5 Leadership Lessons Learned on the Ranch

A few months ago, our whole team learned to speak horse. Or maybe I should say that we learned to speak Sierra, the particular horse with whom we interacted.

The Energize Leadership team had our own retreat and participated in an experiential learning activity that used horses to help us learn about ourselves and how we interact with others. We offer ranch retreats as a core leadership experience and we thought it would be worthwhile to share some of the lessons we learned and how valuable these were for our own team.

Creating experiential learning activities for our clients is nothing new for us, but working with large animals in exchange for PowerPoints and conference tables happens with less frequency than we would like. Most leaders we work with are looking for ways to get their team to work better together – to have greater synergy and an ability to collaborate more seamlessly. We can tell you, nothing works faster or more effectively than interacting with horses.

Why Horses?

Horses are a powerful tool for learning about ourselves, how we communicate, and how others receive us. One day on the ranch can unlock the precise insight you need and can result in huge transformations in your personal effectiveness. Whether with an “intact” team or with a mixed group, the horse experience is an individual one, and everyone learns from each other. When you have a team experiencing it together, the lessons go deep and can quickly impact how the group works together back in the office.

We, too, had a unique experience and everyone received their own takeaway. Here are just a few of the lessons we each learned:

  1. The importance of centering ourselves, to connect with our intuition and be more clear when communicating.
  2. The freedom and strength that can be achieved from leading with vulnerability and emotion.
  3. Understanding the assets we bring to our relationships, and regaining sight of our leadership capabilities as well as the impact we’re meant to make in the world.
  4. How to create direction and lead with confidence, in order to inspire confidence in others.
  5. The value of being mindful of what others are telling you, and learning first to follow before expecting to lead.

So we took these lessons and debriefed them as a team. We all know more about each other now than we would through any other team building experience. The lessons were so simple yet so deep. We also learned how to truly support each other in order to work more effectively together. Now can speak more easily about our individual challenges as we work together to get things done. Not only did we each have a moment of clarity from the experience, we are also able to keep growing and learning from it as we work together. We have higher levels of trust and respect for each other and we honor each other’s needs.

Now… for the Exciting News!

We are going to be offering a horse experience Thursday, February 7th in Ramona, California to a very small group of individuals that we will record for marketing purposes.

Does a horse retreat sound like an experience you would like to have (to clarify, you do not actually ride the horse but you do get into a round pen with him/her)?

To maximize the experience, horse retreats are very small groups – which means we have very limited space. The event will be Thursday, February 7, from 9:30am-4pm in beautiful Ramona, CA.

To learn more about our horse retreat, click here or send us an email and we will contact you to get to know more about your goals!