One of the late Robert Redford’s films, The Horse Whisperer, is a beautiful film about grief and overcoming loss after a tragic accident.
Much of the story focuses on unspeakable pain and how finding your way to honestly connect with others can lessen the load.
Redford’s character uses techniques now known as equine assisted learning (EAL), which has been used successfully for decades as a therapeutic tool for those with mental or physical challenges, trauma or addiction.
In more recent years though, it has been developed as a corporate tool to help team building and communication skills.
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Now well established as a leadership development tool in the UK thanks to innovators like David Harris, in Ireland it is relatively new. A quick internet search shows corporate days using EAL are available in a few locations from Horses Connect and Therapy Through Horses, both in Galway to Ainrush Stables in Limerick and Martinstown Lodge in Meath.
How does it work? Leadership and wellbeing coach Emma Jane Clarke runs corporate team building sessions at her 200-year-old Martinstown Lodge farm outside Dublin. She says her four horses, DJ, Danny, Misty and Rua, are the real teachers.
“Horses are like mirrors, they reflect immediately how you’re feeling and not how you’re acting. They don’t care who you are or what car you drive. Hierarchy and ego are out the window in these sessions.”
Like many animals who are vulnerable to predators in the wild, horses’ survival depends on co-operation within the herd and on quickly reading body language and emotions.
Horses are effective in team development for humans because the animals provide immediate, powerful, non-verbal feedback on human interaction or lack of it.
Recent research in the Administrative Sciences journal found EAL “complements traditional leadership training by developing relational and embodied leadership skills, including trust building, adaptability and emotional intelligence, which contribute to organisational resilience and sustainable growth”.
What’s involved? A typical EAL team-building session is not horseback riding; it’s a learning experience where individuals work together with horses to perform structured, goal-oriented activities. For example, they might have to work together to get a horse to walk around obstacles or move in a certain direction.
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“Let’s say the team needs to move the horse but it won’t move. Maybe the team hasn’t aligned on the how or the why of the task or they’re not clear on their roles. Until they connect, the horse won’t budge no matter what,” says Clarke.
To successfully complete each activity, team members need to regulate their emotions, improve their focus, communication, leadership and problem-solving skills. “Everyone needs to find congruency. You want the horse to walk with you but, if confidence-wise you’re a three out of 10 or you’re scared or nervous, then the horse won’t step along with you. It’s all about how we interact with others, or don’t, and how to communicate well. You can’t hide from the horses, they really see you,” she says.
Paula Mullin, a leadership professional who tried EAL at Martinstown recently, found she had to be present in each moment.
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“My horse DJ knew when I was steady and when I was not. Without words, he showed me how to ground myself, he showed me so much about myself in such a short time,” she said.
“Horses respond not to roles or titles, but to energy, intention and presence. You can’t pretend with a horse. They feel who you are and reflect it back, instantly and honestly. This wasn’t about learning new techniques. It was about remembering how to be.”
Clarke chooses the horses carefully. “The horses don’t need to be specially trained but they need to be special. It takes a certain type of personality to do this work.
“They need to be horses that can forgive very easily. It’s tiring for them too. They can choose to work that day or not. If they come to the fence, they want to work. If not, they can go back out.”
Clarke took up horseback riding as a child in south Dublin and spent much of her career working to increase participation in sport with communities and policymakers. Her career as a director at Sport Ireland was flying but she had an unspoken desire.
Much like Scarlett Johansson’s young equestrian character in The Horse Whisperer, Clarke’s equine epiphany occurred following an accident eight years ago. She spent three months in hospital and then several more in a wheelchair recovering in her mid-terraced Dublin home.
“The worst had happened to me, why not go for my dreams? I dreamed of owning a farm but I’m not from a farming family. I was scared,” she recalls. The reflection time helped her realise that anything was possible once she changed her thinking patterns.
“Thoughts aren’t real. You have to challenge your limiting thoughts and beliefs. Once you realise this, it helps you move forward and get out of your own way. Nothing else had changed except how I thought about it.
“A few months later, my partner Ken [an engineer] and I got the farm; I arrived still on crutches. We’d bought a 16-acre farm with multiple barns and 20 stables. It was an old riding school. We didn’t have this business in mind at first but wanted to add value to farms and bring business to a rural area. I had no idea what I was getting myself into; I just wanted my dream.”
As they struggled to get the farm in shape, Clarke had to accept some hard truths about her new life.
“I like things done well but it took me some time to realise nature will always win. You’re never in your comfort zone on a farm. You have to let go of perfection and embrace the beauty. You keep it neat and tidy but realise it’s a farm.
These life lessons helped inspire Clarke to use her leadership and team-building experience to help other executives develop greater self-awareness and acceptance. She now works with her sister Lisa Chalfa, a fellow certified EAL trainer, helping corporate teams and leaders work better together.
She recently worked with a number of CEOs in siloed organisations, who didn’t realise how stressed they were. The horses showed them how to be more present and the ways that the stress impacted on how they showed up at work and the unconscious messages that the team took from their stress.
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Leadership development tools and techniques are always evolving and this approach seems promising based on the research so far.
The Administrative Sciences journal found EAL “improves self-awareness, emotional intelligence, non-verbal communication, trust building, adaptability and problem solving. Participants report behavioural changes, such as improved empathy, clarity under pressure and team cohesion”.
“Despite the growing popularity of EAL in therapeutic and educational domains, its application within organisational behaviour and corporate leadership development remains underexplored”.
Clarke’s horses have taught her leading is “a verb, not a title”. She said: “Teams need to become like a murmuration of starlings where everyone is moving together in that beautiful synchronised way to achieve their goals and the company strategy.”
Margaret E Ward is chief executive of Clear Eye, a leadership consultancy. margaret@cleareye.ie
