Leadership Lab 5: Engagement & Network Leverage — The Hesitation Is Where the Work Lives

“Your network is either building you or keeping you still.”

Most people in peer and recovery work build networks that run sideways — same level, same field, same rooms. Safe rooms. The rooms where everybody already knows the language and nobody has to explain themselves.

Safe keeps you exactly where you are. The people who could elevate your work the most are usually the ones you have not reached out to yet — not because they are unavailable, but because you have not fully believed you have the right to.

Lab 5 is built around that hesitation. The hesitation is where the work lives. Two maps, six questions, one specific Engagement Move you commit to before you leave the room.

The Two Maps

Engagement is not about knowing the most people. It is about knowing the right people — and letting the right people know you. Lab 5 begins with two honest maps. Names go in. Direction is named. Hesitation is exposed.

• 1

  The Energy Map INpowers · Depletes

  Two columns. Names go in honestly. This is not about good people versus bad people — it is about which relationships are building your capital and which ones are consuming it. What does this person see in you that you sometimes forget about yourself?

• 2

  The Network Map Active · Connected · Within Reach

  Three rings. Place every name where it actually sits — not where you wish it sat. Then name the leader you have not reached and the real reason you have not. Not the logistical reason. The real one.

Six Questions. Start With the One That Hits.

These are not sequential. The room opens with whichever question lands hardest first. Most people fear rejection from leaders they have built into giants. Leaders are people. The question is whether you bring something real to the room — and you do.

• 1

  “What does engaging a leader who is more advanced than you actually cost you — and is that cost real or imagined?”

• 2

  “Is your network expanding with you — or is it a snapshot of who you used to be?”

• 3

  “What do people in your network call you for — and is that the version of you that you want to be known for?”

• 4

  “Where are you giving more than you are receiving — and is that investment producing a return?”

• 5

  “What would you do differently in your professional relationships if you actually believed what you wrote in your Inner Authority Statement?”

• 6

  “What is the one move — one reach, one message, one conversation — that you have been delaying that could change something?”

What You Walk Out Holding

Three deliverables. Each one written in your own hand, in the room. Capital you can deploy in the next seven days.

• The Energy Map & Network Map — an honest read of who is actually around you and what direction the energy is moving.
• One specific Engagement Move — a real reach in the next seven days. “I am going to reach out to… and what I am bringing to that conversation is…”
• Your INpowered Network Statement — one sentence about how you show up in the rooms you enter and the ones you are about to enter. That statement is your credential. Lead with it.

The 90-Minute Flow

Tight architecture. Every minute is load-bearing. Open conversation format — you bring names and answers, the room sharpens them.

• 0–15 minOpening & Premise — arrival check-in, the premise of the lab, and one honest read of where your network is right now.
• 15–35 minThe Energy Map — twenty minutes of writing. Names go in. INpowers on one side. Depletes on the other. No analysis yet, just naming.
• 35–55 minThe Network Map & The Leader You Have Not Reached — place every name in Active, Connected, or Within Reach. Then name the leader you have wanted to engage and have not. Name the real reason.
• 55–75 minThe Six Questions · Open Conversation — the room opens with whichever question lands hardest. Honest exchange. The questions surface the work; the room sharpens it.
• 75–85 minThe Engagement Move — one specific reach you commit to in the next seven days. Who, what you will say, what you are bringing.
• 85–90 minINpowered Network Statement & Close — one sentence in your own voice. The credential you walk out leading with.

Before You Walk In

The lab moves fast. You will get more out of it if you arrive with a few honest answers already on the page. Take 15 minutes with the participant worksheet before showtime.

• A short list of names — people who currently INpower you and people who deplete you. Be honest, not generous.
• One leader in your field — a decision-maker, someone whose room you have wanted to be in — that you have not reached out to yet.
• Your Inner Authority Statement from Lab 1 — if you wrote one. If you did not, that is fine. We start where you are.
• An honest 90 minutes and the willingness to name the move and not negotiate it down.

Where Lab 5 Sits in the Arc

The Missing Curriculum is six labs in three tiers. Lab 5 is the first lab in the Influence Tier — where the inside work meets the rooms that change what is possible for you.

• Tier 1 · Awareness (Labs 1 & 2) — where you are in the system, and the moment that breaks the script.
• Tier 2 · Capacity (Labs 3 & 4) — what you carry, how you deploy it under pressure.
• Tier 3 · Influence (Labs 5 & 6) — how you move the system — not from the outside, from inside the work itself. You are here.

Who This Is For

• Peer recovery specialists and peer support workers
• Recovery coaches, sober companions, and navigators
• Behavioral health workers, supervisors, and clinicians ready to engage upward
• Anyone leading from inside the work who knows there is one move they have been delaying

Prerequisites: none. Bring a list of names. Bring the leader you have wanted to reach and have not. Bring an honest 90 minutes.

Tyshaun Perryman — Founder & Principal Consultant, Insightful Recovery Solutions LLC. NIH CHORUS Co-Author. Leadership Development. Healing Capital.