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Leadership Learning Community

Learning from the Past and Future:Inclusive Leadership for a New Era

Mission Statement: Our aim is to transformindividuals and society by connecting the learningand practice of those who support leadership that iscommitted to promoting social and economic equity.

What must change in our current approaches to

leadership development if we are to provide thescope and quality of leadership needed to address thesignificant social problems of the 21st century?

You cannot solve problems with the same level ofconsciousness that was used to create them. AlbertEinstein

The Leadership Learning Community (LLC) believes that it is

important to ask ourselves what in our currentconsciousness about leadership needs to change if we are totackle the problems that we all care so deeply about. For thepast eight years the Leadership Learning Community hasengaged hundreds of leadership development funders,program staff and researchers in learning about how tocultivate leadership that is inclusive, rooted in communityvalues, and action-oriented. In the process of our worktogether, we have identified the need for a much broaderand more culturally inclusive approach to cultivating andsustaining leadership; that focuses on nurturing andsupporting teams, networks, and communities; and preparesindividuals to lead collectively with others whose leadershipcultures and practices differ from their own.

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As the economic and social divides widen, the nonprofitsector is being called to a new level of leadership.Expanding and transforming the leadership culture in thenonprofit sector depends both on building the leadership

capacity of people of color who have been excluded fromleadership positions; and transforming the conditions thatsustain dominant forms of leadership that are inadequate foraddressing the problems we have. PolicyLink hasdocumented that supporting people of color to take onadvocacy and leadership roles within their communities is aprerequisite for reducing poverty and disparities.1 In a studyon why people of color are not moving into leadershippositions within the nonprofit sector, LLC found thatleadership culture and organizational practices devalue the

contributions of people of color.2

There are several opportunities for radically changing theleadership status quo.

The anticipated transfer of leadership3 creates anopportunity to diversify the sector; however, without amore inclusive leadership culture the under-representation of people of color could worsen.

The election of Barack Obama demonstrated a new

leadership landscape with a massive mobilization usingdecentralized self-organizing strategies, unprecedentedlevels of civic engagement and the election of our firstAfrican American president.

The development of new social technologies presentsunique opportunities to connect leaders to reach newscales of influence; however, realizing this potential

1 Policy Link, Leadership for Policy Change,

http://www.policylink.org/Research/Leadership/2 Leadership Learning Community, Multiple Styles of Leadership: IncreasingParticipation of People of Color in Leadership in the Nonprofit Sector currently beingrevised for publication. http://leadershiplearning.org/node/953 See CompassPoint, Daring to Lead,www.meyerfoundation.org/downloads/4DaringtoLead2006d.pdf and Up Next:Generation Change and the Leadership of Nonprofit Organizations Annie E. CaseyFoundation; Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fundhttp://www.aecf.org/KnowledgeCenter/Publications.aspx?pubguid={4756F522-E7B4-4940-ABB3-BDA345917235}

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http://www.meyerfoundation.org/downloads/4DaringtoLead2006d.pdfhttp://www.meyerfoundation.org/downloads/4DaringtoLead2006d.pdf

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requires a much deeper understanding about howleadership emerges within networks and communitiesof learning and practice.4

In order to take advantage of these opportunities, and reachthe scale and scope required to support systemic change, wewill need to transform how we develop and support leaderswith a new consciousness about leadership.

What are the limitations of the current model?The dominant thinking about leadership places a very strongemphasis on the individuals role in change. Often anindividuals contribution takes on heroic proportions causingus to lose sight of leadership as a dynamic interconnected

process that relies on many individuals. We focus on thisquestion because we believe that the current heroic,individual model of leadership does not:

Recognize and appreciate the leadership of people ofcolor who exercise leadership aligned with differentcultural traditions and values that are often lessdirective and more collective and community-focused;

Develop our understanding of how to support

leadership as a collective, community or networkprocess;

Learn about how leadership is fostered and expressedin communities; and

Understand the implications for leadership in the movefrom organization-centric to network-centricapproaches to change.

The Costs of Our Current Leadership Thinking: If we do

not broaden our thinking and leadership practices beyondthe current models, we believe there will be certain costs.We believe that the current model of heroic individualleadership will not enable us to:

4 Allison H. Fine, Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age, Jossey-

Bass: SanFrancisco, 2006.

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Support the Leadership of People of Color: People of colorwill continue to be under-recognized for their leadershipcontributions and will be under-represented in leadershippositions without more culturally inclusive leadership

models. Many people of color interviewed by LLC explainedthat their leadership is rendered invisible when they do notconform to the dominant leadership norms that privilege adirective style of leadership even when they are actuallyaccomplishing more through a facilitative style thatunleashes team capacity.5 The leadership values of love,equity, justice, and community, which are critical toleadership success for people of color, are often notsupported within the dominant leadership models. If wecontinue to privilege the dominant model about what

leadership should look like, people of color will not haveinfluence at policy tables, in designing community basedsolutions, and in addressing disparities along a number ofpolitical and socio-economic dimensions.

