We all actually know it. The outcome of a collaboration is greatly influenced by how we meet each other as people, and to what extent we feel connected and committed.

Yet, I still encounter organisations that operate in an old groove, where separation and strict division of labor are celebrated, resulting in many tasks falling between the cracks. In such settings, personal and professional autonomy risks having negative consequences for the sense of commitment that extends beyond one’s own domain.

These are the aftereffects of an overly optimistic approach to management processes and an organisational understanding that began at the turn of the century with “Scientific Management,” which now needs to be seriously challenged. Today, we see the results in the form of stress and burnout, loss of meaning, conflicts and collaboration issues, and “quiet quitting” (where people only deliver the bare minimum required to fill their working hours).

We need to view work life, colleague relationships, and leadership from a fundamentally new perspective that is closer to who we are as human beings in this world and that can bring us closer to each other in a deeper understanding and sense of connectedness. Not only with each other and ourselves but with our surroundings. This, with full respect and an awareness of our responsibility for the marks we leave, from relationships to the climate.

The German political scientist and sociologist Hartmut Rosa’s concept of resonance offers a profound framework for understanding relationships and connections, which is particularly relevant in the context of collegial leadership. Resonance can be described as a mutual, engaging, and meaningful relationship between people, where the experience of belonging and responsiveness creates a foundation for growth and development.

This article explores the significance of resonance for collegial leadership, its influence on professional outcomes, and how it can create regenerative processes in collaboration on the core task.

Resonance and Collegial Leadership

Collegial leadership is characterised by collaboration, shared responsibility, and joint commitment to the organisation’s core task. Rosa’s concept of resonance can serve as an analytical lens to understand how collaborative relationships are shaped by trust, mutual respect, and the feeling of being heard and understood.

When resonance is present in collegial leadership, employees experience a sense of connection to both their colleagues and the organisation’s purpose. This creates a meaningful framework for work that motivates increased engagement, creativity, and accountability.

On the other hand, the absence of resonance often leads to alienation, conflicts, and reduced well-being, which negatively affects collaboration and professional outcomes.

To create resonance in collegial leadership, it is important to focus on concrete actions and practices. The following approaches can be effective:

1. Authentic Dialogue: Emphasise the importance of active listening and open communication. Collegial leadership should support an environment where all voices are heard and respected.

2. Shared Objectives: Create a clear and common understanding of the core task. This makes it easier for employees to find meaning in their work and relate to each other.

3. Emotional Intelligence: Leaders and colleagues should work on strengthening their empathetic abilities so they can better read and respond to others’ needs and perspectives.

4. Rhythm and Structure: Create frameworks that allow space for both reflection and action. Regular meetings and feedback sessions can support continuous resonance.

The above approaches are important and mark, for many, a shift in direction, habits, and understanding. As it is well known, one of the most difficult things to change is people’s habits and routines. Therefore, it is important that these approaches are prioritised and regarded as essential in the creation of sustainable organisations.

Self-awareness and Communication Skills as a Foundation

To create and receive resonance in authentic dialogues, it is essential to know oneself and one’s personality traits. This self-awareness enables an understanding of how one affects others and how to strengthen one’s skills in building meaningful relationships. Developing one’s conversation skills is crucial, as it enhances the ability to engage in meaningful dialogues and create an environment characterised by openness and mutual understanding.

In order to engage in resonant conversations, it is necessary for us to look inward and reflect on how our personality traits manifest in our conversational behaviour. This is essential not only to work constructively with our own potentials but also to gain a greater understanding of what is at play in the process.

In the global collaboration through Facet5, which continuously develops new reporting possibilities for psychometric measurements of personality traits, we have identified 5 crucial areas where personality traits are expressed in conversations:

• Presence: Presence is about being fully focused and engaged in the conversation. This involves eliminating distractions and intentionally paying attention to the nuances of the dialogue.
• Hyperawareness: Hyperawareness refers to the critically necessary self-awareness during the conversation. It requires continuously asking oneself questions such as: What biases or assumptions am I bringing into this conversation? How do my emotions and attitudes influence my way of listening and responding?
  
