Shaping Space vs. Taking Up Space

The leadership that we need is less a function of filling existing spaces (zoom meetings, slack channels, internal team meetings) with brilliance and vision and more a function of shaping new spaces where the most important, nuanced conversations are navigated.

I continue to return to what Tressie Cottom said this year: “We are having the thickest conversations in the thinnest spaces.” This is a problem at our societal level, so leaders need to transcend this default inclination toward conversational thinness with cultural practices that create thick, participatory spaces that are capable of offending and reconciling and then moving forward.

Ego-driven leadership takes up space. Fragile leadership holds space. Brave leadership shapes space.