Leadership Style by Choice, Not by Habit

One Lens Is Not Enough

If you’ve ever sat through a strategy session and found yourself sketching possibilities while someone else rattled off timelines, and another kept asking ‘But what if it fails?’, congratulations—you’ve already met the Dreamer, the Realist, and the Critic. These are not job titles. They’re mental roles we all play, often unconsciously. And therein lies the trap.

Most leaders favour one of these voices, not because the situation demands it, but because it’s what feels most natural. We stick with what we know. The problem is, in complexity, what feels natural is often what fails. When a leader is stuck in one lens, they misread the room, misguide the team, and misjudge the moment. The goal of this essay is not to prescribe a new personality type but to offer a frame for mental mobility. Think of it as a cognitive gearbox: the ability to shift up or down depending on the terrain. Robert Dilts’ Dreamer–Realist–Critic model is the gearbox. And knowing when to switch gears is what separates instinctive leaders from adaptive ones.

The Dreamer: Where Leadership Begins

The Dreamer is where all creation begins. Without this lens, there is no vision, no change, no invitation to imagine better. The Dreamer asks: ‘What if we could?’ It is the voice that speaks before the rules step in. In a Dreamer state, leaders imagine new markets, kinder policies, safer environments, and better ways to harvest an orchard or run a school. It’s the part of us that looks at constraints and hears an invitation, not a wall.

But the Dreamer, left untempered, is a liability. Possibility without responsibility breeds fantasy. The skies fill with castles, but nothing lands. A leader who lives here too long becomes disconnected from team bandwidth, timeframes, or budgets. The Dreamer’s strength, then, lies not in its dominance, but in its pairing with the Realist.

The Realist: Giving Vision a Spine

The Realist enters with boots on and a clipboard. They don’t ask ‘What if?’ but ‘How?’ This is the thinker who scans for logistics, breaks big ideas into tasks, and turns metaphors into measurable milestones. If the Dreamer floats, the Realist builds bridges. Their gift is groundedness. A good Realist doesn’t kill a dream; they give it a spine.

Still, realism can be overdone. A leader stuck in this mode risks flattening potential under the weight of planning. Caution replaces curiosity. You end up with a strategy document no one reads and a vision nobody remembers. Over time, the Realist without imagination becomes a bureaucrat, not a builder.

The Critic: The Trusted Pressure-Tester

Then comes the Critic, the most misunderstood of the trio. Not the naysayer or the pessimist, but the pressure-tester. The Critic asks: ‘Where could this break?’ In the best leaders, the Critic is not a barrier but a brake—useful when you’re racing downhill. The Critic sees the blind spots, the legal gaps, the health and safety loopholes. It’s the voice that prevents the plan from derailing three weeks in.

But the Critic too can fall into excess. Overused, this lens corrodes morale. Teams begin to hedge their speech, dilute their creativity, or worse, stop contributing altogether. A Critic without context becomes a heckler in their own house.

Learning to Switch: From Default to Design

So how do we lead well using all three? Not by fusing them into one blurred mess, but by moving between them with clarity and intention. The magic is in sequencing. Begin with the Dreamer—what is possible? Then bring in the Realist—how can we make it work? And finally, invite the Critic—what could go wrong, and how do we protect against it?

Most leaders don’t suffer from a lack of capacity. They suffer from over-identification. ‘I’m a big-picture person’, says one. ‘I’m all about the details’, says another. These aren’t insights—they’re confessions. When identity fixes itself to one mode, responsiveness dies. And in complex systems—whether you’re running farms, councils, or classrooms—rigidity is lethal.

The Payoff: Range Creates Resilience

Learning to shift modes is not unlike learning to shift gears. At first, you’ll grind a few. You’ll try to imagine freely but catch yourself censoring too early. You’ll try to plan methodically but drift into fantasy. Or you’ll offer feedback and notice your team brace for a storm. Good. That’s awareness. That’s the start of range.

The real benefit of the model is not psychological novelty—it’s practical agility. Teams perform better when their leaders can adapt. Safety improves when the Critic is allowed into the room, but only after the Dreamer and Realist have had their say. Engagement rises when people feel their ideas won’t be shot down mid-sentence. Plans stick when they’ve been built, tested, and still believed in.

Borrow the Hat, Don’t Become It

In the end, leadership is less about being consistent than being congruent. Congruent with the moment. Congruent with the mission. Congruent with the people. To do that, you’ll need all three voices—not in conflict, but in conversation.

So if you’re usually the planner, practise the dream. If you’re the dreamer, practise asking how. And if you’re the critic, remember to ask what’s right before what’s wrong. Borrow the other hats. Wear them long enough to learn something. Then hang them up, until they’re needed again.

Because the best leaders aren’t trapped in one lens. They choose the one that sees most clearly.