How Horses Can Help You Become a More Effective Leader
I have a confession to make: I’ve personally struggled with feeling like “the other” in many ways: I’ve been a woman in tech, a Silicon Valley company employee in Europe, and a German living in the UK.
And when you’re the only one—whether it’s the only woman, the only designer, or the only person from your background—you often get the message that “it would be great if you were more like us.”
It turns into death by a thousand paper cuts. You never seem to be able to get it right. You question yourself and begin to lose sight of what it means to be authentic.
I know I’m not the only one who experiences this type of self-doubt. Far from it, in fact. As a leadership and transformation coach, some of the questions I hear most often from my clients are things like:
How do I become an authentic leader?
How do I find my voice and communicate clearly?
How do I find a seat at the table?
How do I fit in?
How do I manage stakeholders?
How do I successfully transition from practitioner to leader?
How do I inspire my team?
How do I become a great leader (not just command and control, but actually enabling my team to perform)?
And one of the most effective ways I’ve discovered to help people answer these questions comes from a very unlikely place: a round pen with horses.
Yes, you read that correctly: horses.
At the moment, I’m certifying as an Equus Coach, which involves working with coaching clients and horses together to build leadership skills and grow communication, confidence and greater self-awareness. If you’re imagining galloping through the countryside at full speed, it’s not quite that. Our work is firmly on the ground and doesn’t require any horse experience—you’ll be interacting with horses in the round pen, exploring coaching questions.
How does Equus Coaching work?
I’d love to share a few of the ways horses can be powerful coaching partners and help us answer some of our most deep-seated questions around identity and authenticity.
Whenever you begin an Equus coaching session—much like any other type of coaching—you start with an intention. You define what you’ll be working on, whether it’s about setting boundaries, refining your communication style, or harnessing your energy level.
The magic happens the moment you step into the round pen with the horse. Horses have this uncanny ability to pick up on our emotions and mirror them back to us. They give us immediate, visceral feedback on how we’re showing up and what message we’re sending.
Not only do horses respond to our body language and energy levels, but they seem to understand what lessons we’re working through. During a discussion on boundaries, I’ve seen a horse pick up a traffic cone and start swinging it about—a very literal manifestation of what happens when we don’t respect boundaries!
We tend to be in our heads at work and in our life in general. But when working with horses it brings us back into our bodies because it’s a physical, corporeal experience. The horse reacts to your body, your voice, and your energy.
If you’re not used to being around 400–600 kilogram animals, this might sound a bit intimidating, but I can assure you it’s a very playful interaction. It gives you the opportunity to experiment with different ways of communicating and discover what feels right and works well.
To bring it back to my personal experience for a moment, communication styles vary significantly between my native Germany and my adopted home of the UK. After decades of living in the UK and adapting to expectations, I sometimes question what authentic communication looks like for me. During my coaching sessions with horses, I’m able to tap back into what feels natural. I can find the right balance between being firm and clear without being overbearing. You can be sure a horse will always let you know when you’ve crossed a line!
At the end of a coaching session, we’ll discuss what we learned in the round pen that day and how we’d like to bring this lesson into our life and work. This practice allows you to create an anchor for yourself. It feels easy to tap into and return to because it’s based on a physical lived experience. You’ve had the opportunity to try different approaches and see their impact immediately.
If this sounds intriguing to you, get in touch. I’d love to explore how we could work together in the round pen (or out of it)!
