Thursday 11October 2007

1. Victorian TAFE Staff Development Network (VTSDN)Practical ways to develop leaders in the workplace: Stories from the fieldProfessor Victor Callanv.callan@business.uq.edu.au Thursday 11October 2007

2. Leadership challenges in VET • Leadership of continuous change in a complex VET environment • More strategic thinking about growing and sustaining the organisation • Greater client focus • Providing enabling systems, structures and cultures that sustain change • Growing the levels of confidence in staff about being able to achieve different goals - with related developments in building trust, higher performing teams, teams, sharing learning, empowerment • Building internal and external partnerships

3. Comparing management and leadership roles

4. Comparing management and leadership roles

5. What do we know from research? The Variety of Experience Learning from Others Other Events Challenging Assignments Hardships

6. Other Events Challenging Assignments Learning From Others Hardships • Role Models • Mentors • Peers • Feedback • Failures and Mistakes • Demotions, Missed Promotions, Rotten Jobs • Employee Performance Problems • Change • Differences Matter • Change in Scope • Fix-it • Scratch • Line to Staff • Projects/Task Forces • Breaking a Rut • Coursework • Education • Learning from Successes The Variety of Experience

7. Organisations need to support the learning experience Potential Learning Event: Challenge, Transition, or Stress Learning: Performance Recovery, Change, and Enhancement Going Against the Grain: Temporary Drop in Performance Leveling Off: The Comfort Zone, What I Already Know How To Do

8. Practical ways I use a lot 360 degree guest speakers, including executive in residence learning journals The VET Manager and leader Readings and lunch groups coaching On the job: challenging assignments, feedback, acting positions Action learning projects Off the job, short courses and executive education

9. What practical ways are you using in your organisation? • Small group discussion • Reporting on what you feel works well, less well, and why? • What does this reveal about the practical ways being used in the VET sector today?

10. Some research evidence: Practical ways to develop VET managers and leaders • Supportive models and frameworks • Off the job experiences • On the job experiences Callan, V.J., Mitchell, J., Clayton, B., & Smith, L. (2007) Approaches for sustaining and building management and leadership capability in VET providers. Adelaide: National Centre for Vocational Education Research. http://www.ncver.edu.au/publications/1802.html

11. Supportive models • Organisational supports (e.g. TAFE Development Centre; WA DETA and its VET Teaching and Learning Directorate; Victorian TAFE Association • Growing use of guiding capability frameworks • Strategic statements of intention about significance of leadership development – Uni. of Ballarat “Roadmap for Leadership in the Future”; NSW North Coast TAFE and Staff Development Plan; SW Sydney TAFE and ‘leadership is our strength” positioning

12. Off-the-job development • Higher education programs – Vocational Certificates in Educational Leadership, Master of Adult and Vocational Education • In-house programs: some accredited but mostly not; 2-5 days; action learning to class based; external facilitators; reactive; little follow through • Better example is the Chair Academy Program: individualized PD plan, mentoring program, workshops, mix of participants, with accreditation, but even it has its critics • Use of annual development and training calendars; Staff development days

13. Anything to add around practical off-the-job? • Your experiences • Other initiatives you have heard about that seem practical and useful

14. Off-the-job: Strengths • Raised awareness about the role and activities of their own Institute, as well as the strategic planning processes and the challenges • Gained an appreciation of the role of middle and senior manager • Expanded their networks inside the organisation through the contact with fellow participants • Provided opportunities for structured and unstructured reflection about their skills, roles

15. Off-the-job: Strengths • Given them more confidence around leading change and in responding to resistance, dealing with difficult people and poor performance • Provided often deep personal insights about personal preferences and leadership styles, and feedback about ways of developing their skills • Given them access to experienced and interesting external consultants who talked from both theory and practice

16. Off-the-job: Shortcomings • Quality of some external programs and facilitators - “a more generic feel” than being TAFE specific • Quality of some internal facilitators who had VET knowledge but were less skilled as facilitators • Lack of integration between parts of a program, • Some programs not being well themed across the various days • Fragmentary, reactive and short term nature of professional development

17. Off-the-job: Shortcomings • Lack of support by the senior executive for the program, its projects and the participants • Lack of clear guidelines around the role of coaches and mentors associated with some programs • Failure to make clear the expectations upon participants about their attendance at each workshop, their commitment to the program, and the time outside of work hours that was required to get the best outcomes from the program

18. A case for more internal programs • A larger number of participants are exposed to a professional development opportunity at a cheaper average cost • The internal programs build improved networks, shared visions, and result in more cross-institutional sharing • Participants focus more on cross-campus or cross-department projects that can have added operational and strategic value • Senior staff can be profiled to more junior staff, and to motivate and to challenge those below them

19. A case for more internal programs • Can be linked more to strategic goals of the organisation • Members of the senior executive team are encouraged to be active as mentors to program participants and their projects • Link the program to the option of completing assessment towards an accredited VET or higher education program • Other reasons to support such programs?

