As an executive coach over the last decade, I’ve witnessed a recurring pattern in leaders – across industries and roles – that of a loss of balance and perspective. Many wrestle with finding an equilibrium in energy, pace, and attention. It’s a symptom of modern organisational life, shaped by increasing complexity, ambiguity, and unrelenting speed.
Let me begin by asking you some questions:
- As a leader, are you constantly on the go, rarely pausing to breathe?
- Do you feel disconnected from your organisation’s broader vision?
- Do you crave perspective on your leadership challenges?
- Are you constantly delaying your own development for more immediate priorities?
These questions reveal a common tension: the dominance of action over reflection. The gravitational pull within organisations often places greater emphasis on cognitive performance and quick results. While necessary, I know from my own leadership experience, and from the many leaders I’ve supported as a coach, that this are just part of the story. Effective leadership also requires intentional slowing down and regaining balance.
Studies by neuroscientist Iain McGilchrist, show our brains are wired for two kinds of attention. The left hemisphere allows for narrow, focused attention, while the right hemisphere is attuned to broad open attention and creativity. The modern workplace heavily favours left-brain functioning and McGilchrist estimates suggest we spend 80% of our time in that focused mode, often at the cost of creativity, intuition, and connection.
We’re simply not designed to thrive like this. For millennia, humans have lived in close relationship with nature. That connection supported our holistic cognitive and emotional health. But in recent history, we’ve increasingly lost touch with it. Nature, therefore, offers a powerful antidote to today’s stress and burnout. It supports our need for reflection and perspective.
Leaders often navigate complex paradoxes – balancing action with reflection, structure with flexibility, detail with vision, continuity and change. These aren’t binary choices; they require discernment, agility and ambidexterity. Nature’s processes of dynamic equilibrium uniquely mirror these tensions, offering rich scope for exploration. As psychiatrist Sue Stuart-Smith said, “When we work with the nature outside us, we work with the nature inside us.”
This is where nature-based coaching comes in. Whether held outdoors or online using natural metaphors, coaching informed by nature enables a richer kind of exploration. Like nature’s cycles – seasons, storms, renewal – leaders go through similar rhythms. Exploring this within nature shifts perspectives and deepens insight.
Simply getting out of the office and walking outside disrupts routine thinking and expands attention. Neuroscientist Shane O’Mara notes that walking boosts memory, creativity, and cognitive flexibility. And so coaching conversations while walking bring fresh thinking and solve problems more creatively.
Walking side-by-side also changes the coaching dynamic. Moving together fosters a sense of connection and reduces formality. The subconscious process of synchronising steps naturally encourages openness, trust, and emotional safety – important ingredients for transformational work. And nature supports silence; it feels reflective, rather than awkward. Pauses become moments for insight rather than conversational gaps to fill.
Over the years, I’ve seen how nature prompts deeper reflection. Looking out across a valley may spark a strategic breakthrough. Being in a forest can invite perspective on a turbulent change process unfolding in the organisation. Observing a flock of birds might shift how someone sees their role in a system. These encounters bring an entirely different quality to leadership conversations that can’t easily be replicated in an office or online setting.
It’s also deeply grounding. Stuart-Smith reminds us that humans are a grassland species. For hundreds of thousands of generations, we’ve evolved in natural landscapes. Urban life, in contrast, has been a mere blink in evolutionary terms. Our nervous and immune systems are still attuned to natural environments. No wonder nature restores balance so effectively.
Leaders have a responsibility both develop themselves and to model this balance for others. Of course, the pressures are real – time is tight, responsibilities are heavy – but stepping outside, even briefly, can shift your energy and perspective. Coaching in nature offers a space to reflect, restore, and lead with renewed clarity.
If you’re wondering how to start, here are some practical ideas:
Three reflections to take for a walk:
- What shifts in my own “nature” do I notice when I am outdoors?
- How can nature help illuminate the connections between challenges I’m facing?
- What’s my role in the wider system? What legacy do I want to leave?
Three actions to try today:
- Take a meeting outside – walk with a colleague or join remotely with headphones.
- Build daily micro-moments of nature connection, with deeper immersion weekly or monthly.
- Stand barefoot on the grass, listen to birdsong, and simply observe how it feels.
Whether you’re facing a leadership transition, managing team challenges, or recalibrating your career direction, nature-based coaching offers an expanded lens through which to explore possibilities. It reconnects you – with yourself, your purpose, and the world around you.
Take a look outside. What might shift if you gave yourself permission to pause?
Anna Brown is Accredited Master Executive Coach who specialises in weaving the power of nature into a transformational growth journey for executive leaders in transition.
