Transformative Leadership Elaine M. Sullivan

Transcription

1 Transformative Leadership Elaine M. Sullivan Powerful questions are those that, in the answering, evoke a choice for accountability and commitment. They are questions that take us to requests, offers, declarations, forgiveness, confession, gratitude and welcome, all of which are memorable and have a transformative power. Questions with little power: How do we get people to show up and be committed? How do we get people to come on board and to do the right thing? How do we get those people to change? How much will it cost and how will we get the money? Hidden agenda in these questions is to maintain dominance and to be right. Questions designed to change other people are the wrong questions. These questions are a wish to create a predictable future. Questions with great power: What is the commitment you hold that brought you into this room? What is the price you or others pay for being here today? How valuable do you plan for this effort to be? What is the story you keep telling about the problem of this community? What is it about your group that no one knows? Questions that have the power to make a difference are ones that engage people in an intimate way, confront them with their freedom, and invite them to co-create a future possibility. Powerful questions are the ones that cause you to become an actor as soon as you answer them. A powerful question has these three qualities: 1. It is ambiguous. There is not attempt to try to precisely define what is meant by the question. This requires each person to bring their own, personal meaning into the room. 2. It is personal. All passion, commitment, and connection grow out of what is most personal. We need to create space for the personal. 3. It evokes anxiety. All that matters makes us anxious. It is our wish to escape from anxiety that steals our aliveness. If there is no edge to the question, there is no power. By answering these kinds of questions, we become more accountable, more committed, more vulnerable; and when we voice our answers to one another, we grow more intimate and connected. These questions have the capacity to move something forward. These quotes are taken directly from Peter Block s book: Community-The Structure of Belonging

2 Quotes on Peter Block s Work on Community Block's framework for genuinely improving communities has six components: 1. The engagement and convening of a broad cross-section of the community to explore issues and ideas collectively. 2. The creation of small groups within larger groups as the basis for exploratory conversations focused on possibilities, not problems. 3. A focus on questions that open rather than rushing to answers, that encourage learning and exploration rather than giving and getting advice. 4. The creation of several types of conversation: o Conversations of invitation: invitations that declare the possibility of collective resolution and action, frame the choice to attend or not, describe the hurdle and expectation of participants, stress appreciation for those who choose to attend, and are delivered personally. o Conversations of possibility: surfacing/exploring the crossroads that each participant is at that gives him or her passion about the subject o Conversations of ownership: surfacing/exploring what actions each participant is prepared to commit to o Conversations of dissent: surfacing/exploring doubts, reservations, and reasons for lack of commitment o Conversations of appreciation: surfacing/exploring the value, learning and connection each participant has received from others 5. The creation of an atmosphere of hospitality, welcoming strangers. 6. The creation of physical and social space that supports belonging. Peter Block describes the retributive community as one in which compassion is marginalized, associational life is devalued, and finding fault and allowing fear to power our conversations and actions reigns. The restorative community, by contrast, is one in which isolation is not allowed to exist and one in which new energy is created, a new sense of aliveness and wholeness comes into being, and one in which we embrace belonging. It is belonging that will help us not only face the future but create it according to our greatest aspirations. So hope has a good reason to exist, after all. Taken from the work of Peter Block s book: Community: The Structure of Belonging

3 Peter Block on Transforming Community Transformative Leadership Elaine Sullivan The Transforming Community Conventional thinking about communal transformation believes that focusing on large systems, better leaders, clearer goals, and more controls is essential and that emphasizing speed and scale is critical. The conventional belief is that individual transformation leads to communal transformation. Our explorations to this point lead instead to the understanding that transformation occurs when we focus on the structure of how we gather and the context in which the gatherings take place; when we work hard on getting the questions right; when we choose depth over speed and relatedness over scale. We also believe that problem solving can make things better but cannot change the nature of things. Community transformation calls for citizenship that shifts the context from a place of fear and fault, law and oversight, corporation and systems, and preoccupation with leadership to one of gifts, generosity, and abundance; social fabric and chosen accountability; and associational life and the engagement of citizens. These shifts occur as citizens face each other in conversations of ownership and possibility. To be more specific, leaders are held to three tasks: to shift the context within which people gather, name the debate through powerful questions, and listen rather than advocate, defend or provide answers. Excerpted from The Transforming Community, Chapter 7, Community: The Structure of Belonging, Peter Block. The Power of the Small Group Each gathering needs to become an example of the future we want to create. The small group is the unit of transformation. Large-scale transformation occurs when enough small groups shift in harmony toward the larger change. Small groups have the most leverage when they meet as part of a larger gathering. The small group produces power when diversity of thinking and dissent are given space, commitments are made without barter, and the gifts of each person and our community are acknowledged and valued. Excerpted from Book at a Glance, Community: The Structure of Belonging, Peter Block.

