Allal Bennani is an entrepreneur, IFS (Internal Family Systems) therapist and expert in leadership psychology. In his role for EVE, he leads a workshop on “the power of enthusiasm”. He answers questions from the EVE webmagazine about his journey and his vision of leadership.
Hello Allal. Can you tell us what drove you to become the director of Zara Men, and then an IFS coach?
Allal Bennani: I joined Zara just after graduating, as a sales representative for the Middle East. After 8 months, I was offered the position of commercial director, and a year later role of general manager for Zara Men. At the age of 26, I found myself heading up an entity that encompassed 87 countries and 3,600 stores. It was a real success story that any business school student would dream of! But after 8 years in these roles, I realized that I couldn’t be myself. I wanted to reconnect with my firm inner conviction that I was born to help. That’s my mission.
I designed a training program for myself that would introduce me to all the most meaningful approaches to developing and guiding other people. I spent four years meeting the very best experts and mentors: I met the Dalai Lama, Tony Robbins, Dick Schwartz (founder of the Center for Self Leadership) and others. So that is how I became an IFS therapist: I care for people, I teach, I run workshops like the one here at EVE (and very soon in Paris, on October 28-29).
Your workshop at EVE aims to “awaken” people’s potential for enthusiasm. How do you go about it?
Allal Bennani: We all have a huge amount of resources inside us. And we don’t even realize it. My job is to reconnect people with what they don’t know is already inside them. I release the brakes, I heal the wounds by looking for what has hurt them deep inside. A common belief makes people worried about working on something that hurts them, and we are afraid to re-open old wounds. But it is really the opposite: it sets you free! All you need to do is to learn how to look inside yourself.
Traditional coaching puts people in motion: you are given goals to achieve, one after the other. And that’s great as long as there is movement, but as soon as you stop, everything falls to pieces if you haven’t taken the time to look inside yourself in more depth. In order to get people to reconnect with their inner self, I create experiences, exercises and role plays: by using the body we can understand things better and really start to change.
What do you think the leadership of the future looks like?
Allal Bennani: The leader of the future is responsible and human. Responsible, in that he or she is aware that their statements and actions have an impact on the planet. Human, because individual fulfillment is the key to change. The new generations don’t want a salary, they want meaning, sincerity, and authenticity.
Interview by Marie Donzel for the EVE webmagazine.
