I was fortunate to participate in an immersion session last week in Switzerland as part of the Brave Space programme, during the holidays in China. Through bi-weekly calls and one offline immersion, this programme builds leadership for the participants on different themes from around the world.
Physically, it is my first time trying serious hiking and mountaineering, descending from a cliff with a hanging rope, swimming in a lake about 10 degrees – in a word, all activities requiring bravery.
Mentally, we each brought one case from our day-to-day work, and people helped each other through “case clinics”. This is done by listening deeply, clarifying, reflecting, relating to their own experience, and coming up with ideas for future attempts. In my “pod”, there is a friend committed to reviving the journalism spirit within the DACH region (DE, AT, CH), a friend working for decades to build an ecosystem of entrepreneurship in the US and beyond, and me myself, facilitating marine protection within NGOs working in China. These represented different forms of how NGOs work together.
This experience is so Swiss: we all shared a small cottage in the Alps, tried fondues and Swiss chocolates, heard Schwyzerdütsch (while people were kind enough to speak Hoher Deutsch when talking to me), and most importantly, the process was facilitated by Swiss coaches and guides.
