This article was originally published on Mint.

For Columbia professor Hitendra Wadhwa, leadership is about doing the inner work in order to have outer impact.

Hitendra Wadhwa is an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School in New York and founder of Mentora Institute, a leadership development organization. With an MBA and a Ph.D. from MIT’s Sloan School of Management in the US, Wadhwa has coached dozens of Fortune 100 C-suite executives and is the author of the 2022 book, Inner Mastery, Outer Impact: How Your Five Core Energies Hold The Key To Success. 

Wadhwa was recently in India to finalize a partnership with Mumbai-based Shilputsi Consultants to bring his work into the country. He spoke to Mint about his research and approach. Edited excerpts:

Many leadership models have been developed over the years. How is yours different?

There are five ways in which I have sought to advance the discipline of leadership to challenge the current models, to respond to the challenges that today’s leaders face. 

Traditional models have had a western, behavioral and outer kind of focus. What I am seeking to do is to recognise that there is a unique wisdom in the cultures of the East which are more in the inner and spiritual life, with a more integrative approach to life. When you bring that into alignment with Western sensibilities, you get something more complete, effective and adaptive for today’s time.

What are those five differences? The first is that leadership should not be seen as something that a chosen few get to do. It is an inner choice. It is not that we should be trying to advance our career so that we can maximize our moments of leadership, but we should be seeking to advance our character so that we can maximise our leadership in a moment.

The second shift is when we think about what it means to be the best for yourself and others. Traditionally, people try to find their answers by selecting a certain set of behaviors or competencies. For example, you have to be assertive, be a visionary or be decisive. But I find that for every one of those behaviors, the opposite is also true. You have to be not just decisive but also patient; not just assertive but also agreeable; not just visionary, but also pragmatic. So, you have to be everything and the complete opposite. That’s the problem with taking a very outward Western behavioral approach as opposed to that approach to leadership based your inner core. The space within you from your best self, arises where you are beyond ego, attachments and insecurities. That is what great leaders do.

The third shift is that this inner core can be approached and expressed not through behaviors but through energies and I have this model of five energies—purpose, wisdom, growth, love and self-realization. 

Fourth, these energies can be translated into simple actions. In our research, I found 25 actions to be present in any situation of breakthrough performance, where leadership is being practiced in exemplary ways.

Fifth, typically we have been learning on the sidelines by training people in workshops or classes whatever. Then, we are meant to unleash them back in the workplace. But most people actually are not able to practice what they may have learnt: When real pressure comes, one may continue to assert one’s point of view and not listen to the other person. So how do you close that gap? What we have found is that it’s important to focus on “learning in the flow” of work as opposed to learning on the side.

In the past you have alluded to the fact that this model leads to better work-life balance, but some people say work-life balance is an oxymoron.

At the core of this model is the honoring of the human quest for fulfillment, meaning and purpose. When we engage in “leadership in flow”, there is inner mastery and outer impact. We are, by definition, happy, resilient and committed to what we’re doing. As a result, it has a positive impact on our emotions and in our ability to diminish stress. That’s one way in which we find there is work-life balance. The second way in which this model helps is that it actually invites us to look at all aspects of our life through that same one unified lens of bringing out the best in ourselves and others in all situations.

You have said that great leaders like Mahatma Gandhi exhibit the leadership in flow, but they were able to do this because they were leading mass movements. In the case of business leaders, isn’t it different since corporations are structured organizations?

That is one way to think about it. On the other hand, today, more organizations are recognising that they are living in a space where there is a lot of dependency and collaboration with partner organizations, government and the community. So, in some ways, these boundaries are starting to become more fluid because organizations are realizing that they cannot just be so focused on self-gain.

There have been many great academics, such as Michael Porter and C.K. Prahalad who turned entrepreneurs. While Porter succeeded, Prahalad failed. What’s your future? 

Jim Collins once reflected on how Peter Drucker told him that one can either be a successful thought leader, or can build a really successful consulting business. So, I agree with you that this is a challenge for most thought leaders. In our case at Mentora, I was blessed to have had a previous career at McKinsey. Also, while I did my PhD, I did go out and do other things that helped me build a network. 

George Skaria is a columnist and co-author of Beyond Three Generations: The Definitive Guide To Building Enduring Indian Family Businesses.