Everyone has blind spots. The hardest part of leading is seeing what we cannot see on our own. That takes curiosity, listening, and a willingness to update what we came in believing. I keep watching this unfold across the peer cohorts I facilitate, and the leaders in those rooms are showing me what it looks like.
It starts with curiosity. The leaders I see doing this well show up willing to be challenged about their situation. They treat their first read of the problem as a hypothesis, not a conclusion. Curiosity is what lets the real issue surface.
Then there is listening. Not the kind that waits for a turn to speak, but the kind that takes in what a peer is describing. Often, the most useful moment is not advice but hearing another leader name something you have been carrying without language for it.
And it asks for a willingness to update what you came in with. The leaders I see hold their original question loosely. They come in wanting one outcome and leave realizing they need a different one. That different one is usually what moves their challenge forward.
I am learning alongside the leaders in these rooms. Across Cook and DuPage County, I facilitate five peer cohorts. Three are Nonprofit Leaders Forum cohorts in Bloomingdale, Hanover, and Schaumburg Townships, where mid-level leaders from 32 nonprofits work through real challenges and build a trusted network. Two are part of the Agency Capacity Builder, which I designed for the Milton Township Community Mental Health Board: 18 agencies in two cohorts, one focused on how to recruit, develop, and keep great people, the other on how to make data work for the programs they deliver. The conversations are honest. The commitments spur on growth. And the work gets better because of it.