent those [molded rubber] Sesame Street finger-puppets, and to this day, I can't throw them away. I still have them." (My dad (z"l), who was a game and toy designer, had brought them home -- enough to share some, so I did.)

When Nitza and her mom Gila, along with Nitza's darling young son, enter Meishe and Bina's living room, I spring up and hug them. I also introduce Pat, but want to sit closer to them to be able to talk and leave Pat on the couch. By now, everyone is talking with her and she is enjoying the conversation and a sort of melon that she says later tasted like a more delicious version of cantaloupe, but which isn't the same color.

Pat looks perfectly comfortable, and I take the golden opportunity to sit down especially next to Gila, who is just a few years younger than my mom and she kindly lets me speak halting Hebrew with her, rather than English, even though she understands English perfectly. It is so cool! Gila, Nitza, Edna and Bina all are sitting near me at the same time and we have a history! At this moment, I don't need the Dead Sea serum; I am 30 years younger, just reminiscing with them. And being around typically remote people who still remembered my dear father (z"l) brings him back to life for me for a bit, even if just for the length of our visit.

The time with my Israeli family is too brief, as we are meeting my mom's 90ish-year-old friend for lunch Chaya back in Tel Aviv, but it leaves Pat and me wanting more, and I hope our Beit Herut-based family feels the same way. Gila (second from the left in this last photo) says to me emphatically, "I'm all alone in that big house, so next time you and Pat come to Israel, you must stay with me." We'd love to and hope to. What a rich visit, with 22 of my emotions on parade, some internally and some externally: awe, anticipation, surprise, nostalgia, envy, mourning, ache, appreciation, amusement, peace, sadness, hope, courage, warmth, pride, love, vulnerability, nervousness, excitement, wonderment, and renewal -- with relief leading the way...relief that I could pick up with my family where we left off, that the family, including Pat, warmly received one another, relief that I could communicate in Hebrew, even if at a pre-Kindergarten level, and relief at the ease we felt, being with all of them.

Friendship-joy Inventory

The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.

Worry and Pleasure

Often, I feel bad that I don't invest in friendships much with anyone other than my partner, Pat. Work and school and commuting take up so much of my time that I don't get to play with friends like I did as a young kid through college. It's kind of like downhill-skiing. I did it a lot as a kid and loved it, but now that I've got premier equipment, I hardly go.

Probably, I'm a more desirable friend than ever, with all the maturity and interesting experience I've gained over my lifetime so far...but I don't want to spend this blog entry, flaggelating myself about my lack of friendship time-investment. Years ago, Pat told me a great point that I recalled often, including now; she learned from a Psychology professor during her Psych. MS program: "At any given time, people are doing the best they can."

So I do want to imagine further what I began thinking about during a commute home the other night: What if I could put together a table of friends from over my lifetime? What if they got to meet one another? Some of them already have met one another, but....I'd love it if all of them took turns, describing to one another how they became friends with me and what I was like as a friend....When else could a scenario like that take place, other than at my wedding or funeral?

They'd start their conversation that way, and then they'd get to know one another and would see further what terrific taste I have in friends!

I wish it didn't take an occasion like that. I'd make a huge table, including the people that I still consider friends, no matter when we last saw one another.

Probably only five of the 57 friends ever read this blog, and yet, I'm worried that I've forgotten to list someone essential....

Selected Emotions that Accompanied Scenes from the Friendships

In Childhood:
Peacefulness: standing on the front-steps of our childhood home, looking up at the towering tulip tree with Deb
Exhiliration: bike-riding to the Dorothy Heroy public pool with Kathy
Splashy joy: swimming in JJ's pool with JJ and her little sister Erica
Pride: discussing Israel Test preparation with Sarah during our school-bus rides

In High School:
Awe: watching Atalia do ballet exercises
Delight: picking a fresh orange off the tree in Israel with my Israeli cousin Nitzah
Anticipation: learning from Susannah how to give tours to school-groups at the Museum of Philosophy in NYC

In College:
Serene excitement: looking at the Chinese art collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art with Scott
Mystery: planting tulips in nearly frozen ground at Marni's house near Detroit, and then seeing photos of our labor's fruits in the spring
Relief: going swimming five days a week in Jerusalem with Cathy during my junior year abroad

