Leading with Integrity: Lessons from Trauma-Informed Therapy
“Lead Like Someone Who's Done Their Inner Work”
Ask any skilled therapist what their role is, and they’ll probably say something like this: to create safety, foster insight, and support the client’s growth - not to solve things for them.
At its best, leadership should work the same way: not as top-down control, but as a relationship built on trust, clarity, and shared purpose.
In a time when many workplaces lean into micromanagement, productivity surveillance, and shifting success metrics, it’s more important than ever for leaders to model something better. Especially in people-based organizations - where our product is the people - the stakes are even higher.
Here’s what therapy has taught me about leading with insight and integrity.
Co-Creation Builds Commitment
In therapy, treatment planning isn’t something done to the client - it’s done with them. The therapist might guide the process, but the client is the expert of their own experience. Goals are co-constructed. Progress is defined together.
As the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) outlines, client involvement in treatment planning is a core principle of trauma-informed practice. The same is true in leadership. When leaders co-create goals with their teams, they shift from control to collaboration. They invite ownership, input, and alignment. When goals are imposed unilaterally, without room for discussion, the result isn’t greater ambition - it’s disconnection. People stop seeing themselves in the work.
People are more motivated when they have a voice - and a stake - in the direction of their work. Trauma-informed leadership invites people to the table. It asks, what do you need to be successful? What does success look like for you?”. When we co-create goals, we send the message that “your perspectives matter here”.
One of the most painful dynamics I’ve seen - both in therapy and in leadership - is when people are invited to participate, only to realize later that their voice was never going to shape the outcome. It’s a fast track to learned helplessness, the exact thing we try to counteract in healing spaces. Leaders must be careful not to confuse involving people with empowering them.
Collaboration doesn’t lower the bar - it makes it more likely people will reach it.
Safety First, Then Growth
In both therapy and leadership, nothing meaningful happens without trust. Harvard professor Amy Edmondson's research on psychological safety shows that teams perform better when people feel safe enough to take risks, ask questions, and admit mistakes.
Good therapists know this. They create an environment where clients feel safe enough to be honest, vulnerable, and brave. And good leaders can too - by owning our mistakes, being transparent about expectations, and treating feedback as a conversation, not a correction.
Leaders don’t have to be perfect - just grounded enough to admit when they’re wrong. I’ve found that the more I admit my own mistakes, the more respect I earn and the more trust I build. That’s the kind of safety that allows people to show up fully, and grow.
I want my team to know that transparency isn’t a buzzword. It’s a commitment. It’s the backbone of the relationship. You don’t have to be perfect to belong here. But you do have to be real. Safety and accountability go hand in hand.
In therapy, we don’t expect compliance - we build trust so clients feel safe enough to explore, push back, and grow. As a leader, I’ve learned that rigidity masquerading as decisiveness often comes at a cost. Leaders who want true alignment must tolerate healthy disagreement. Without it, we risk obedience and lose buy-in.
Lead With Questions, Not Answers
Great therapists know that insight sticks best when it’s discovered, not delivered. That’s why they ask open-ended questions, get comfortable with silence, and trust the client’s process.
Leadership is no different. When we rush to fix, even with the best intentions, we can unintentionally undermine trust and autonomy. As organizational psychologist and MIT professor Edgar Schein writes in Humble Inquiry, “telling” reinforces hierarchy - while asking builds connection. Inquiry isn’t soft. It’s strategic.
Try shifting from:
“Why didn’t you…?” → “Can you walk me through your thinking?”
“Here’s what you should do…” → “What options are you exploring?”
“What’s the solution?” → “What support do you need?”
These small changes signal trust and empower people to think, to grow, and to lead themselves, both in the therapy session and in leadership.
🔗 Want to go deeper? I explore the leadership pitfalls of over-advising in my last article: Stop Giving Advice: What Therapists Know That Great Leaders Must Learn.
Predictability Isn’t Boring - It’s Ethical
Yes, the modern workplace is fast-paced. Markets shift. Priorities evolve. But while change may be inevitable, confusion doesn’t have to be.
One of the core principles in trauma-informed care is predictability. Clients need to know what to expect, how things will be handled, and what the boundaries are - because unpredictability mimics trauma. And healing begins with consistency.
The same applies to leadership.
When leaders change expectations without explanation, adjust metrics mid-year, or move the goal posts without warning, it doesn’t just frustrate people - it breaks trust. It signals that success is arbitrary, and that no amount of effort guarantees stability.
Just as we measure progress in therapy based on individual context and client-centered outcomes, effective leadership must recognize effort and impact - not just metrics. When our recognition systems reward performance that doesn’t match what’s happening on the ground, we start to lose trust. High performers stop raising their hands and start asking themselves, “is it worth it?”.
People can rise to challenges - but not if the finish line keeps moving. If someone isn’t meeting expectations, they should know exactly what steps to get there. That’s not just good management - that’s integrity.
Predictability is not a lack of ambition. It’s a show of respect. And in people-based companies, it’s not just strategic - it’s ethical.
Leaders can’t always promise certainty, but we can offer consistency in how we communicate, clarity in what we ask, and transparency in how we measure success.
When You Can’t Change Everything, Change What You Can
Not all leaders have full control over the systems they operate in. Like many, I lead within a fast-paced, mission-driven organization where decisions are made at multiple levels. There are times I’ve disagreed with decisions or felt tension between organizational goals and the realities on the ground.
But disagreement isn’t dysfunction. In fact, it’s essential.
Healthy teams welcome debate. Diverse perspectives challenge assumptions, uncover blind spots, and lead to better solutions. Groupthink might feel more efficient in the moment, but it stifles innovation and erodes trust over time.
That’s why I speak up when I can. I advocate for clarity, for fairness, for decisions that reflect care for the people doing the work. And even when I’m not the one making the call, I try to lead in a way that reflects what I believe good leadership looks like - human-centered, principled, and strong enough to hold space for complexity.
Debra Meyerson, a Stanford sociologist known for her work on leadership and organizational change, calls this kind of work tempered radicalism - the practice of working within systems while also challenging them, changing what you can from the inside, and staying grounded in your values even when change feels slow.
Good therapists already know this. In therapy and social work, we support clients who often live within systems that are unjust, disempowering, or harmful. We may not have the power to change those systems right away, but we still show up. We build trust, offer tools, validate pain, and help clients reclaim their voice and agency.
That’s why a social justice lens is essential in this work. Being a good therapist means recognizing that individual healing can’t be fully separated from systemic harm - and that our role includes advocacy, empowerment, and sometimes, resistance.
The same applies in leadership.
As Bob Chapman, CEO of Barry-Wehmiller and author of Everybody Matters, writes:, “The skills of leadership and the courage to care can exist in any business, at any time.” And we know this is true - there are companies that succeed not by sacrificing their people, but by valuing them.
It’s not a trade-off. It’s a commitment.
You Can Lead Differently
You can create a safe space. You can build real trust. You can ask thoughtful questions instead of offering answers. You can resist toxic urgency and advocate for clarity.
Even if the system around you is flawed, your leadership doesn’t have to be.
And if you’re not sure where to start, maybe begin where a good therapist would - by listening more deeply, trusting a little more, and walking alongside instead of ahead.
