Embodied Learning: From Childhood to Transformational Leadership

In many organizations, leaders are expected to act rationally and decisively, but these expectations are often detached from the real conditions in which decisions are made: under pressure, influenced by emotions, uncertainty, and the demands of the body itself. Yet, managerial training still largely rests on a cognitive model of learning, where progress is measured through concepts, frameworks, and abstract knowledge acquisitions. In this model, the body, emotions, and lived experience are largely sidelined. Contemporary cognitive science, however, paints a very different picture: we do not learn solely with our brains, we learn with our entire bodies.

Why does the body matter in learning and decision-making?

This disconnect between how organizations design learning programs and how humans actually learn has profound implications. To explore these dynamics, WDHB, in collaboration with the RITM Lab at Université Paris Saclay, has embedded a doctoral research project at the heart of our work. This ongoing research examines how embodied learning shapes organizational learning processes: how the body influences how individuals and collectives learn, how the degree of embodiment affects the transfer and integration of learning into everyday practices, and how bodily memory contributes to the formation of shared meanings and identities in complex environments. By integrating research, practice, and reflection, WDHB aims to generate both scientific insights and actionable frameworks for organizations seeking to learn, adapt, and transform in conditions of accelerating complexity.

At the core of this shift lies embodied cognition theory (Shapiro et Stolz, 2019) which has fundamentally reshaped our understanding of learning processes. It posits that cognition is neither abstract nor disembodied but emerges from the dynamic interaction between the body, the environment, and action. Even the most abstract concepts are grounded in sensory and emotional experiences. Learning, therefore, is less about accumulating knowledge than about reshaping patterns of perception, action, and decision-making in a durable way.

Lesson from when we were kids…

To understand why so many learning initiatives fail to translate into meaningful change, we need to look beyond organizations themselves. The roots of effective learning do not begin in executive classrooms, but in the way humans first learn to think, act, and make sense of the world. Revisiting how learning emerges from early childhood—and how these embodied mechanisms continue to shape us through adolescence and adulthood—reveals a critical blind spot in how organizations approach leadership development today.

A striking illustration comes from the study by Crollen and Noël (2015), who studied numerical learning in children aged five to nine. The children completed counting and addition tasks under three conditions: without motor constraints, with interfering hand movements, or with interfering foot movements. The findings clearly showed that hand movements significantly disrupted numerical performance, while foot movements had a much smaller effect. In other words, fingers are not just a pedagogical tool, but are deeply integrated into numerical cognition.

This study highlights a crucial point: abstraction does not precede embodiment; it emerges from it. In childhood, numerical representations are built from concrete sensorimotor patterns. The body is not an accessory to learning; it is a structural component. For organizations, this insight is significant. Neglecting the role of the body in complex adult learning risks more than superficial training failures: it can lead to poor knowledge retention, weak application of skills in real work contexts, and leaders who struggle to respond effectively under pressure, ultimately undermining organizational agility and decision-making quality.

…feeling our way through learning as students…

As individuals move into adolescence and early adulthood, learning increasingly involves abstract concepts such as leadership, vision, resilience, and professional identity. Yet, the body continues to play a central role. This is evidenced by the study of Bigo and Islam (2021), which involved business school students attending an intensive “Yoga & Leadership” seminar. The researchers analyzed 100 reflective journals written by participants, not to measure performance, but to explore what students experienced, felt, and learned through their bodies.

The study revealed that the body serves as a powerful tool for understanding managerial concepts. Physical postures function as gestural analogies: a stable or forward-oriented posture, for instance, helps participants grasp what it means to have a clear vision or to be present as a leader. Abstract concepts take form through bodily experience, making them more tangible and memorable.

The research also highlighted the role of bodily intensity. Holding a challenging posture, feeling fatigue or discomfort, becomes a lived metaphor for professional challenges. Participants spontaneously draw parallels between physical effort and the capacity to face pressure, difficulty, or uncertainty in their future managerial roles. The body becomes a training ground for mental resilience and self-mastery.

Finally, the authors identified a mechanism of unlearning. Through relaxation, breathing, and letting go physically, participants became aware of cognitive habits, judgments, and limiting beliefs. By releasing tension in the body, they created space for rethinking and developing new ways of thinking and acting. The body does not merely support the acquisition of new knowledge; it also facilitates the deconstruction of old patterns.

