Future Leadership from Cirrus on Vimeo.

In an increasingly diverse world, we need to grow our capabilities to work with others (contextual leadership), to realise our place in the system (adaptive leadership) and to network globally (networked leadership). This does take time, but it is an investment with massive benefits.

The areas that have changed or intensified can be identified in the diagram below. This is an iterative model – it will change and morph, but essentially now guides my work and the work of Think Beyond.

I’ve written a quick explanation of each of the parts of the model and linked it to a recent YouTube video from IBM. The video is a great collation of some of the best leadership thinking from around the world.  So here goes…

Ethical Leadership

Not new…yet it’s lack has led to a number of large companies cheating, snooping and damaging relationships as never before. And the ripples have been felt throughout the world. Ethical leadership focuses on the greater good and on growing relationships through modelling, trustworthy behaviour and listening to the needs of others. Video quote: “Heroic leadership is becoming increasingly archaic.”

Self regulated leadership

Key components include mindfulness; understanding of self and our effect on others; and managing our own time and priorities. In an information rich world it is easy to be overwhelmed, or in Clay Shirky’s terminology, experience “filter failure”.  Video quote: “Technology cannot make our choices for us.”

Contextual leadership

Leadership has become more complex as we interact across generations and cultures. Our workforces are more diverse than ever before. There is a growing demand for culturally intelligent employees and a greater need for intergenerational understanding. Video quote: “Younger and younger leaders are emerging and will run the corporation.”

Adaptive Leadership

Adaptive leadership focuses on the complexity of leadership, where there are often multiple solutions; and where the problem may not even be clear. This demands leaders who are more flexible, can manage polarity, think creatively and take intelligent risks. Video quote: “We have become risk averse. If the phone was invented now we wouldn’t be allowed to use it because of the fear that information was going outside the company – people might say whatever they want and you wouldn’t be able to control it!”

Networked Leadership

This is the most dynamic parts of the future leadership model.  Collaboration, influence and personal learning networks have been strengthened with the growth of technology. Being networked is also about exploring new ideas, looking outside your own circles of understanding, and looking for the trends. Video quote from Thoma Friedman, “When I first wrote The World is Flat, facebook, twitter, the cloud and linkedin were not on the radar.”

Take a look at the video yourself and reflect on the five aspects of future leadership mentioned. What questions do you have? Future blogposts will explore this model and its parts in more detail. Your comments will help guide my thinking…

YouTube

What would learning tourism look like?

Imagine if visitors emerged from the airport to be greeted to the ‘Christchurch campus.’ They might come to jump start their learning. They may have just finished an online degree and just want to have a place to argue about their ideas. Christchurch could be transformed into a place of scholarship and learning, passion and delight – a place where tourists would come to collaborate, engage and immerse themselves in thinking.

In the past, businesses have focused on ‘training’, appointing training managers to develop, induct, supervise and manage employees. This focus is disappearing, to be replaced with the concept of a learning organisation, a knowledge economy and life long learning.

We have the opportunity to attract people who understand the complex nature of the world and want to explore learning in more depth: “They need to learn to cope with the unexpected – and Christchurch is the perfect place.” People could come to learn strategies for coping with change, to explore innovation and to use information communication technologies to stretch their thinking.

Stephen Heppell quotes England as having 2.2 million jobs that are online. One in seven are working from home. In Christchurch, the number working from home, or connecting online, has increased too. The Christchurch Campus could be the heart of online learning and of online working. With ultra fast broad band focused on learning principles we could provide worldwide expertise in the best models of home hubbing, hot desking and digital collaboration. As new spaces are designed we could become world leaders in flexible design for learning organisations.

What would it take?

For Christchurch to be a world leader in learning it would require leaders across the city and beyond to do things from a coherent systems perspective, following agreed principles of learning: learner-focused, future focused, system coherent and sustainable. It would require educators to collaborate for a greater good and to explore new ways of working across networks. “You won’t do it by rebuilding education in the old way.”

Building on Stephen’s ideas, I think there are some opportunities we should consider:

1. Set up a Young Learner’s Commission. Get a group of young learners to look around the works and intereview people who are already doing great things in learning. This group would be representative of all student groups and develop an initial structure of student researchers who would listen to the voices of their peers. Learning designed by young learners, for young learners, with input from experts.
2. Run a series of educational events, starting with a conference, forum or TEDx for ideas to be explored and developed.
3. Establish an independent learning taskforce to work with the Ministry of Education, Christchurch City Council, CERA and government to develop ideas with all stakeholders. Resource this and ensure that all city developments are made with learning in mind.
4. The Ministry of Education should set up an innovation learning unit that supports schools to try new ideas and make it easy for them to explore ways of working with each other for the benefit of all students. This should be trialled in Christchurch as a demonstration hub.

We could make a start on this before the end of the year. It will take leadership and commitment – I think it is worth it.

“…and in doing so you could rebuild your city, rebuild your future, rebuild your economy and rebuild the excitement and enthusiasm for learning. It’s a no brainer really.”

In the late 1990’s the then Minister of Education, Trevor Mallard, took a step towards moving schools into the 21st century by allowing Discovery One School to open in Christchurch. It was, for a conservative Ministry, a bold step and it took many people beyond their comfort zone. Twelve years on the school is well established and the school’s community is enjoying and benefiting from the educational opportunities available in the wider learning environment.