• Decoding: A competent conversation partner is able to extract the essence of what the other person is saying – both what is said directly and what is implied between the lines. Decoding is about reading tone of voice, body language, and context, then connecting it with the content to achieve a deeper understanding.
  
• Verbalisation: The ability to express oneself clearly, honestly, and convincingly is an essential part of any conversation. The courage to articulate without fear of mistakes and the ability to communicate with conviction strengthens the relationship and makes the message clear.
  
• Flow Control: Conversations have a structure that can be compared to a journey: a beginning, a middle, and an end. Flow Control is about being able to manage this process – opening the conversation with a relevant introduction, keeping it on track, and concluding with clarity and purpose.

The above has always been an important part of leadership development. The new aspect is that this should also be a development area and a recurring focus in future organisations, where team collaboration and collegial leadership are emerging as the dominant forms of organisations.

Leadership plays a central role in creating frameworks where resonance is prioritised. It is the responsibility of leadership to promote a culture where the importance of conversations and regenerative processes is in focus. Since culture and organisations are created by people, it is necessary to have a prioritised strategic focus on developing individual competencies. By prioritising these elements, the organisation can strengthen both collaboration and professional outcomes, thereby establishing real conditions for resonance in cooperation.

Everything is connected and in interaction

Inspired by the French philosopher, sociologist, and anthropologist Bruno Latour’s actor-network theory, the concept of resonance can be expanded to include an understanding of the interconnectedness of all things. Latour emphasises that relationships do not only occur between people, but also involve objects, technologies, structures, and environments as active co-creators of meaning and dynamics.

In this context, resonance is not only about the interpersonal, but also about how the organisation’s physical and social environment creates the conditions for mutual responsiveness. For example, workspaces, digital tools, and organisational structures can either support or hinder resonance.

Creating resonance therefore also involves an awareness of how these material and immaterial elements are integrated into practices that support community and collaboration. This expanded understanding of resonance emphasises the need to view the organisation as a network of actors, where all elements play a role in shaping relationships and outcomes.

Aesthetics in all its forms and physical expressions hold particular significance for how an individual experiences organisational resonance between intention and action. Or put another way, if the organisation values present and resonant colleague relationships but only offers frameworks that are either sterile, conformist meeting rooms or cluttered storage spaces with vague purposes, its overall effort will be experienced as contradictory and untrustworthy.

Organisations and their leaders should instead view internal communication, resonant processes, and conversations as a key strategic area, because everything ultimately depends on this. If we do not have resonance between people, we risk alienation, and if we do not align ourselves with the awareness of the interconnectedness of all things, we create contradictions between intention and means.

This connection between an organisational culture that values resonance and collegial leadership, and that creates the right facilities for inspiring conversations, is important in itself. In addition, there are the facilitating competencies and the individual’s access to developing their own conversation skills, as previously mentioned.

Ref.: Samtalekapital (John Langford) www.samtalekapital.dk

Overall, I refer to this connection as Conversation Capital, which should be seen as a GPS for the organisation’s overall strategic development of resonance. With good professional conversations, we can achieve the resonance that is important for people’s well-being and mastery. This, in turn, impacts the results of the work processes that individuals engage in, which often involve a greater complexity than we can fully grasp as individuals.

Resonance as a Catalyst for Professional Results

In my role as an external consultant, supervisor, and process facilitator, I often observe that teams, colleague groups, and leadership groups lack facilitating, methodological skills when it comes to conducting professional conversations. However, the understanding of both the importance and potential is not lacking, which is a good starting point.

But even in organisations where conversations are a significant part of professional daily life, there is a need for competence development when it comes to conversations as a discipline and method in collegial collaboration. Sometimes this is due to shyness or a lack of courage to take charge in processes. Other times it is due to a lack of method or training in its application. Finally, it can also be due to a limited methodological repertoire or creativity in its use, leading to an uncertain, static, and mechanical experience of facilitated conversational processes.

Many organisations therefore use external consultants as supervisors for teams or as regular “method trainers.” The side benefit is that this can also bring immediate higher legitimacy in the management of processes in vertical colleague relationships.