…to becoming leaders who feel, think, and act.

These findings are especially relevant for organizations. As challenges become more complex, fast-moving, and identity-driven, relying solely on intellectual understanding is insufficient. Leadership cannot be reduced to a set of concepts; it is lived, experienced, and built through embodied practice. For organizations, this means that training programs focused only on knowledge transfer risk producing leaders who excel in theory but struggle to act under real-world pressures, fail to navigate ethical dilemmas, or are unable to adapt to unpredictable challenges. Integrating embodiment into learning can directly improve decision-making quality, team performance, and the organization’s capacity to respond to complex, high-stakes situations.

This principle is most evident when observing senior leaders confronted with extreme situations. The recent study by Davis et al. (2026) exemplifies this by introducing a new educational framework, MLLEC (Multi-Dimensional Leadership Learning in Extreme Contexts), designed to develop adaptive, embodied, and ethically aware leadership skills. To test it, they created a simulation of the 2008 K2 mountain tragedy and involved 312 senior executives across different formats, including live-action simulation, online simulation, and a board game.

The results showed significant gains across all dimensions measured, particularly in transformational learning and ethical decision-making. Beyond the quantitative improvements, the qualitative feedback from participants was revealing. Leaders reported deep emotional engagement, profound self-reflection, and in some cases, genuine transformations of professional identity. These learnings were deeply anchored, notably because of the role of bodily memory, which retains experiences long after words fade.
This study highlights a key limitation of traditional corporate training approaches. Teaching models and theories alone does not adequately prepare leaders for volatile, complex, or morally ambiguous situations. Immersive experiences that engage the body, emotions, and ethical judgment are essential for deep and transformative learning.

From fingers to boardrooms: the lifelong role of the body in learning

Taken together, these studies reveal a striking continuity from childhood to senior leadership. At every stage of development, the body plays a central role in how we understand, retain, and transform our ways of acting. The recurring challenges faced by corporate training programs—low transfer, superficial learning, and a disconnect between knowledge and action—are thus not mere pedagogical failures; they reflect a learning model that neglects a crucial dimension: embodiment.

It is within this perspective that WDHB’s work is situated. Experiential learning has long been our foundation, and insights from embodied cognition now provide a robust scientific underpinning. Building on this foundation, the recently developed Threaded Learning framework operationalizes these insights by weaving multiple dimensions of learning — lived experience, bodily engagement, context, and community — over time, rather than following a linear model. Through its integrated design, which combines authentic challenges, exposure to diverse perspectives, structured reflection, collective dialogue, and intentional learning environments, Threaded Learning fosters deeper, more lasting, and truly transferable transformations in leadership practice and identity.

From the outset, the doctoral research I’m conducting is central to this work. It investigates how embodied learning operates in organizations and how bodily engagement affects learning transfer and leadership identity. The findings are designed to generate concrete, actionable outputs for both WDHB and its clients: refining leadership program design, developing evidence-based tools and frameworks, and providing recommendations for embedding bodily engagement in organizational learning and change initiatives. By linking rigorous research with practical application, this work advances the science of embodied learning while helping leaders and organizations build more resilient, adaptive, and ethically grounded capabilities.

From the child learning to count with their fingers to the senior leader facing profound ethical dilemmas, one reality remains consistent: learning always engages the body. Recognizing this continuity is not a step backward but a decisive advancement in rethinking leadership development and corporate learning for today’s organizations.

References:

Bigo, V., & Islam, G. (2022). Embodiment and Management Learning : Understanding the Role of Bodily Analogy in a Yoga-Based Learning Model. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 21(4), 648‑668. https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2021.0190

Crollen, V., & Noël, M.-P. (2015). The role of fingers in the development of counting and arithmetic skills. Acta Psychologica, 156, 37‑44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2015.01.007

Davis, K., Kutsch, E., Turner, N., & Lynch, Z. (2026). From tragedy to training : Multi-dimensional leadership learning through the K2 mountain simulation. The International Journal of Management Education, 24(1), 101324. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijme.2025.101324

Shapiro, L., & Stolz, S. A. (2019). Embodied cognition and its significance for education. Theory and Research in Education, 17(1), 19‑39. https://doi.org/10.1177/1477878518822149