The Canterbury Earthquakes have presented another opportunity for bold leadership in education. The rebuilding of Christchurch has focused on the redevelopment of the central business district, the restoration of the infrastructure serving the city and the relocation and welfare of the people whose homes have been ruined in the series of earthquakes. The Ministry of Education, school boards, principals and their teaching staff have been focusing on the restoration of ‘business as usual’ in the education sector. There have been huge demands placed on the education system at all levels and the fact that schools are functioning so well should be acknowledged and the efforts of all concerned applauded.

However, beyond the need to have schools functioning again is the growing concern for the long term outlook for education for Christchurch, particularly in the eastern suburbs. Schools have suffered in many ways; their communities have been severely dislocated and, in some cases, dismantled and are disappearing; their buildings and campus sites have been badly affected by liquefaction and structural damage; their governing and managing bodies have been stretched to the limit coping with the need to have schools functioning again while coping with their own personal circumstances.

The projected roll outlook for Christchurch indicates that some schools may no longer be economic units and may face closure. An assessment of the pre-earthquake situation reveals that there has always been a number of schools at different levels struggling in Christchurch for a variety of reasons. Throw in the extra dimensions of new housing developments, the relocation of a number of families, and importantly, the growing acknowledgement of the demands of 21st century learning and information technology developments, and there emerges a platform for reassessment about how we do things in Christchurch.

A simple ‘worst-case’ scenario would be for the Ministry to simply close some schools and amalgamate others. Some schools would disappear and some would get bigger but effectively, nothing would have changed and the opportunity for real progress would have been lost.

A ‘best-case’ scenario would see political and personal interests laid aside and a ‘think tank’ of knowledgeable people gather together to present a blueprint for education in Christchurch. They could address the need to educate our children in a seamless system which encompasses health and welfare issues as well being responsible for delivering an appropriate education system for our children as they emerge into the 21st century workforce and life generally. They could address the types of school campuses which would best meet this need by utilising current space and buildings in a more efficient way. This would reduce the need for unproductive competition between schools and ensure that children are coming first in our thoughts. They could address the governance and management systems presently utilised and adapt them so that greater efficiencies become evident which, in turn, would lead to better performance in schools.

They could address the impact of information communication technologies and present ways in which current and future systems can be used for the benefit of pupils and staff. They could communicate with communities who are presently connected with the education system in a remote and/or fractured way and who sometimes feel disenfranchised by the ways we have worked in the past.

They could also explore issues such as middle schooling; kindergartens and primary schools on the same campus site; single sex education in separate schools but with shared infrastructure; and the establishment of learning hubs and resource centres to support the needs of all our children.

Other innovative issues might include flexible enrolments enabling students to pursue studies at other educational facilities, transport networks to facilitate flexibility, and establishing more effective partnerships in the teacher training programmes.

There are examples of such schemes and community projects all over the world. The need for a physical rebuild of our schools in Christchurch has presented us with a unique opportunity to develop some exciting strategies within a responsible fiscal framework. We have the expertise and the knowledge within our community to formulate such plans. The research, the knowledge, the many examples of excellent practice are out there waiting to be tapped into, co-ordinated and manifested into a transformed, modern, effective system.

“Preparing for 21st century learning” has become an outdated catch-cry. We are 11% through this century already. Are the Government and the people of Christchurch going to waste the chance to really seize this opportunity and work collaboratively to prepare an educational environment the people of Christchurch can be proud of? Will be catatonic or catalytic?

I would suggest that this model can be adapted for educational leadership, especially to encourage student voice. Schools often focus on informing and discussing, thinking that discussing = consulting. Yet this is just the start, often being implemented when ideas are well developed. The second stage of consultation sees stakeholders involved in dialogue during the early stages of planning and having a role during the whole process even if they do not make the final decision. Less often, schools focus on students as equal partners, with decisions being made together. And still less frequently are students entrusted to initiate and manage their own work.

All these levels of engagement are appropriate. When students (and other stakeholder in all settings) have opportunities to be partners in decision making there is a greater chance of commitment and increased opportunities to make decisions for oneself. This is the fine balance between structure and freedom.

So in the Storify below I have taken snippets of the journey to date. Social networks enable more power to our people than ever before. As a company that focuses on leadership for the future, we understand that leadership is not about power but about influence. In today’s world we all have the opportunity to influence the future as never before.

This archive of social networking conversations takes snippets from a variety of social networks and Storify helps bring these together easily. The snippets include information about the earthquake, its effect on education, its effect on businesses, and on the lives of us all. They are stories of corage, hope and possibilities.

You will see a “load more” message at the bottom – click it! There are several pages of enlightening material, resources and links. It’s worth it….

With massive unrest, diminishing trust and violent clashes the future picture for some countries is unclear and concerning. Now, more than ever, the way a country is led and how the people perceive that leadership, impacts on us globally. Swedish academic superstar Hans Rosling graphically illustrates changes in global development over the past 200 years, and at the same time models aspects of leadership that we all should take note of. He uses his expert knowledge and translates that transparently in ways that the masses can follow and connect with. He understands the power of technology and uses it to enhance his message. He can see the big picture, as well as break that picture into smaller parts to analyse. He connects and collaborates. Leadership for the future demands this.