Leadership isn’t just about delivering results—it’s about creating spaces where healing can begin.
I learned this early, leading the environmental department in post-war Iraq. I wasn’t just managing environmental policy; I was supporting people whose lives had been fractured by decades of war. Many had lost homes, loved ones, or the very sense of safety that makes life bearable. Staff members arrived each day carrying invisible burdens—grief, displacement, and uncertainty. In meetings, I often saw silence where trust used to live, and fear beneath professionalism.
There was no manual for leading through collective trauma. But rebuilding efforts needed to go beyond laws—they had to restore trust.
As an environmental leader, I directed the national strategy to rehabilitate the Mesopotamian Marshlands after they had been drained and weaponized against the Marsh Arabs. These wetlands—once called the Garden of Eden—had been deliberately destroyed, turning an entire ecosystem into a graveyard. The ministry took steps to reintroduce water, develop environmental regulations, and establish partnerships with international donors. Field-based initiatives were launched, and new restoration-focused departments were created. While I did not personally travel to the marshes due to security constraints, I ensured that local voices, particularly Marsh Arab communities, were central to planning and implementation.
In purpose, we found the path to healing—a brief, sacred moment where relief from trauma came through service. Whether it was the steady rhythm of service offering the structure needed for recovery, or a single act creating unexpected reprieve, healing emerged.
Inclusion was intentional. I brought the Marsh Arabs into the conversation, and their wives, mothers, and sisters stepped forward, who, in turn, brought in their children. What began as environmental restoration became a generational invitation to rebuild. Their survival depended on more than clean water—it depended on being seen, heard, and valued.
From that process, Women and the Environment was born—an initiative rooted in service, grounded in healing. It went on to empower thousands of women in rural Iraq, offering environmental training, health awareness, and leadership development across regions that had once been silenced by war.
Years later, that same lesson came back to me in a new context: helping establish the first Veterans’ Court in Ukraine.
I wasn’t a judge. I wasn’t a veteran. But I had lived through war, and I understood the psychological weight that trauma carries long after the gunfire ends. I led the academic design and facilitation of a workshop that brought Ukrainian judges together with U.S. experts who had pioneered trauma-informed court models. But before we talked about systems, I shared my own story: surviving conflict, raising a child alone, and seeking healing after displacement.
That opened a door. The Ukrainian judges shared not only legal questions, but also human concerns: How do we serve veterans whose wounds are invisible? How do we hold people accountable without retraumatizing them? What does justice look like when the battlefield is still fresh in their minds?
Together, we mapped out a new kind of courtroom—one that balanced structure with compassion. A space that recognized trauma not as an excuse, but as a factor, and offered veterans a path toward reintegration, not just punishment.
That workshop led to real change. One expert on our team, deeply moved by the experience, volunteered to travel to Ukraine to help implement what we had started. The experience wasn’t just professionally meaningful—it was personally healing. It reminded me that systems, too, can be sites of healing if they are built with intention.
I saw that same need for healing—and the same opportunity for transformation—at the Defense Language Institute.
Many of my students were service members returning from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were now being asked to study the language and culture of places where they had experienced trauma. Sitting in class, being told to engage with those memories through vocabulary and grammar, was not easy. Some broke down. Others disengaged. And many carried their pain quietly, beneath the surface of military discipline.
But I didn’t treat these reactions as disruptions—I treated them as signals.
I organized talent shows where students could express themselves in the target language—not through tests or drills, but through singing, dancing, poetry, and acting. These weren’t simply creative outlets. They were healing rituals. In those moments, students began to reconnect with one another, with themselves, and even with the cultures they had previously feared or misunderstood.
Learning shifted from obligation to empowerment. The classroom became a space for renewal, not retraumatization.
This is the heart of trauma-informed leadership.
It doesn’t mean lowering expectations—it means raising awareness. It doesn’t mean solving every problem—it means showing up with humanity. It doesn’t mean leading perfectly—it means leading with presence.
Trauma doesn’t always announce itself. Sometimes, it sits quietly in a meeting room. Sometimes, it shows up in silence, resistance, or fatigue. And sometimes, it just needs a leader willing to say: You are seen.
Whether rebuilding a marsh, reimagining a court, or reshaping a classroom—the path to healing starts with how we lead.
How have you made space for healing in your work? What does trauma-informed leadership look like in your world? Let’s continue the conversation.
