Photo courtesy © Chris Hadfield
When you ask Chris Hadfield how he defines leadership, he goes back to his cadet days. The astronaut wasn’t old enough to join pilot school, so he enrolled in a junior leadership course instead. It was there that he first heard the line that has stayed with him ever since.
“Leadership is the art of influencing human behaviour to accomplish a mission in the manner desired by the leader,” he says.
Hadfield, the first Canadian to command the International Space Station, pauses to underscore the point, then says it again.
“Leadership is the art of influencing human behaviour to accomplish a mission in the manner desired by the leader.”
We’re talking about leadership because he’s set to speak at the Leadership at the Speed of Science summit, focused on stress and performance in leadership. The event will take place Oct. 1 at the BMO Centre in Calgary (here’s what you can expect).
For Hadfield, this definition has guided decades of practice in the most unforgiving environments. It is blunt, but it is also practical. Leadership is not about title or personality, he says, but instead what you do in the moment.
Hadfield speaks from a place of unusual responsibility. Commanding the International Space Station with the lives of an international crew and the interests of multiple nations at stake meant leadership was never theoretical.
“I’ve commanded the International Space Station. It’s not only a $150billion asset, the biggest thing humanity has ever built in space, the pride of 15 different countries, but at the same time, it’s a vessel that contains human life. And when you make mistakes up there, not only can you do enormous financial damage, but you kill people just with one moment’s inattention,” he says.
What leaders can learn from practicing for failure
Hadfield will share stories and leadership perspectives in Calgary on Oct. 1, when he opens the Leadership at the Speed of Science summit at the BMO Centre. The program is designed around moments of pressure and ambiguity, not bestcase scenarios.
In addition to opening the summit, Hadfield is also releasing a new novel on Oct.7 which draws on his spacefaring background to bring readers inside a highstakes mission.
“If things are going well, you don’t need leadership. The only reason that leaders exist is for when things are going wrong or when you’re trying to change what’s happening right now,” he says. “The greatest antidote for fear is competence. If you don’t know what you’re doing, then everything is terrifying or at least everything is daunting and you don’t feel ready to deal with it.”
Tammy Arseneau, founder and CEO of Cortical Consulting & Coaching and host of the summit, says that is a message business leaders often overlook.
“When there’s a lot of change or pressure on leaders, the good ones will ask for help. That’s hard to do, but it matters because sometimes you realize you’re not showing up the way you want to as a leader. That’s when you need support to be better for your people, your family, and yourself,” she says.
Arseneau’s perspective on seeking help under pressure echoes Hadfield’s own emphasis on preparation.
Hadfield talks about practice as something deeper than repetition. In his world, astronauts spend most of their time simulating failures so they can recognize patterns and respond without panic when real problems appear.
“I served as an astronaut for 21 years. I was in space for six months. So what did I do for 20 and a half years? I practiced. I prepared,” he says. “And I didn’t practice for things to go right. I practiced for things to go wrong. That’s what astronauts do for a living. We practice for things to go wrong.”
In business, Arseneau points to operations teams in the oil sands as an example of practicing for disruption.
“Operations leaders do a really good job of thinking through what could go wrong and running drills to practice for it,” she says. What is often missing, she adds, is the real pressure leaders feel when those events actually happen. Bringing that element into preparation would make practice more complete.
For Hadfield, that blend of technical rehearsal and inner readiness is what builds real confidence under pressure. Hadfield says preparation also depends on having a clear definition of success. To illustrate, he points to the calm of a quarterback facing a rush of defenders.
“Imagine what it looks like to be a football quarterback,” Hadfield says. “I watch football on television and I just picture how overwhelmed I would be if someone just suddenly handed me the ball and all those huge people are running at me and now I’ve got to do the right thing.”
What looks effortless, he explains, is the result of deliberate preparation.
“Those guys are calm, and they didn’t get there accidentally. They got there because they identified what success looks like. They have a clear understanding of what victory looks like.”
That, he adds, is what leaders need to give their teams. “Number one is a common definition of success that you clearly understand and that you properly communicated to your team.”
Leadership shows up when the future is unclear
Hadfield says leadership shows up when the future is unclear. Most of the time, if people are capable, a leader can stay in the background. But in a crisis, the role shifts. That is when people look for direct and immediate direction.
“If the spaceship is hit by a meteorite and the air is all being sucked out, I don’t care what anybody else is thinking. This isn’t a time for democracy or varying opinions. We have already thought about this. We’ve practiced, and if we don’t do the thing that we need to do right now, we’re all going to die.”
Those tipping points also animate Hadfield’s new novel, The Final Orbit, a space thriller that imagines what happens when lifeanddeath decisions unfold in orbit.
In less extreme moments, Hadfield says the role of a leader is to shift along a spectrum depending on what the team needs. He describes it as moving between +1, 0 and 1.
When leaders join a new team, he says, they often feel the need to add value right away. But in a new environment without context, that impulse can do more harm than good.
His advice is to aim to be a zero. By observing first, leaders can understand how things work before stepping in. Once they have that awareness, they can become a +1 by adding value because they know what they are doing.
Many leaders, he warns, end up at 1 because they try too early. Instead of helping, they set the team back.
Being a +1 happens when you hold at zero, watch closely, and then shift and step in when the situation truly requires it.
Having multiple different perspectives is also important for leaders, and it’s a big reason Arseneau programmed the summit to bring people together from different backgrounds.
She says that listening to different perspectives sounds simple but is often the hardest part of leadership.
“It’s not easy to hear when someone challenges you, but the point is to separate how their words make you feel from the value of what they’re saying. I’ve had teams push back in ways I didn’t like, but I’ve learned to give it time and think it through. Diversity of thought is not easy, but it’s necessary.”
The point is not passivity but timing. Influence carries more weight when it is used sparingly, and leaders who learn to move between these states are better positioned to keep their teams focused when disruption arrives.
Arseneau says that is exactly the kind of conversation the summit is designed to spark.
“Because of the complexity and the pace of change, it’s not possible for any one leader to see the whole picture. That’s why different perspectives are critical. It doesn’t mean you’re abdicating as a leader. It means you’re listening, then making a call based on all the information.”
is the official media partner for the Leadership at the Speed of Science summit. Tickets for the Oct. 1 event are 70% sold out, so get your ticket here to see Col. Hadfield and others speak on leadership.