In Early Career:
Playfulness: marching around our Chicago apartments, singing Ma'oz Tsur... during Chanukah with Robyn
Comfort: eating dinner my U.S. cousin Sari during a D.C. business trip
Amusement: meeting Steve for Middle Eastern food during his Chicago business trip
Pure fun: going dancing after a "10% Show" shoot with Jack and some of the production crew
Intrigue: visiting my synagogue-friend Ed in his John Hancock apartment prior to going to a Jewish film festival together
Abandon: reaching out to touch Grace Jones' leg during a concert that Robert, may his memory be blessed, took me to on his 26th birthday
Spiritual fulfillment: enjoying Werner as one of my two best friends at work, though his dad had been a rocket-scientist in Nazi Germany
Pleasant surprise: sitting on the Belmont rocks with Pat at Lake Michigan
Purpose: trading experience with Paul every day during our commute to Schaumburg -- his on artificial intelligence and mine on GLBT community voluntarism
Merriment: delighting in discovering Rob's and my compatible sense of humor during a business meeting in Austin
Love: during our walking-tour of Greenwich Village, David, finding a Daisy-Dukes-hot-pants-wearing-blonde can-holder as a gift I could give to Pat upon my return from my business trip
Adoration: listening to Gerard describe his total love for David at their wedding in Toronto
Self-assurance: setting up the workshop-room at the 1995 International Gay & Lesbian Business Expo with Lyn, where she, with her architecture degree from Princeton, was asking if I needed her to run and get a tape dispenser -- whatever it took to ensure Rob's and my presentation's success
Faith: hearing Mary Alice describe her plan for conquering large health challenges and then her doing so...twice, and also hearing how she established a popular, essentially lesbian, sorority in college more than 25 years ago
Silliness: at the "Adirondyke Weekend," Deb and I sitting across from each other at dinner and laughing non-stop
Pleasure: walking around Mia's and Deb's house with Mia, learning of all the cool ways she opted to design the inside of their home
At homeness: Kathy, reminding my mother of a woman I had a crush on in college, except that in Kathy's case, my mother liked Kathy
Redemption: dancing to fast, '80s pop-tunes with Sheila while pretending that we're in high school still and it's no issue for us to be dancing together
Holiness: being invited to succeed Carol as the Tri-State co-leader of our GLBT employee networking group; I said, "I don't want to lead it," and Carol said, "But it has to be led."
Appreciation: Carmen, always listening so presently always makes me feel beloved
Rescue-sense: avoiding the conference-center bar after-hours at IBM's Global GLBT Leadership Conference in 2003, and having Suzanne, also one of the delegates, who skipped it explain a Catholic concept, "...avoiding the near occasion of sin"
Fondness: AnnaMae, discovering that my birthday was identical to her daughter's and how that delighted Suzanne and her
Kinship: commuting with Jennifer to NYC from Montclair and learning that she had gone with a friend to the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival even though she's heterosexual....I had been to it once, in 1987, with my girlfriend at the time, and hadn't loved the experience because I don't love women's music, and so all the more so, I was impressed by her adventuresomeness
Hilarity: Joel, explaining why he would no longer enter a particular synagogue that met in a church, saying that he refused to go back to "Saint Nebbish's"
Gratitude: famous for her ultimate pragmatism and no-nonsense attitude, Kathy was marvelously compassionate when I learned of my otosclerosis
Hope: Julie's creativity thrilled me when I read what she considered an early version of a novel she wrote; if I could have such a talented friend, then perhaps my own talent, if more modest, might shine a bit someday, too, if I labored at it
Relaxation: spending a long afternoon of my vacation, walking down much of the pedestrian path of the Westside Highway to Battery Park with Richard, talking about our lives and dreams.

In Mid-career:
Safety: Joseph, making me feel I'm in funny, stylish, smart, good hands when I'm with him
Glamorousness: attending the GLAAD Awards at the Kodak Theater in L.A. with Mike in 2003
Energy: Jane, dancing during the holiday party at her home a number of years ago to that Country song, "I Feel Like a Woman..."
Ease: Laughing and relaxing over Montclair dinners with Nancy
Amazement: Silvy, letting her daughter Kay splash around in the pool, where I was swimming during my 40th birthday; I looked at Silvy's face for a moment and couldn't believe all the ways that she is active -- as a mother and at work
Entertainment: Sylvie, artfully tucking a pair of oranges into a white napkin that she had fashioned into a bikini-top on our dining-room table, for us to discover after work one evening while staying with us
Privilege: Jim, helping me be a better facilitator at work, since he is a menschlich Master Trainer with marvelous experience, and in parallel, whenever we have enabled each other to laugh hard during our workdays
Adventure: Chitra, finding books with me at the Stamford Public Library's book sale while she was in the States and my book discoveries with her at Blossom Bookstore in Bangalore
Reassurance: Keiko, giving me some Washington State apples she had found in the grocery store when we were on business in Bangkok
Sense of possibility: Linda, encouraging me to apply for a Masters at Columbia's Teachers College; she had just earned one herself
Inspiration: Wendy's many-years survival of an advanced stage of cancer and her positive attitude around it continually impresses and inspires me
Confidence: meeting Radhika while I was in India and becoming friends with her boosted my self-assurance about being able to find and befriend kindred spirits anywhere in the world...and that there could be kindred spirits anywhere
Appreciation: Shalini, giving me gifts prior to my departure from India -- some great earrings from the desert in the north and a wool, patterned shawl -- I saw that she really did enjoy our colleagueship while I was in India and I felt then that I hoped we'd be friends ongoingly
Shelter: Inder, hosting Pat and me for dinner at his family's home in Bangalore, and their maid cooking delicious food
Succor: Dearg, meeting us for lunch on our first afternoon in India, and taking us to a queer film festival at the Alliance Francais in Bangalore
Elevation: Sapna, who's heterosexual, volunteering to help lead the India chapter of IBM's GLBT employee group, saying that she was for anything that helped advance humanity
Happiness: discovering that there was another lesbian, living in my town, working in leadership development like me, with my same name -- and spelled with an "h"
Validation: Sarah's partner Helen, having a Masters in the same field as I'm pursuing mine, and agreeing that it's challenging to pursue a Masters while working full-time
Kinship: My classmate Susan, joining me for dinner after class one night and discovering so much in common despite how differently we have led our lives so far.