Field Guide — Leadership Exploration
Leadership is not something a few people do to everyone else. It emerges when the conditions are right — for leaders, followers, members, and individual contributors alike. These three explorations help you examine those conditions together.
Who This Is For
Leaders
You get an honest picture of how your approach is actually experienced — not the version people share when you are in the room. That picture is the starting point for everything that follows.
Followers
You get a structured way to share what you actually experience day to day — without it being used against you. Your stories are the most important data in the room.
Members
You get to see the patterns that connect your individual experience to the wider team. What feels like a personal frustration often turns out to be a shared one — and that changes what is possible.
Individual Contributors
You get an equal voice in shaping the conditions of your own work. These explorations are not done to you. They are done with you. Your perspective is not a nice-to-have — it is the point.
There are always more followers than leaders in any organisation. And everyone has to learn to follow before they can lead. That means the real leverage for improving performance is not at the top — it is with the many people doing the actual work. These two methods help you see what that majority of people are actually experiencing, so you can create the conditions for leadership to emerge naturally.
Six questions that surface the unwritten rules of your organisation. This is the conversation that reveals the gap between how your leadership model is supposed to work and how it actually works on the ground.
TL;DR
Ask your leadership team these six questions in order. Don't rush. The most important information will come after the first, polished answer — when people start saying what they actually think. Budget 90 minutes. Record the conversation if you can.
Who
A leadership team, a project team, or any group of people responsible for creating the conditions for others to do their best work.
When
At the very start of any leadership development effort, before any programmes are designed or solutions are proposed.
These questions were adapted from Eliyahu Goldratt's Theory of Constraints. In their original form, they were designed to evaluate whether a new technology was worth adopting. Applied to leadership development, they do something more valuable: they force an honest reckoning with the gap between the current state and what is actually needed.
Five questions that invite the leadership team to explore its purpose from the perspective of the people it walks alongside. This is the conversation that shifts the focus from managing upward to understanding what leaders, followers, members, and individual contributors actually need to thrive.
TL;DR
Walk the team through these five questions as if the people they lead are the primary focus — not the executive above them. Question 3 cannot be answered in the room. You must go and walk alongside the frontline teams directly to hear what they actually experience. That conversation is the most important part of this exploration.
Who
The same group that walked through Method 01 — or a wider group that includes frontline members and individual contributors.
When
After the first exploration, while the conversation is still fresh. The two methods build on each other.
These questions come directly from Peter Drucker's Five Most Important Questions framework. Drucker designed them for non-profit boards, but they apply with equal force to any group exploring its purpose. The key insight is that leadership is not a position — it is a relationship. And like any relationship, it can only be understood by listening to both sides of it.
Three questions that give every person in the room — regardless of role or title — a way to share what they are actually experiencing. This is the practice that makes the other two methods honest.
TL;DR
Use these questions with the whole team, not just the leadership group. Give people time to write their answers before sharing. The goal is not to find the right answer — it is to hear the real one. Three minutes of writing, ten minutes of sharing, and you will learn more than a year of surveys.
Who
Everyone: leaders, followers, members, and individual contributors. This method only works if all voices are in the room.
When
After Methods 01 and 02, as a way of grounding the leadership team's reflections in the lived experience of the people they walk alongside.
This method is grounded in the SenseMaker approach developed by Dave Snowden and the Cognitive Edge network. The core principle is that people are the best interpreters of their own experience. The facilitator's job is not to analyse the stories — it is to create the conditions in which people can share them honestly, and then to help the group see the patterns that emerge.
Putting It Together
The three methods are complementary. Together, they give you a complete picture of the current state of leadership in your organisation — from the inside, from the outside, and from the ground up.
Method 01 — Goldratt
"How do we really work together?"
Focus
Internal
Reveals
The blockages, workarounds, and cultural scar tissue that get in the way of performance.
Output
An honest map of the current state — the gap between the official story and the lived reality.
Method 02 — Drucker
"Who do we serve, and what do they actually need?"
Focus
External
Reveals
The gap between what the leadership team thinks it provides and what the frontline teams say they actually need.
Output
A clear, customer-defined mission and a specific, actionable plan for the leadership team.
Method 03 — Narrative Capture
"What is the real story of what it is like to work here?"
Focus
Individual
Reveals
The lived experience of every person in the room — the moments of connection and friction that no survey ever captures.
Output
A shared, honest picture of the patterns that shape daily work, grounded in the voices of everyone, not just the leaders.
What comes next
These two diagnostics are the starting point, not the solution. Once you have an honest picture of the current state, the next step is to begin collecting the real stories of the organisation — not through surveys, but through a regular, low-friction practice of narrative capture. That practice, combined with the quantitative baseline provided by a validated culture measurement tool, creates the feedback loop that allows a leadership team to see whether its actions are actually making a difference. The goal is not to fix the system. The goal is to develop the collective judgment of the people inside it.