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Leadership Consulting for Social Change - Dr Stanley Arumugam
Consulting Psychology Conference – UNISA – 21st
August 2015
ABSTRACT
Consulting psychology can make a significant impact working with leaders for social change across all
sectors both nationally and internationally. This work requires us as consulting psychologists acting as
change partners to re-think our role from technical-specialist behavioural experts to change advocates
of organisational culture and systemic social change. This session will explore issues ‘below the
surface’ that show up in our leadership engagements implicitly and explicitly in the South African and
African context. The session will explore what consulting psychology conversations look like with
leaders as change partners on issues such as profit, poverty, corruption, corporate governance, race,
gender, culture and climate change? Working with leaders for social transformation requires us to
take positions as a community of practitioners. How could we do this in a professional-ethical and
authentic way that brings our best selves to the work of social transformation and also brings a
distinctiveness to the contribution of consulting psychology in South Africa?
The 2015 Consulting Psychology Conference “From Below to Beyond” will explore Consulting
within the fields of Leadership, Diversity and Wellness
We aim to weave a ‘golden thread’ from the underlying dynamics (Below) of consulting psychology,
through to the current best practices, and looking forward to the future possibilities (Beyond) our
profession.
 Below: Discussing personal and professional experiences, insights, transformations and the
practical realisations of consulting – working with the ‘invisible and subtle’ dynamics.
 (At the) Surface: Discussing current best-practice, theories and models that are applied in
practice – working with the ‘visible and accessible’ dynamics.
 Beyond: Exploring the possible future practices and implications of meeting our clients’
leadership and executive functioning requirements – taking Consulting to the next level –
working with ‘future-scenario’ dynamics.

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Introduction
How do we respond to Nkandla, Marikana, Eskom
load shedding, e-tolling, xenophobia, service
delivery protests, corrupt government officials, toxic
corporates and fat cat executives driving the bottom
line, gender inequality and racism in the workplace?
As South Africans we have a range of responses:
irritation, shock, fear, anger, cynicism, denial,
rationalising, and desperation. It depends on where
we are in our lived experience of the South African
story. These are all leadership issues and this is our
business as consulting psychologists…
This is the context of consulting psychology in post-
apartheid, democratic South Africa. How does our response to our personal experiences show up in
our leadership consulting work to our major clients as consulting psychologists: to government and
the private sector?
Climate change is at our door, nationally and globally. In the
last months we have seen thousands of people die from
unusual heat waves in India and Pakistan and the UK
also had a record high. Many of the industries we
consult to are complicit in speeding up climate change
especially in Africa where massive land tracts cannot be
farmed, where mining activity is impacting small farmers
and damaging ecosystems. In Dec we will have another
global climate dialogue in Paris to what effect? How do
we consult to companies that continue to endanger the
planet?
I was talking to a friend of mine recently about her
new executive job in the banking sector. She is a
highly capable woman, with a brilliant track record and
niche skill set and sought after. I asked her if she was
aware that her international bank is a tax haven for
many corporate multinationals evading taxes in
African countries which is directly impacting the plight
of the poor. In Zambia alone, one UK multinational - if
it paid its taxes would fund the education needs of all
Zambian children. She was unaware and felt ashamed
and helpless about what she could do because she
feels strongly for the poor. How would we engage with
such a corporate leader as consulting psychologists?
You can give me many more examples of our broken world. The world we consult in…
This is a rather gloomy picture. It can either depress us and make us feel guilty for the money we
make in these contexts or it can be a moment when we re-group as a community of professionals and
ask how do we work in a way that makes a difference – a way that helps us pay our bills, a way that is
aligned with our values, a way that brings our best without selling our souls. I believe there is a way –
but we have to have the courageous conversations we teach our clients to have.

