Horse sense for leaders: in this leadership course, horses have the reins

T+D, March, 2003 by Eva Kaplan-Leiserson

The horse is the teacher, Louis Wood insists. A real-life cowboy schooled in natural horsemanship (often described as "horse whispering"), Wood takes time away from running his 300-acre ranch in Virginia not only to train horses, but also to help horses train human beings.

Wood's method of working with a young or difficult horse (though difficult is a misnomer to him; he says it's often the riders who need the most reaching) is miles away from the traditional method of horse breaking. Instead of trying to dominate a horse, bending its will to his own as in the traditional method, Wood listens and communicates with the animal using body language, establishes trust, partners rather than tries to control, and teaches what the horse is ready to learn.

It is this unusual interplay between man and animal that John Lord, director of the Leadership Development Center at the University of Virginia, wants his students to learn from. The goal of the Horse Sense for Leaders program, built around observation of Wood's equine training sessions, is not to imitate the cowboy's individual techniques. Rather, Lord asks participants to observe Wood's work and listen to his running monologue to generate questions about their own leadership styles and gain new insights.

Watching Wood work real-time with the horses provides an immediacy that role playing can't, Lord says. Observers can see effective leadership in action and its results minute by minute.

After two days of watching Wood work with the horses, participants brainstorm what they've learned with Lord and co-facilitator Tara Telfair. Questions the observers explore include how Wood defines the relationship with the horse and sets expectations, how he communicates, how he motivates, and how he defines success.

Each person will come away with a different set of lessons, Lord asserts. In his own experience of watching Wood, Lord says he didn't learn something new about leadership so much as gain insights about what he already knew.

The goal is for participants to see their relationships with others through fresh eyes. "If you leave here with something on your mind that's bothering you," Lord says, "then we will have succeeded."