Leading Libraries Series: Introduction

 

Building 21st century leadership practice

 

While personal leadership and authority still have an important place in our work, we need new and different capabilities for leading in a more distributed and collaborative way.

The four Leading Libraries ‘Leading for..’ capabilities were designed with these different skill sets in mind. The materials in this series aim to provide you with the ideas and practical tools to:

• ‘lead from any chair’ – not just as managers or supervisors.
• 'lead with’ - not just ‘lead on behalf of’ - our citizens and clients.

Why these capabilities?

Many leadership programmes focus on the knowledge and skills needed by senior managers running organisations and departments – all good and helpful ideas but what about 'leading from any chair'? What about the skills that any person might need if they want to 'lead for' an important change – in their team, community, service or place?

If we are aiming to 'transform leadership' in a way that increases the chances of promoting diversity, creativity and collaboration, a different set of capabilities are needed. People need to understand and practice skills that support different styles of leadership – more collective, more emotionally aware and more innovative styles.

The 'Leading For' capabilities at the heart of this series were developed with these new styles and requirements in mind, informed by:

• The passion of Libraries Connected and CILIP for engaging more inclusive, diverse leaders and leadership (Leading for Inclusion)
• The 21st century Public Servant emphasis on relational, emotionally resonant and entrepreneurial approaches (Leading for Dialogue)
• The need for more collaborative and distributed forms of leadership as we create meaningful change (Leading for Innovation)

All these capabilities are about the skills you need to support your services and communities, but what about what you need to survive and thrive? As importantly, how can you support your staff as they work under significant and increasing pressure? While all the capabilities are designed to help you work more enjoyably and effectively with the people around you, we also wanted to recognise the fact that anyone who is leading in the public service needs unusual levels of 'endurance' in order to take care of themselves and their people.

This need to 'Lead for Resilience' came even more to the fore during the Covid19 pandemic – through all its phases – and the additional pressures of uncertainty, remote working and sudden shifts of direction may be with us for some time to come.

 

The capabilities in more depth

Developing the capabilities

The four sets of materials under these 'Leading For' headings form the rest of the content in this series. Each module is designed to meet three overall objectives:

• Give you the skills and tools to take that capability on board for yourself.
• Incorporate those skills into your day-to-day work using a cycle of reflection and experimentation
• Offer content which can also be used with a peer or in a team to help you build these important capabilities together.

There is more detailed description of each capability in the sections below.

 

Skills for inclusive leadership

The Leading for Inclusion set moves beyond an understanding of what inclusion is to focus on leadership practices that really make a difference at all levels.

Regardless of your background or lived experience, it will help you to recognise the true value of difference and diversity in your own life and to become aware of the positive and negative uses of power and privilege. The content then moves on to more specific understanding of the dynamics and costs of exclusion and offers practical steps for increasing your own allyship – for yourself and for others.

 

Skills for resilient leadership

The Leading for Resilience set draws on significant research into the abilities and qualities of naturally resilient people. It will help you develop habits and practices to help you keep your equilibrium in tough times and stressful circumstances. The content then moves on to think about how we can all 'survive and thrive' together, with a range of suggestions for building mutually supportive, emotionally open relationships and teams.

 

Skills for dialogic leadership

The Leading for Dialogue set is designed to help you pay attention to how you operate in conversation with others so you can become more choiceful and effective in group settings.

Starting with the vital step of 'generative listening', the content then moves into the different 'moves' we can make in conversation – to balance our ability to put forward our own views with the need for genuine inquiry into the perspectives of others.

For those of you who are interested in convening or facilitating dialogue, there is also content on understanding group needs and suggestions on how you can personally support a sense of psychological safety in conversations.

 

Skills for innovative leadership

The Leading for Innovation set takes the best tips and techniques from 'Design Thinking' approaches which can be used by anyone who is interested in collaborative, creative change – whether that is a new service idea, a change to an organisational process or a novel way of engaging with citizens.

The content takes you step-by-step through a simplified 'inquiry and design' cycle, paying attention to the blocks and difficulties that can happen along the way. There is an emphasis on experimentation and prototyping and on collective creative processes.

When you are working through this set, your learning will be even more effective if you choose a change of your own that you would like to make happen – even better if you can work with a group of colleagues in the process!

 

Continue to: Working on your development