Joan Goldsmith is an educator, facilitator, coach, mediator and organizational consultant who as worked in the private and public sectors. She specializes in leadership development, organizational change, team building, strategic planning, collaborative negotiation and conflict resolution.

Joan is an author who has written and co-written numerous books about organizational management and how to resolve conflicts in the workplace.
She is also a fierce feminist and advocate for social change, and she's the recent author of the upcoming book, Women Leaders at the Grassroots: 9 stories and 9 strategies. If you would like to get a copy of the book, you can contact her through me: duncan@fractalfriends.us.

In this conversation we talk about the special role that women play in creating social change as weavers of webs of association and by being models of balanced living. We talk about the importance of inclusion. We talk about listening to the voices of the voiceless, and making the extra effort to lift up those around us that the current systems doesn't hear. We ponder the difference between managers and leaders, between the quality of leadership and the role of being a leader. While managers focus on “doing things right” by following the rules, true leaders focus on “doing the right thing” by asking: Am I following my values? Am I speaking up for the right group of people?

And we reflect on the importance of setting limits, finding time to be in silence and letting yourself get bored sometimes.

Learning to Lead by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith — *Learning to Lead* by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith

Joan’s Resources

Contact Duncan to get a copy of Women Leaders at the Grassroots: 9 stories and 9 strategies.

Book written with Warren Bennis

Learning to Lead: A Workbook on Becoming a Leader

Book written with Ken Cloke (Previous guest on Fractal Friends)

Other Resources

In this episode, we talk about the dearth of teachers of color in U.S. schools. This episode of Malcolm Gladwell's podcast Revisionist History by talks about the hidden impact of Brown vs. Board on teachers. Listen to it here: "Miss Buchanan's Period of Adjustment"

In this episode, Joan says that there are hundreds of thousands of homeless children. The National Center of Family Homelessness put the number of homeless children in a year at nearly 2.5 million. You can read more about this grave problem here: National Center on Family Homelessness

In the conversation with Joan we talk a lot about the importance of recognizing and supporting the web of relationships, a key aspect of Joan's understanding of feminine" leadership. This reminds me of the work of John Paul Lederach. In his book The Moral Imagination Lederach talks about the four capacities of the moral imagination. You can read a summary of Lederach's book here.

The goal of transcending violence is advanced by the capacity to generate, mobilize, and build the moral imagination. This faculty rests on four capacities:

Moral imagination requires the capacity to imagine ourselves in a web of relationships, one that includes even our enemies.
It requires the ability to embrace complexity without getting caught up in social schism.
It requires a commitment to the creative act.
It requires an acceptance of the risk that necessarily goes along with attempts to transcend violence.

Poetry

Mary Oliver was an “indefatigable guide to the natural world.” A prolific writer of both poetry and prose, Oliver routinely published a new book every year or two. Her main themes continue to be the intersection between the human and the natural world, as well as the limits of human consciousness and language in articulating such a meeting.
Listen here to a beautiful and rare interview with Mary Oliver from the On Being Podcast: Listening to the World

“The Journey” by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice--
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried...
It was already late
enough, and wild a night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and
deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life that you could
save.

A Haiku from Matsuo Basho:

Wrapping Dumplings
Wrapping dumplings in
bamboo leaves, with one finger
she tidies her hair.
Oh these spring days!
A nameless little mountain,
wrapped in morning haze!
The dragonfly
can’t quite land
on that blade of grass.

And here is the story Joan shared in the episode by Mother Theresa.

To Die Like An Angel
One evening we went out and rescued four people off the streets. One of them was in desperate condition. I told the sisters "you take care of the others. I will care for this one who is worse off", I did everything for her that my love could do. I put her into bed and I saw a beautiful smile, light up her face. She squeezed my hand and then it's only just say two words. "thank you" and then She closed her eyes. I couldn't help but ask myself there beside her body "what what I have said, If I had been in her place".. my answer was very simple. I would have said that I was hungry, that I was dying that I was cold. Or I would have said that this or that part of my body hurt or something like that. But she gave me much more. She gave me her grateful love, and she died with a smile.

Music

This song is by KR3TURE ft. Cello Joe - “To Love”

The song in this episode is a brand new collaboration between two artists and friends of mine. KR3TURE and Cello Joe. I think this song is fitting, because it's new, I want to share it and isn't it all about LOVE?

Listen to “To Love” on Spotify here.

“Grassroots Women Leaders Building Webs” with Joan Goldsmith