🫛 How green is your leadership thumb?


"Living systems
don't need micromanagement. They need tending."

We often think leadership is about driving outcomes or steering the ship. But what if it’s more like tending a garden?

In this week's article, Melis offers a fresh take; leadership as ecology. Instead of pushing harder, it’s about creating the right conditions for growth.

Like in nature, thriving doesn’t come from control, but from care, timing, and attention to what’s needed. When leaders focus on the work environment, not just the output, people flourish.

🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛

Creativity returns.

Trust grows.

Good things happen.

🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛🫛

This isn’t soft, it’s smart. It’s a call to lead more like nature does: with patience, presence, and a deep respect for the systems in which be all exist and belong.


Latest article

✍️ The Ecology of Leadership (from control to conditions)


Latest Podcast

🎙️ Episode 4 of The Smoosh Podcast
Title: Sparky Sparky Boom Boom


What's happening with Melis

Reading:
The Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu

Listening to:
A Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry

Doing:
NOT the crochet squares! They need a rest. She's knitting a scarf instead. Winter is coming...

Pondering:

The 2027 AI report (https://ai-2027.com) and pondering what our response should be as heart-centred, values-drive designers and leaders.


What's happening with Ben

Reading:
Training from the Back of the Room by Sharon L. Bowman

Listening to:
Worklife podcast with Adam Grant

Doing:
A LOT of workshop facilitation.

Pondering:
Why he hates the term 'soft skills' so much! There's an article brewing about this topic. Stay tuned...


An invitation: consider where in your life you can move more between control and surrender. Maybe even dance with it. Shimmy shimmy...

You've got this.

Love,

If you like this, please share it.

If you believe in our work and think we can support people in your network, please forward this newsletter on.

PO Box 455
Ashburton, 3147
Unsubscribe · Preferences

This Human by Melis Senova

Enabling senior design professionals to be more influential within their organisations. ✨ Author of this human and design character, published by BIS Publishers.📚

Read more from This Human by Melis Senova

“Nature never forces growth. It listens, responds, and knows when to pause. Imagine if we led that way.”" We’ve been sold the idea that more is always better. More growth, more speed, more efficiency. But life doesn’t work that way. In her latest article, Melis invites us to take a cue from nature; where growth is smart, responsive, and knows when to pause. Trees don’t grow taller just for the sake of it. Ecosystems thrive through balance, not endless expansion. So why do we lead our teams...

"Return to what's real, not what's rehearsed." We are not just walking stories — we are walking scripts, shaped by early patterns and often running on autopilot. But what if we could pause the performance long enough to notice it? In this newsletter, we explore how presence interrupts the plot. In Stillness in Motion, Melis reveals how embodied leadership begins with the radical act of being fully here — not posturing, not predicting, just present In What’s Your Life Script?, Ben trace's the...

"The work of the eyes is done. Go now and do the heart-work on the images imprisoned within you." This quote from Rainer Maria Rilke is the perfect primer for this newsletter and this time in our evolution. There is A LOT happening in the world, no matter where you are, no matter what you do. As a leader, there is more complexity, pace and pressure than ever before. It may feel easier to look outside of ourselves for answers, but it's not the whole picture. Whether we call it heart-work, or...