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For my talk this morning, I will focus on leadership consulting. As part of the conference brief, I will
explore what leadership consulting could look like below the surface. To do this, I want to invite you to
consider some of our paradigms as consulting psychologists and critically look at what is serving not
only our paying clients but also the wider society we live in. I want us to consider in this conversation
‘what makes consulting psychology in South Africa distinctive?’ and what role we can play as change
activists in not only driving bottom line profits but also in making a better world. We can do both within
the ethical commitment we have first as psychologists and also as informed and concerned
consultants.
CONSULTING PSYCHOLOGY: AMERICA & SOUTH AFRICA
In my preparation for this conference, Stephen kindly shared with me the special edition of the
American Journal of Consulting Psychology which was reflecting on the future of consulting
psychology. This gave me a good insight of the interests of American consulting psychology which
sees its distinctiveness in its research competence. As I read through the special edition and other
volumes of this Journal, I was disappointed in the breadth and scope of American consulting
psychology which, in my view is mechanistic and instrumentalist. Much of the research interests and
consulting topics are in the domain of the US corporate sector. As an example – one of the research
papers is about THE WEALTHY: A FINANCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE (Klontz et al. 2015)
“ A deeper understanding of the wealthy can help mental-health providers better serve this population
and help individuals aspiring to increase their income and net worth by challenging inaccurate beliefs
about this population’s psychology and financial behaviors.”
 What would a psychology of poverty look like in the South African context and in our
African marketplace?
 What is consulting psychology for us in South Africa and how do we want to define
this emerging discipline.
Liebowitz & Blattner (2015) reflect on the shifts that typical clinical psychologists have to make to be
effective in consulting psychology. A big shift is related to a new view of the client from an individual
or family to a larger systems perspective. In this new space consulting psychologists have to deal with
diverse topics not trained in clinical or counselling psychology – organisational culture, mergers and
acquisitions, regulatory compliance, good governance, organisational politics, race, gender, labour
movements, climate justice and human rights. The worlds are very different. From my observation, I
feel that many consulting psychologists go into these corporate roles with their eyes wide open and
quickly learn how to navigate in corporate systems – often this is a stretch and may even create
tensions in our professional ethics and values systems. Overall, I feel this domain of work is being
mastered.

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This is great as a manifestation of ‘above the surface’. The question I have for us is this – how
different is our value contribution from that of a McKinsey or Deloitte or Accenture consultant that has
no in-depth training and experience in the psychological disciplines? Coming back to my earlier
question what is our unique value proposition? Leonard et al. (2014) identify one of the challenges
identified in the new era is that the leadership development market is being taken over by the big
consulting houses, like McKinsey, Boston Consulting and the like.
What do we do? Fight for our share of the pie or create a new value proposition?
In South Africa – the coaching market is also booming and the majority of coaches are not
psychologists and corporate clients are happy to use their services. Do we have something better,
different, more compelling? What is our unique value add?
I want to use the rest of my time to explore with you a few conversations we need to have with
ourselves as consulting psychologists – conversations that take us below the surface. To keep in the
allotted time – I will focus on leadership development as one domain of consulting.
1. Leadership Development – what’s the value add?
Leonard (2002) reported revenues of $62 billion for management consulting in 2001.
(Kaiser et al. 2014) in LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT: THE FAILURE OF AN INDUSTRY AND THE
OPPORTUNITY FOR CONSULTING PSYCHOLOGISTS: Leadership training and development is big
business; in the United States alone, it has doubled over the past 15 years to become a $14 billion
industry. Consulting psychologists have benefited greatly from this explosive growth. Nonetheless,
citizens around the world lack confidence in public and private sector leaders, and organizations are
worried that they do not have enough good leaders. There is a significant opportunity for
consulting psychologists to steer the leadership industry in a more constructive direction—if
they have the courage to do so. (Kaiser et al. 2014)
This same lament is true for us in South Africa and in Africa. Where have all the leaders gone? Are
we part of the industry that churns out branded leaders through our business schools and executive
coaching programmes or do we want to be part of the team that builds good leaders for social
change?
2. Changing Paradigms of Leadership development (Scharmer 2009)
Scharma speaks of ‘Ten propositions on transforming the current leadership development paradigm’.
I will discuss two in this presentation:
(1) We live in a world of massive institutional failure, a world that presents current and emerging
generations of leaders with unprecedented challenges.
How are the new generations of leaders in government, business, and civil society being prepared to
deal with the profound economic, environmental, and social disruptions of our time? What resources
and connections will help them, when thrown into the eye of the storm, to respond in innovative ways
rather than resorting to the reactive responses of the past?
(2) Current generations of leaders are poorly prepared to deal creatively with the major challenges of
our time because the present mainstream approach to leadership development operates on a flawed
model – remedial / fixing
The mainstream approach to leadership development is based on (a) experts assessing current skill
deficits, (b) filling these deficits by putting people through individual-?‐person-?‐centric training
courses, and then (c) being surprised when those “trained” individuals, upon returning to their
institutions, are “sucked back” into the old systems.

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3. Leadership Development to Leader Development
I believe part of the problem and opportunity is in moving from leadership development as an
intervention at individual and organisational level to leader development as a transformational
process. This moves beyond the typical MBA model of leadership development to enquiring about:
a) The purpose of leadership?
b) What is ‘good’ leadership?
c) How leaders can be accountable to their followers?
d) How leaders can also be followers?
e) what congruent leadership looks like ?
- individual/organisational/societal
- mind/body/soul
f) what does collective/shared leadership look like?
These conversations about purpose, morality, spirituality and stewardship take us below the surface
and they require courageous conversations. This space is opened up in executive coaching. How do
we move the conversations into these spaces as consultant-activists?

