Our approach is to support you
Today many companies and organisations are facing disruption and rapid change. Some of their teams, dealing with unprecedented challenges resulting from the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, are feeling helpless, dispirited and exhausted.
Here are some of the questions you are currently asking of us, and our responses:
Can business actually contribute to a more peaceful and safer world?
Our experience shows us that business offer powerful leadership both to resolve conflict and to prevent it in the first place. We know of many examples of businesses working with local peace initiatives to stop violence and build a safer environment. You will find more detail in our report ‘The Missing Peace’.
What practical methods can be used to restore morale?
The ability to listen is the first ingredient here. When someone is stressed, angry or afraid, the best possible response is for a colleague to invite them to speak openly about how they feel. The person who listens must neither interrupt nor comment but simply listens with complete attention. This is then the start of a process which defuses tension and raises morale.
What tools do our teams need in order to cope better?
When a crisis arises, most of us are handicapped by our ‘inner critic’. This is also called the ‘imposter syndrome’ which can suddenly attack us making us feel inadequate to any challenge. We offer exercises that any individual can undertake personally and quietly at home to address and negotiate with their inner critic, instead of trying to banish it.
What new skills can lead to better communication?
When people feel disempowered to express what they really mind about, this makes them angry and frustrated. Therefore, our course entitled The Mighty Heart in Action – 10 modules in a sequence over 10 weeks – enables teams to systematically acquire the methods that enable them to communicate more openly, to transform their anger and frustration. Instead of being bottled up, or bursting out, this energy is then a fuel for transformation, and helps them to take a stand for what they care about. For more details please see mightyheart.co.uk
Sometimes it seems as though ‘nothing’s working’! Can you throw any light on this?
Given the upheavals that people all over the planet have experienced over recent years, it’s not surprising that individuals and groups go through dark periods when chaos seems to reign. The key leadership skill in these circumstances is to use your right-brain intelligence to complement the skills of your more linear left-brain. The left brain is brilliant at planning, measuring, listing and logic. By contrast the right brain sees the whole picture, it is able to sense how people are feeling, what’s in the atmosphere and what is needed from moment to moment. It makes connections, it is expansive, creative and imaginative. The use of both capacities of your brain and your heart are needed during these complex and demanding times.
“Business can offer powerful leadership both to resolve conflict and to prevent it in the first place.”
Business Plan for Peace (BPP) and Plan for Peace (P4P) are two distinct but related entities: BPP is a private limited not-for-profit company registered in England and Wales (company number 11780694), and P4P is a charity registered in England and Wales (number 1189261). Each entity is governed by its own board.
We are developing a sustainable not-for-profit model. Business Plan for Peace provides a pay-it-forward model for the Mighty Heart awarding scholarships and bursaries, and all profit generated from income under Business Plan for Peace services are donated to our charity to Plan for Peace contributing to our conflict transformation and infrastructures for peace programming in the UK and globally.
To find out more about Plan for Peace visit planforpeace.org.
