On Day 11, John Mackey discussed what it means to be a conscious leader every day, shared some lessons on what he’s learned from crises in the past, and offered some invaluable insight into one of the most important elements of Conscious Capitalism, creating win-win-win solutions for all your stakeholders.   

Here are the key takeaways from the webinar:

Crisis cuts away the non-essential and can help conscious leaders to rediscover what matters above all else: Purpose, service, and love.

John articulated the 3 key categories of Conscious Leadership: Vision and Virtue, Mindset and Strategy, and People and Culture and within those categories he discussed the staples of Conscious Leadership that matter in good times and bad: Put purpose first, Lead with love, Always act with integrity, Find Win-win-win solutions, Think long-term, Innovate and create value, Constantly evolve the team, Regularly revitalize, and Continuously learn and grow. He told us, “Purpose matters a lot, service matters a lot, love matters a lot. You’re reminded we’re all in this together. You do what you can to lead people and keep your organization alive while being of service. It gets down to the basics. The trivial starts to disappear.”

Past crises reveal that stakeholders always play a critical role in survival.

John recounted some of the direst crises he has endured over the last 40+ years as a business leader, acknowledging that with each crisis, staying true to the company’s higher purpose and working with stakeholders were the keys to survival. 

Creating win-win-win solutions for all your stakeholders is a skill that gets better with practice.

John said it best when he said, “Finding win-win-win solutions is an ethical position; it’s a framework to see the world through, where you’re always asking ‘How can you win? How can I win? How can we all win?’ … Once you begin to think that way, your mind is unleashed to come up with creative, imaginative solutions to problems that cannot be solved when you’re stuck in a win-lose paradigm.” 

Crisis creates opportunities for retreat and innovation. Whenever possible, choose innovation.

There’s a lot of regression during a crisis. People may turn inwards in an effort to retreat to safety. But a better strategy is to open your heart wider. John reminded us to “Take this opportunity to breathe deep and move forward. That will be a great accelerator toward consciousness.” The good news is that a crisis like this is able to disrupt the status quo, creating opportunities for innovation that were previously unforeseen. Conscious leaders will have numerous opportunities to be innovative and think long-term, to take their organizations places quicker than they would have gone if there had not been a crisis.