20. On-the-job development • Formal projects with external funding (Reframing the Future) - advancing skills in change management, strategy development and implementation, team processes, rethinking diversity management issues • TAFE Development Centre, Victoria (e.g. Leadership Development Scheme) • Coaching and mentoring – major initiatives, but needs work around training of coaches, guidelines, clarification of roles • Staff rotation, challenging assignments, secondment to another organisation – not really being exploited well

21. Other on-the-job initiatives • At your place? • Elsewhere to share with the group?

22. What I use or promote • Encouraging managers to reshape their job • Temporary assignments and acting positions • Develop external interface roles through projects or tasks that get staff out of the organisation • Managing problem employees with support of coaches • Higher stakes projects - take on high profile project, represent the organisation in the media/at public meetings, take on responsibilities once done by their boss • Manage a cross-cultural project or culturally diverse team

23. 3. Why is on-the-job happening less in VET? • It is happening but… • A culture of “being too busy to engage in ones personal development” – role of CEO • Financial barriers - no back-filling – need for policy • Slow emergence of a strategic approach to management and leadership development – around the recruitment, socialisation, development, workforce planning and succession planning for managers and potential leaders • It is difficult to do well – -try to provide more supports for the “manager as learner” in the workplace

24. Preparing the learner to approach the workplace as a learning environment • Earlier ideas around capability models, access to coaches, integrating on and off the job initiatives • Set the workplace learning around the Johari Window • Encourage more opportunities for reflection • Give them access to more tools and people that provide feedback • Workshop topics that capture why projects succeed and fail • Provide access to coaches who support people “on capability-driven” assignments

25. JOHARI WINDOW(Joseph Luft & Harry Ingram) Known to Self Not Known to Self Known to Others Open Self Blind Self Hidden Self Unknown Self Not Known to Others

26. JOHARI WINDOW • Open: What you knowingly share about you and is on ‘public record’ (what you know, what you know they know) • Blind: Represents information about yourself that others know but you don’t • Unknown: Represents parts of yourself about which neither you nor others know • Hidden: Contains what you know of yourself but hide from others

27. REFLECTION

28. TOOLS FOR FEEDBACK • 360o questionnaires • Coaches/mentors • Challenging assignments • Projects • Syndicate work

29. Coaching to support “capability-driven” assignments • Coaching is essentially one way of leading • Coaching is a structured conversation or managed dialogue leading to positive change • Coaching is about building trust and confidence and being a sounding board, providing support and encouragement to staff • Coaching is also about your enhancing the staff member’s performance capability • Coaching needs to be seen as a process to help another person fulfil their potential

30. Six Questions to Guide the Coaching Relationship • WHO? Who are they and their needs and expectations?What are my expectations as their coach? What is my style as a coach? • WHY? Why am I coaching? How will I know coaching is effective? • WHAT? What will we talk about? Who sets the agenda? • HOW? How will I coach them? • WHEN How often & for how long will we get together? • WHERE? Where will be have these sessions?

31. Concluding comments • We need to promote the view in VET that effective leaders are those who continue to develop their repertoire of capabilities throughout their careers • A significant part of this development occurs through practical experiences • The more varied the practical experiences, the greater the likelihood of developing a broad repertoire of capabilities

32. Sources • Bentley, T. & Kohn-Bentley, E. (2002) Leadership Coaching for the Workplace, Toronto: Irwin • Buckingham, M. (2005) “What Great Managers Do,” Harvard Business Review, March, pp 70-79 • Callan, V.J. and Latemore, G.M. (2007, in press) “Developing Leader’s Through the Inner and Outer Theatre” International Journal for Leadership Development • Daudelin, M. (1996) “Learning from experience through reflection.” • Hayes, K. (2003) Leadership Coaching: A Practical Guide, Frenchs Forest: Pearson • McKenna, P. J. & Maister, D. H. (2002)”Win Permission to Coach” in First Among Equals: How to Manage a Group of Professionals. New York: The Free Press p 57-94 • Peltier, B. (2001) The Psychology of Executive Coaching, New York: Brunner Routledge • Skiffington, S. & Zeus, P. (2003) Behavioural Coaching, Sydney: McGraw Hill