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4. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR US AS CONSULTING PSYCHOLOGISTS?
1. Getting comfortable with our change as social – practitioners
- breaking away from technical/expert as our core competence
- taking our ethics seriously – do no harm
- bringing our whole being into our leadership development practice
- stretching ourselves in non-corporate roles and experiences
2. Inviting transformation through our curiosity and compassion for the world
- finding how our talents meet the needs of the word
- building partnerships with diverse groups and people - working with a NGO
- knowing that our work can make a difference in this world
3. Finding the distinctiveness of consulting psychology in South Africa
- leveraging our history and experience to build a discipline that is socially conscious
- creating safe spaces for conversations about race & gender in organisations
- taking the triple bottom-line seriously: profit – people – planet
- making politics and social issues our business
4. Developing pan African models for leadership development
- How do we move away from the US business schools to embracing indigenous models of
African leadership especially as we advance into the African market?
- How do we avoid South African imperialism in Africa and partner with humility?
Call to Action : “Be the change you want to see in this world” Mahatma Gandhi
END

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APPENDIX 1:
LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT FROM A COMPLEXITY PERSPECTIVE
Richard E. Boyatzis - Case Western Reserve University
Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research 2008, Vol. 60, No. 4, 298–313
Intentional change theory (ICT) explains sustainable leadership development in terms of the
essential components of behavior, thoughts, feelings, and perceptions related to leadership
effectiveness as a complex system (Boyatzis, 2001, 2006a, 2006b). Sustained, desired change
represents a metamorphosis in actions, habits, or competencies associated with leadership
effectiveness
Five Discoveries of ICT
Leadership development involves emergence of nonlinear and often discontinuous experiences in an
iterative cycle: Boyatzis (2006a, 2006b) observed that the moments of emergence are (a) the ideal
self; (b) the real self; (c) a learning agenda; (d) practice; and (e) trusting relationships that facilitate
openness to the moments of emergence.
First Emergence: Seeing His/Her Desired Future
The starting point in leadership development is the discovery of who the person wants to be. This
occurs through a moment of emergence of a new awareness into the person’s consciousness.
Second Emergence: How Does the Person Act With Others?
Awareness of the current self—the person others see—is elusive. The human psyche protects itself
from the automatic intake of information, but this ego defense mechanism can confuse us into an
image of who we are.
Third Emergence: Developing a Learning Agenda
The third emergence is the articulation of a way to get to the desired self, using strengths and building
on some weaknesses. The most critical element of this emergence is that it is a type of plan for things
the person wants to try and explore.
Fourth Emergence: Experimenting With New Habits
The next emergent awareness in leadership development comes in the form of experimenting and
practicing behavior characteristics of effective leaders. This may be reinforcing some behavioral
habits that have been effective in the past or trying new ones.
Fifth Emergence: Others Helping Us
Boyatzis (2006a, 2006b) explained how sustained, desired change for individuals needs others to
help, guide, support, and sometimes coax us along the process and through the emergent moments.
Concluding Thoughts
Leaders can be developed, or more accurately, they can learn behavioral habits of effective leaders.
They can change in desired ways but not without effort and intent. By extension, teams,
organizations, communities, and even countries can change in desired ways, but again, without
purposeful desire, the changes may be slow or result in unwanted consequences. Such unintended
effects may engender a shared hopelessness. Various segments of this article explored the emergent
discoveries of intentional change to assist a consultant, coach, or faculty member in designing and
executing change efforts. ICT helps us examine leadership development and see how individuals,
groups, and organizations can create leaders and bring about desired changes in a sustainable
manner.

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REFERENCES
Boyatzis,R.E.2008. LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT FROM A COMPLEXITY PERSPECTIVE.
Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 60(4),pp.298–313.
Kaiser, R.B., Carolina, N. & Curphy, G., 2014. LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT : THE FAILURE OF
AN INDUSTRY AND THE OPPORTUNITY FOR CONSULTING PSYCHOLOGISTS. Consulting
Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 65(4), pp.294–302.
Klontz, B.T. et al., 2015. THE WEALTHY : A FINANCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE. Consulting
Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 67(2), pp.127–143.
Leonard, H.S., Freedman, A.M. & Kilburg, R., 2014. TRIBAL ELDERS ’ VIEWS OF CONSULTING
PSYCHOLOGY ’ S PAST , PRESENT ,. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research,
65(4), pp.266–277.
Liebowitz, B. & Blattner, J., 2015. ON BECOMING A CONSULTANT : THE TRANSITION FOR A
CLINICAL. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 67(2), pp.144–161.
Scharmer, O., 2009. Ten propositions on transforming the current leadership development paradigm,
Available at: http://www.ottoscharmer.com/sites/default/files/2009_FieldBasedLeadDev.pdf.