Leadership Development
Studying leadership at Harvard University: reflections.
LDC Blog, July 2015
Last month I ticked off a bucket list item. I was a student at Harvard University in Boston. I went to hear from the University’s best on “leadership development” in a dual-purpose ‘program’; it was also cleverly structured as a personal leadership development exercise.
Of course, an experience like that gets you thinking. I’ll spare you the details of my personal development and reflection – just let you know it was useful and continues to be so – and blog here about the two major things that got me contemplating. One is a general observation, and one is more specific and provocative.
Firstly, the general observation: It was interesting that despite being a really diverse group of people, it felt as though we had more in common than we did that was different. There were 70 participants from 21 countries and, for the first time, a majority of women (54%). While we were all in leadership development and/or coaching work, it was still pretty astounding – or is it reassuring? – that the challenges and joys we find in our work are largely universal. New Zealand is definitely on the money in terms of leadership development. I guess the global research projects on leadership development keep us connected with similarity and difference across the world, and it’s helpful to experience it first hand too. Perhaps our size enables us to continue to experiment and achieve great things.
That brings me to my next observation, which I pose as more of a challenge for us as organisations and leadership development professionals.
Many people were ‘star struck’ with being at Harvard. The expectations were – actually, I don’t know what they were! Somewhat superhuman, I think. Sure, it’s a prestigious institution and you pay high fees and you expect great return. But if there’s one thing I have learned in my now decades of working with leaders on their development, whether you get value out of a learning opportunity, or not, is largely down to how you approach it as a participant. Learning experiences abound, and in the leadership space, it’s not about knowing stuff. It’s about using what we know to achieve stuff – sometimes against the odd.
Harvard or Lambton Quay?
It’s all about the approach and readiness as a participant.
The thing that struck me most is that the facilitators were not Harvard-struck. They referred to the high fees periodically and the realisation that there were great expectations. Beyond that acknowledgement, they showed no signs of caring about what we thought about the leadership development experience. They just got on with it. And with a focus on immersive adaptive leadership, the challenges abounded. Some people really did not like it!
That’s what got me thinking.
In New Zealand I fear we are too concerned with the ‘happy sheets’ – those ‘reaction’ evaluation forms completed by participants at the end of the workshop experience. ‘Did you like the content? Which session helped you most? What about the materials? What about the facilitator?’ And the most comments are generally collected about … the food and the room temperature... That aside, facilitators and courses are canned or continue on the basis of those sorts of reaction evaluations.
Yet happiness does not necessarily create learning. Don Kirkpatrick taught us that back in the 1950s when he developed his four levels for evaluating training. From easiest to most difficult to evaluate, he said we should consider ‘reactions’, ‘learning’, ‘behaviour’ change, and business ‘results’. They do not necessarily flow naturally from one to the other. In fact, adaptive leadership has as a key premise “discomfort” – that we learn best when we are on that boundary of no longer knowing what to do. That means if we want to learn and thrive, we have to look at things differently – we have to, well, “adapt”! Adapting requires ‘behaviour change’ and all in the quest for achieving new and different ‘results’. Einstein’s famous quote comes to mind. “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” So, do we ‘persist’ or do we ‘do something different’?
Happiness with learning experiences seems a bit tame if we want true change. If participants are really ‘satisfied’ with the experience, maybe they haven’t been challenged enough. Maybe facilitators were complicit in helping participants gain reinforcement that what they’re already doing is okay. You know what? Maybe what we’re all currently doing is not okay. Maybe we all need a bit of challenge, a bit of discomfort to urge thinking about things differently and trying new ways of working.
So I’m thinking that in New Zealand we are often playing it far too safe to be creating true learning and potential behaviour change for many workshop participants. I’d like to see us be more courageous, more challenging, and get people thinking more about what they can do as leaders to make a ‘real difference’, rather than ‘soft-tweak performance’. That means changing what we ask about when seeking reactions to workshops too. (Today, the Kirkpatricks continue to teach us plenty about that.)
I’ve recently agreed to start a coaching relationship with a leader who says she wants stimulation and provocation to grow. Seeking a coach who will challenge her is part of what she is looking for. What an absolute privilege to work with someone who is up for it from her instigation, rather than my enquiry! She will be a leader to watch out for, and the public service in New Zealand will be all the better as a result of her contribution.
So, let’s take it to the next level in leadership development in New Zealand, and introduce more challenge to learning and adapting. Of course, being there in support is vital too. But the key question for now: what challenge are you up for?