Showing Up: The Power of Community in Leadership Development
Scrolling through my Facebook feed, I paused at the vibrant photos on Jolie’s timeline. Colorful images of travel adventures and special moments with family painted a picture of a life rich in experiences and deep in connections. The Jolie in question is Jolie Chehadeh, Vice President of Employee Experience at LVMH. We first met when Jolie was the VP of Global Talent Management at Esteé Lauder and we partnered on a project to understand creative talent. In our interactions since, I have been struck by Jolie’s profound insights, her candor, and her joy for life. Jolie is the type of person that cultivates meaningful relationships wherever she goes.
I had a lightbulb moment looking at a picture of Jolie stood in the lush French countryside next to a dear friend, their expressions saying, “I’m so glad we’re here together.” What better person to explore the importance of community in leadership development with than Jolie? Core to her job at the luxury goods icon is fostering connection and building community in a diverse, decentralized, organization. Core to her life is a deep value of belonging. As Jolie puts it, “Throughout my whole life I show up. I show up for the people I care about. I will move mountains to show up.” So, I dropped her a note and she agreed to a conversation.
The Foundations of Community
For Jolie, the concept of community is deeply rooted in her upbringing. Growing up in Minnesota with a Lebanese father and American mother, community for Jolie was about lots of love, lots of energy, and lots of passion. Community wasn’t about going to church, despite half her family being Maronite Catholic and the other half Greek Orthodox. It was about those backyard moments surrounded by aunties, uncles and cousins, the children playing and the adults drinking the arak, smoking cigars, and sharing the ja ja, the gossip. This early exposure to a tight-knit community laid the foundations for Jolie’s understanding of the significance of community. For context, it was the 80s and 90s so Jolie wasn’t having explicit philosophical conversations with her parents about values. Rather, her adoption of community as a core value came through observation and experience, "My parents role-modeled the behaviors," she explained. "We knew if there was a family event, we don't go to a friend's house. We reschedule. We knew that there was Friday night family dinner. We knew mum and dad showed up to our events and were on the PTA."
The Impact of Community on Personal Identity
Jolie credits her early sense of community as being instrumental in shaping her personality. Community gave her resilience, stability, and the confidence to get out of her comfort zone. With a strong sense of adventure, Jolie became an intrepid traveler, exploring and living in countries far and wide. Having an international father and a mother who worked for the airlines made travel easier. Her parents gave her and her brother the gift of going out into the world, where she has seen community take different shapes and forms. Travel has given her the insight that community is something you take with you and build on. That community isn’t necessarily a place or a tangible entity but rather a feeling of belonging that permeates boundaries.
Community has made Jolie a kind, more compassionate, and self-aware person. Jolie reflects, “It's the sense of belonging. Regardless of where I was in life, whether I was a student or an academic, wherever I was living in the world, I go back to my family foundation that sets the tone. It’s a place where I am so stripped down, so authentically raw, and so myself. That has given me the ability and confidence to show up in that same way in other facets of my life."
Community in the Workplace
As Jolie transitioned into her professional life, she found the concept of community extended far beyond family and friends. "Even in my first job at J.P. Morgan it was never just about the work," she says. Community has given Jolie a framework for her career. “I join an organization and I have expectations of psychological safety, showing up for each other, compassion, and nurturing.” This mental model has shaped Jolie's approach at LVMH. She emphasizes the importance of creating a sense of community within the company, particularly through talent management and L&D initiatives. "Learning and Development is the one intentional, structured way we bring cross-Maison people together," Jolie explains. "The main piece of feedback we hear is that community, those networks, is the place where leaders get to learn from peers, get to understand their shared experiences, and build deeper connections across the Group."
This approach not only fosters a sense of belonging but also contributes to employee retention, engagement, and job satisfaction. "In general, community at work is really important. We are looking for more meaning and value. We don't just show up and do a job. We want to feel a greater sense of belonging. We want to know we can influence with a point of view that is respected, that we can have fun, and that we are doing things that contribute to a greater good. Creating community matters even more in a decentralized company comprising 75 global brands."
Community and Leadership Development
At LVMH, community plays a crucial role in leadership development. Jolie highlights their Leading for the Future program, which uses a peer coaching model. The program is founded on leaders building greater self-awareness of themselves today and for the future. By bringing together leaders from diverse brands within the LVMH portfolio, the program creates opportunities for perspective-taking and perspective-sharing. Jolie explains, "When leaders can see across vastly diverse brands like Tiffany, Rimowa, and Sephora and when they can be together in a room with other regional GMs or functional leaders, each of those leaders can calibrate themselves, find inspiration, and be humbled. That's the power of connection and perspective."
Jolie believes that this community-based approach to leadership development offers unique benefits. "As we form community, whether it's at a one-day event or through longer- term initiatives, it creates shared experiences, vulnerability, and gives leaders permission to show up in a more human way. You don't feel as alone even though you are at the top, your job is hard, and you have to make tough decisions."
Jolie’s insights align with research into the importance of community in leadership development. Day (2000) argues that leadership development is inherently a social process that is enhanced through relationships and interactions within a community context[1]. Similarly, Wenger and Snyder (2000) highlight the value of communities of practice in fostering learning and innovation within organizations[2]. Galli and Müller-Stewens (2012) discuss the significance of social capital in leadership development, which is built through community interactions and shared experiences[3].
The Universal Need for Community
I like to save my big questions until last. As we wrapped up our time together, I asked Jolie why she thinks community is an integral part of the human condition. Since the beginning of humanity, we have lived in social structures with varying levels of interdependence, tribes, villages, families, and organizations to name a few. "It's partly for survival,” said Jolie. “We are naturally wired to be emotional beings.” Jolie believes we are fundamentally stronger together. "If you have people coming together in a shared experience, believing in the direction, and caring about the mission, you'll be stronger for it. This is not an isolated, solo journey. People need to connect to something. It validates, reinforces, and challenges." Jolie’s view echoes the findings of Avolio et al. (2009), who argue that leadership development is most effective when it occurs within a supportive community that provides opportunities for practice, feedback, and reflection[4].
A final thought
In partnership with Dr. Taylere Markewich, founder at Insights and Advantage, we have developed a new group coaching program, the Collective. The program gives small cohorts of leaders a confidential space to deepen their self-insight, make breakthroughs on perceived barriers, and to put their learning into practice. A foundational principle of the Collective is collaborative learning alongside other executives, guided by experienced executive coaches. So much of what Jolie shared in our conversation resonated with the tenets of the Collective.
In an increasingly disconnected world, Jolie's lived experiences and deep belief in community serve as a powerful reminder of the importance of fostering genuine connections. Whether in our personal lives or in the workplace, the communities we build and nurture have the potential to shape us, challenge us, and ultimately make us better leaders and human beings. As I reflect on those Facebook photos, I see them now not just as snapshots of Jolie's adventures, but as testament to the power of community in action. In every shared moment, there's a lesson for all of us about the value of connection and its
[1] Day, D. V. (2000). Leadership development: A review in context. The Leadership Quarterly, 11(4), 581-613.
[2] Wenger, E. C., & Snyder, W. M. (2000). Communities of practice: The organizational frontier. Harvard Business Review, 78(1), 139-146.
[3] Galli, E. B., & Müller-Stewens, G. (2012). How to build social capital with leadership development: Lessons from an explorative case study of a multibusiness firm. The Leadership Quarterly, 23(1), 176-201.
[4] Avolio, B. J., Walumbwa, F. O., & Weber, T. J. (2009). Leadership: Current theories, research, and future directions. Annual Review of Psychology, 60, 421-449.
