Leaders are experience architects
Reminder: It's time for your Weekly 1:1™
Today's agenda: Leaders are experience architects
The question on the table: What experience are you actually designing for the people around you?
Before we start: It’s time for iced tea
Every leader is designing an experience. Most of us just haven't thought about it in those terms. But once you start, it changes how you see almost everything you do.
I've spent much of my career working in the events industry, and one of the things that world gives you, if you’re paying attention, is a heightened awareness of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of something that was intentionally designed for you. A well-produced event has a quality to it that people sense even when they can't name it. There is energy to it, a rhythm. The flow feels right. The details say someone gave it deep consideration and really cared. There's a presence to it, as in, someone was thinking about you before you even arrived.
I've been thinking about how much that carries over into leadership. Not just in the events industry, but everywhere.
When you schedule a meeting with your team, you're making design choices - whether you realize it or not. How you name it, what you put first on the agenda, whether there's room for people to actually think or whether the whole thing is just information moving from one person to the next: all of that lands somewhere. People feel the difference between a leader who has thought about their experience and one who hasn't. They might not say it out loud, but they feel it.
The thing that the events world continues to teach me about design is that it requires holding two things at once. You have to plan - really plan, think through the details, be intentional about what you want people to walk away with - and then you have to let go of the plan enough to be present to what's actually happening in the room. Those two things can feel like they're in tension, but they're not. The planning is actually what frees you to be present. You've already done the thinking, so you can show up and listen.
That's what I think the best leaders do, too. They've thought about the experience before the conversation starts: what does this person need from me right now, what do I want them to walk away with, what am I actually trying to create here. Then, they're present enough to follow what unfolds rather than just execute what they planned.
And it's not only about your team. Your stakeholders, your leadership, the people above you and beside you - they're all having an experience of your leadership, all the time. Every interaction adds to something or takes away from something. That's not meant to create more pressure, it's an insight that can unlock new potential once you're aware of it.
Intentional design in events never meant controlling everything. Anyone who's produced a live event knows that's not possible and probably not even desirable. It means being clear about what matters, making thoughtful choices in advance, and being grounded enough that when something unexpected happens -and something always does - you respond to it rather than just react. (See my May 26 issue for more details on the gap between responding and reacting.)
Event leaders think about this before anything else: know your audience - not just who they are, but what they need, what they're feeling when they walk in, and what you want them to carry out. That thinking doesn't stay at the event door. It shows up in every room, every conversation, every relationship we lead.
The question I'll leave you with this week:
Is there an experience you're creating right now - a recurring meeting, an ongoing relationship, a conversation you keep having - that you've never actually stopped to design? What might be different if you did?
Lisa English, ACC, CMM is a Leadership and Executive Coach and Strategic Consultant with deep expertise in Events, Travel and Hospitality. The Weekly 1:1™ publishes every Tuesday at 8am PT. Subscribe at lisaenglishsg.substack.com or subscribe below.