4 Parker Palmer on the The Principles and Practices at Work in the World Participants in a Circle of Trust return to their homes, workplaces and communities, taking two important resources with them: 1) Greater access to the inner teacher and a new depth of self-knowledge, often resulting in a clearer sense of guidance for their personal and professional lives and a resolve to live closer to their core commitments. 2) Principles and practices from the Circle of Trust approach that can be applied to their daily lives. As a result of participating in circles of trust people report: a stronger sense of purpose and integrity expanded capacity to be fully present to others in ways that affirm and heal increased skill in asking the honest, open questions that help others uncover their own inner wisdom greater confidence to seek or create communities of support increased understanding, appreciation and respect for human differences, based in deeper awareness of the identity and integrity of ourselves and others greater capacity to build the relational trust that helps institutions pursue their missions more courage to live and lead authentically renewed passion for their work or vocation a deeper commitment to leadership and service to others The work of the Center for Courage & Renewal and the Circle of Trust approach is informed by a movement model of social change. Every social movement, small and large, that has made the world a more just and hospitable place has been animated by active respect for human identity and integrity. Typically, these movements have unfolded in four stages: (1) individuals reach a point where the gap between their inner and outer lives becomes so painful that they resolve to live divided no more; (2) people form communities of support that can help sustain that decision; (3) they go public with their values and visions in order to gather support; (4) together in community, they achieve the moral leverage necessary to help transform our common life. What happens in a Circle of Trust grounded in honoring the identity and integrity of each participant flows out into the world as an authentic source of personal and societal healing and a power for positive social change. Excerpted from: Foundations of the Circle of Trust Approach

5 1 Transformative Leadership: Personal and Communal Elaine Sullivan Block, Peter. (2008). Community, The Structure of Belonging. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Block, Peter & McKnight, John. (2010). The Abundant Community. San Francisco: B.K. Cashman, Kevin. (1999) Leadership from the Inside Out. NY. Excellence Dunn, Halbert L. M.D. Ph.D. High Level Wellness. (1961) Washington: Mt. Vernon Printing Co. Fox, John. (1997). Finding What You Didn t Lose. New York: Jeremy Tarcher. Greenleaf, Robert K. (1998). The Power of Servant Leadership. San Francisco: B. K. Intrator,Sam & Scribner, Megan: (2007) Leading From Within. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Macy, Joanna. (2007). World as Lover, World as Self. Moxley.Russ (2000) Leadership & Spirit. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Palmer, Parker. (1997). The Courage to Teach. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.. (2000) Let Your Life Speak. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. (2004) Your Hidden Wholeness San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. (2005) Politics of the Brokenhearted (Deepening the American Dream). Seligman, Martin. (2002) Authentic Happiness. New York: Free Press. Wheatley, Margaret (2001). Leadership and the New Science. NY: Berret-Koehler. (2002). Turning to One Another. San Francisco. B.K. Pub. (2005). Finding Our Way: Leadership for an Uncertain Time. San Francisco:B.K. Whyte, David (2002). The House of Belonging. Washington: Many Rivers Press.,. (2001) Crossing the Unknown Seas: Work as Pilgrimage of Identity. Riverhead Books. Zweig, Connie and Steve Wolf. (1997). Romancing the Shadow. New York: Ballantine Books. 1