Strengthen Collective Leadership Capacity: James MacGregorBurns, often considered the father of the leadershipdevelopment field and author of the seminal leadership bookLeadership6, was asked in a recent interview about the next

frontier for the field of leadership. Without hesitation heanswered, We need to better understand leadership as acollective process. There is a growing recognition thatindividual leaders need to be trained to work moreeffectively to unleash the collective leadership capacity of agroup; and to better understand how diverse groups,especially those representing multiple organizations andstakeholders, identify shared purpose and vision and createcapacity for coordinated action. Some programs haveexpressed concern that the selection and recognition ofindividuals may actually undermine the collective processand diminish the work of teams who share responsibility forachievements.

5 See the LLC study on Multiple Styles of Leadership: Increasing Participation of Peopleof Color in Leadership in the Nonprofit Sector currently being revised for publication.http://leadershiplearning.org/node/956 James MacGregor Burns, Leadership, Harper: New York, 1978.

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Build and Sustain Cross Sectoral Work: Solving communityproblems requires an integrated cross-sectoral leadershipapproach focused on systems-wide change rather than

individual leadership that tackles problems as isolatedspecial interests.7 Focusing on the individual leader does notsupport an integrated, community problem-solvingapproach. The fragmentation of the non-profit sectorpersists with most leadership programs focused onorganizational improvements that are not able to addresssector-wide problems with systemic thinking and solutions.

Leverage Current Network Trends: Current technologicaldevelopments and organizing trends are rapidly increasing

the potential of ad hoc groups and networks to lead changework. If the current assumptions about the power of theindividual to exert influence (usually in an organizationalcontext) persists, we will continue to maintain the leadershipstatus quo and miss opportunities to participate in the largescale networked change processes and social movementsthat are needed to solve complex problems in the currentenvironment.

Enhance Leadership within Communities: Leadership isdeeply embedded in relationships and communities, a factthat is often overlooked when individuals become the focusof leadership development. Developing the skills andcapacities to work effectively with others in communities isnot accomplished by pulling people out of place and awayfrom their community connections. Place-based leadershipdevelopment strategies have demonstrated success in moreeffectively addressing and solving community problemsbecause they engage a broad cross-section of leaders andare more responsive to the communitys needs.8

7 See the study by Dr. Jeanne Campbell and Tom Adams on Grassroots Leadership:Growing Healthy and Sustainable Communities,www.wkkf.org/Pubs/CCT/Leadership/GrassrtsSptFndrs2PC_2003_01_21.pdf8 See The Collective Leadership Framework:A Workbook for Cultivating and SustainingCommunity Change http://www.ethicalleadership.org/publications/publications whichwas developed for and used by the Kellogg Leadership for Communtiy Change program.See also the Policy Link report, Why Place Matters: Building a Movement for Healthy

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http://www.ethicalleadership.org/publications/publicationshttp://www.ethicalleadership.org/publications/publicationshttp://www.ethicalleadership.org/publications/publications

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To support more inclusive leadership models we needto ask:

What approaches are successfully supporting and

enhancing the leadership of people of color andaddressing organizational climate?

What opportunities do the rapid changes in socialmedia create to support and leverage the impact ofleadership within networks and social movements

What approaches are supporting leadership as acollective process?

How can we understand, innovate and designleadership development strategies that support people

in a community context? How can we develop leadership evaluations that

measure and encourage collective and networkedleadership?

What could change?As our dominant models and assumptions about leadershipour challenged, and leadership enhancement strategiesreflect more inclusive and connected approaches to

supporting leadership, we expect to see that:

Leadership programs are serving more people of color.

Leadership programs have adopted the approaches andprogram design elements that are most conducive tosupporting people of color.

Performance review and recognition systemshistorically tied to the dominant cultures leadershipmodel become more aligned with inclusive and

connected leadership models. Funders report increased ability to identify and invest in

leadership programs and strategies that diversifyleadership and address issues of fragmentation.

Communities, www.policylink.org/documents/WhyPlaceMattersreport_web.pdf

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Leadership programs find that their graduates arereporting increased collaboration across a number ofsignificant divides.

There are more models of leadership enhancement

strategies that are supporting leadership action utilizingnetworks.

ConclusionWe believe that the lessons from current leadership workand the learning from a rapidly changing environment canbe integrated to generate a new body of theory, practice andevaluation results that can shift the current leadershipparadigm to exponentially increase impact, the sustainabilityof social innovation and systemic change.

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:

What leadership design, curriculum and recruitmentapproaches will foster increased collective leadershipcapacity that is inclusive, rooted in community and actionoriented?

What opportunities do the rapid changes in social mediacreate to support and leverage the impact of leadershipwithin networks and social movements

How can leadership programs more effectively cultivate,promote and sustain the leadership of people of color.

How do we appropriately target our leadershipinvestments (e.g., the types of experiences and activities we

support) to get the outcomes we seek?

How do we measure changes in collective (or community)leadership capacity? How do our evaluation toolssimultaneously build reflective learning capacity anddocument concrete results?

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