Resonance in Regenerative Processes

Resonance plays a central role in regenerative processes by generating sustained energy and innovation within the organisation. Regenerative processes involve continuous renewal and development, where both individuals and organisations learn from experiences and grow together. When resonance is present, employees experience meaning and purpose in their work, which enhances their ability to manage change and contribute to sustainable solutions. With a methodological understanding and facilitating competencies, we lay the foundation for establishing the regenerative organisation.

In practice, regenerative processes can be supported through:

1. Reflection Spaces: Allow time and space for employees to reflect on their work and relationships.

2. Recognition: Celebrate successes and acknowledge individual and collective contributions.

3. Flexibility: Create working conditions that accommodate employees’ needs and life situations.

Conclusion

In this article, I have raised the flag for the concept of Resonance and its significance between people. Through the connection to Latour’s actor-network theory, I have argued that everything is interconnected. Furthermore, I have introduced the concept of resonance and the actor-network concept as a theoretical foundation for my model, Conversation Capital, as a GPS for a highly prioritised strategic focus area. Through this, I have linked the organisational and individual levels.

Resonance in collegial leadership strengthens collaboration around the core task by:

1. Promoting open communication: A resonant culture creates space to share ideas and concerns, which improves problem-solving and innovation.

2. Creating psychological safety: Employees feel safe to take risks and fail, which is crucial for learning and development.

3. Strengthening engagement: When employees experience resonance, they feel connected to the core task and work purposefully to create value.

4. Supporting a feedback culture: Resonance promotes open dialogue, where feedback is seen as an opportunity for development rather than criticism.

Hartmut Rosa’s concept of resonance provides a valuable framework for understanding how collegial leadership can be strengthened through meaningful relationships and dialogues. When resonance is prioritised and understood in light of Latour’s actor-network theory, it creates a foundation for better professional results, stronger interpersonal dynamics, and regenerative processes that ensure sustainable development. By implementing concrete strategies for resonance, organisations can build a collaborative environment where engagement, well-being, and innovation thrive.

Hartmut Rosa (born August 15, 1965) is a German sociologist and political scientist who, from a critical theoretical approach, works on acceleration and alienation in high-speed society. In his work Resonance, he shows that resonance is the counter to increasing alienation. Link to his profile at Friedrich Schiller University in Jena: https://www.fsv.uni-jena.de/19060/prof-dr-hartmut-rosa

Bruno Latour (born June 22, 1947, died October 8, 2022) was a French philosopher, anthropologist, and sociologist. In the 1980s, Latour founded actor-network theory, a social constructivist framework for understanding reality. To understand the creation of knowledge, one must look at all the actors involved in the network surrounding a discovery, which includes not only humans but also non-human actors such as machines and natural phenomena. Bruno Latour’s website: http://www.bruno-latour.fr

Facet5 Ltd offers robust strengths-based tools for measuring personality traits. Facet5 is valid and research-based and is a “Big Five” tool. Facet5 includes the SuperSkills report, which measures how individual personality traits are expressed in conversational competencies, with strengths, risks, challenges, and potentials. John Langford is the Danish partner at Facet5 and uses the tool in development processes. He also accredits consultants, HR specialists, and recruitment consultants in the use of Facet5. Link to Facet5: https://www.facet5global.com/home/

Scientific Management: Taylorism or Scientific Management refers to a method for production planning during industrialisation. It was introduced by Frederick Winslow Taylor in 1903. The aim of this approach was to find the optimal method to achieve a given goal. One of the tools used was time and motion studies, which allowed for the elimination of unnecessary physical movement in specific workflows. This task-oriented optimisation of workflows has now become a natural part of work planning in many places and has influenced several of today’s well-known management and control programs.

By John Langford, management and organisational consultant, expert in the development of sustainable leadership, teams, and colleague relationships. Associate partner at Facet5, process consultant, expert in regenerative leadership and colleague relationships, optimisation of workplace conversational capital and collegial leadership, business coach.

Published Jan 7, 2025