Katrijn Van Oudheusden, Author, Selfless Leadership, Coach
Katrijn Van Oudheusden is a coach, and she is an author of a book titled, “Selfless Leadership”. The concept of “selfless leadership” goes beyond professional achievements.
Podcast
Overview
Leaders, as we know, are supposed to lead the teams, enabling them to efficiently work towards the goals. It is important to understand for the leader that it is not about himself/herself. Great leadership is about service to others. Here comes the concept of selfless leadership, where the leaders need to understand the true meaning of their power, which is to ensure the benefits of the people who follow them.
Today, we discuss the subject in detail with our guest, who specialises in self-leadership coaching. We also talk about the importance of coaching in this respect.
About Katrijn Van Oudheusden
Katrijn Van Oudheusden is a coach, and she is an author of a book titled, “Selfless Leadership”. The concept of “selfless leadership” goes beyond professional achievements. She discusses the importance of the same and elaborates on her process of coaching.
DISCUSSION
Katrijn is an author of a book titled, “Selfless Leadership” and she decided to write as a reflection of her coaching process.
She explains, “The biggest impediment to great leadership is ego. Selfless leadership is about becoming a better ego. It is to see the core selflessness of who we are. It is leadership by someone who has seen through the ego.”
Katrijn, who is also a selfless leadership coach, gives four key insights enabling her coaches to self evaluate themselves:
- We are not the doer, decider, and controller of our life, but we are being lived.
- We cannot be limited by our egos. We are new in every moment.
- We are not separate from each other as human beings.
- We are naturally in service to others
Impact of Coaching
Katrijn explains that for self-leadership, particular coaching can help people to see these insights. She talks about her coaching process, which is a structured program.
Selfless leadership was initially also termed servant leadership. Katrijn describes, “It is our true nature, what we are as human beings. It is to be selfless and in service to others.”
Coaching Vs. Mentoring
Katrijn talks about her motivation to become a coach. She explains the difference between coaching and mentoring,
She explains the difference, “Coaching is helping a person self-reflect. Mentoring is more of an element of guidance and an element of knowledge being passed on.”
Katrijn acknowledges the impact of culture on coaching, however, feels that “selfless leadership” is cross-cultural as it applies similarly to the entire mankind.
Food for Thought
Katrijn feels that with young leaders coming to the workforce, we are still not prepared for the environment of co-creation and collaboration. She feels the problem in the way of collaboration is the ego of most of the senior leaders.
She lays down the key lessons for the audience to take away from the conversation:
- It is not about you: don’t take things so personally.
- Look at ourselves and the story we have created about ourselves.
- Enjoy the opportunity to experience anything at all in life.
Profile
As a professional coach, I guide those who want to be in service to the world to find their own understanding and practice of authentic and effortless servant leadership. Selfless leadership is not a job title, but a way of being and showing up in the world.
It is the only type of leadership that will be tolerated in a world of New Work, and we will all be cal led to both lead and fol low, depending on what circumstances require of us.
