Deeper Ground
A leadership programme for teams who want to lead well in a world that makes it hard. Over a few months, your leaders build practical ways to see how the organisation connects - and how to help it work as one.
Who this is for
Deeper Ground is for leadership teams who care about leading well and want to understand their organisation more fully.
It might be a time of big change - a restructure, a merger, a new strategy - and you'd like your leaders to see the whole picture as well as their own part of it. It might be a team of strong individuals who want to work more closely as a group. Or it might simply be a sense that the challenges ahead call for new ways of thinking together.
The programme works best with leadership teams of 6-12 people who work together. Throughout, they work on a real challenge from their own organisation. By the end, they've made progress on something that matters, and they have practical tools they'll keep using.
It's also for the person bringing it in - an HR director, a chief executive, or someone leading leadership development - who wants something practical that fits the reality of their organisation.
How the programme works
The programme follows a steady arc - from seeing clearly, to reading patterns, to rethinking the leader's role, to working with the whole organisation, to making it last. Each session pairs personal insight with practical tools for the organisation. Between sessions, leaders try things out in their day-to-day work, which is where most of the learning happens.
Seeing clearly
Leaders start by widening their view - noticing what they tend to focus on, and what slips past. We look beneath everyday events to the patterns, structures and beliefs that shape them. Each leader maps where their attention goes, alongside a facilitated conversation about the health of the organisation. Comparing the two is a useful place to start.
Reading patterns
When something goes wrong, the natural response is to fix it - and then the next thing. This session helps leaders step back and spot the patterns that keep coming round. They learn to draw causal loop diagrams, which show how different parts of the organisation affect each other, and to recognise common patterns known as system archetypes. They also start to see their own thinking as part of the picture.
The shift - from fixing to cultivating
With a clearer picture, the question becomes: what do you do with what you see? Here, leaders explore creating the right conditions as well as solving problems. Tools like condition mapping help them design for the outcomes they want, rather than chasing each symptom as it appears.
Working with the whole system
Leaders practise reading how different parts of the organisation influence each other, and finding the places where a little focused attention goes a long way. Connection mapping and leverage point analysis help with this. The group brings everything to bear on the real challenge they've been working on through the programme.
Nurturing growth
How do you build an organisation that helps people grow, rather than wearing them out? Leaders look at what gives them energy and what drains it, and pick up practical ways to create that kind of supportive environment for others. Looking after yourself and developing the organisation turn out to be closely linked.
Embedding and sustaining
New insights can fade once everyday pressures return, so the final session focuses on making them last. Leaders build simple habits and rhythms - health check-ins, decision reviews, pattern reviews - and each makes a few specific commitments about what they'll keep doing.
What makes this different
Deeper Ground looks at how leaders think and see, alongside what they do. How a leader sees the organisation shapes where they put their attention, and that shapes what happens next. So the programme works on both.
Personal and organisational, side by side | Every session has two strands. One looks at how each leader thinks, decides and shows up, drawing on mental models and the shortcuts our minds take. The other offers practical tools for reading and working with the organisation. The two connect: how we think shapes how we read the organisation, which shapes what we do and what happens as a result. |
Your real organisation | Everything is built around your own context. The group works on a real challenge from your organisation from the first session to the last, and by the end has made progress on it as part of the day job. |
Practical systems thinking | Causal loop diagrams, system archetypes, leverage points and condition mapping are all tools leaders learn to build and use for themselves. By the end, each person can map a pattern that keeps recurring, see what keeps it going, and find good places to act. |
Learning between sessions | Much of the development happens between sessions, as leaders try things in their real work. Each activity is designed to fit a busy diary - around 30 to 60 minutes of noticing and one small experiment each fortnight. It's less an extra task and more a different way of paying attention to what's already happening. |
Shaped to fit you | The programme keeps a steady arc but adapts to your organisation. A compact version runs over four sessions, the full version over six, and an extended version adds more depth and time on your real challenge. Optional one-to-one coaching between sessions can support personal development, and a States of Vitality assessment can ground the programme in data from the start. |
What leaders take away
Leaders leave with new ways of seeing their organisation, and practical tools they can keep using long after the programme ends.
A systems lens - seeing the organisation as a connected whole, and noticing how one area affects another.
Pattern recognition - spotting the patterns that keep coming round, and understanding what keeps them going, so it's easier to work with the cause.
Causal loop diagrams - a practical, reusable way of mapping how parts of the organisation affect each other, which leaders can use on any tricky challenge.
Familiarity with system archetypes - recognising common patterns, such as 'shifting the burden' and 'accidental adversaries', which makes it quicker to understand what's going on and choose a good response.
Condition design - a condition mapping tool for any outcome you're working towards, built around the question 'what would help this happen naturally?'
Leverage point thinking - knowing where focused attention is likely to make the biggest difference across the organisation.
Self-awareness - a clearer sense of each leader's own habits of attention, what they tend to notice and what they tend to miss, and how that shapes the way they lead.
Habits that last - simple rhythms, such as health check-ins, decision reviews and pattern reviews, that keep the new thinking going after the programme ends.
