ERCs as Leadership Training Grounds

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ERCs as Leadership Training Grounds
Kelvin K. Droegemeier University of Oklahoma ERC
Annual Meeting 17 November 2005
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What Does the Word Leadership Mean to
You?OrWhat Came to Mind When You Saw the
Title of This Session and What Made You Attend?
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Were Bombarded with Material on Leadership but
do we Really Understand It?
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Key Questions

• How Many of You are in Leadership Positions in
  an ERC?
• How Many of You were Formally Trained or Educated
  to Lead???
• Was/Is the ERC a Baptism by Fire??

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Proposition

• I believe one of the greatest opportunities
  within the ERC program is the development and
  nurturing of leadership skills
• In adults (the traditional ERC leadership)
• In students (the next generation)
• ? In disciplines
• ? In institutions
• ? In the research enterprise
• Seizing the opportunity requires deliberate
  action it will not happen automatically

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Why ERCs?

• ERCs, STCs, and now SLCs are playing a unique and
  powerful role in the landscape of research and
  education, teaching us how to deal with
• Exceptionally complex and potentially
  transformative problems
• End-to-end and systems thinking
• Highly multi- and cross-disciplinary themes
• Large geographically separated teams
• Partnerships with industry
• Involvement of higher education in K-11

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Goals for Today

• Develop a better understanding of leadership
• Dialog about existing ERC leadership efforts
• Discuss whether leadership should be a more
  formal part of the ERC portfolio
• Determine how to proceed

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The Potential Payoff

• This is not about training the next generation of
  center directors!
• Its about teaching people to
• Recognize and embrace their unique abilities and
  limitations
• Relate effectively to people having different
  views
• Deal with situations theyve never faced and that
  have no known solutions
• Work for a broader purpose while fulfilling their
  own specific goals and needs
• Draw the best out of others by motivating and
  inspiring

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• "The growth and development of people is the
  highest calling of leadership." - Harvey S.
  Firestone

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The Payoff

• If successful, we WILL train the next generation
  of center directors and a whole lot more!!

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The Continuing Effect

• "Example is not the main thing in influencing
  others, it is the only thing." - Albert
  Schweitzer

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Leadership Searching for a Definition
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Leadership Searching for a Definition

• Powerful/influential
• Intelligent
• Mobilize people and resources to work toward a
  common goal
• Effectuate positive change
• People of high values/standards/ethics role
  models
• Well known/famous
• Operate with a mixture of formal and informal
  authority

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But What Makes Them Leaders?

• Money?
• Pedigree/education?
• Beliefs?
• Actions?
• Personalities?
• Looks?
• Connections?
• Work ethic?
• Chance?

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• "Leadership is a combination of strategy and
  character. If you must be without one, be without
  the strategy." - Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf

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Leadership Searching for a Definition
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Leadership Searching for a Definition

• Powerful/influential
• Intelligent
• Mobilize people and resources to work toward a
  common goal
• Effectuate positive change
• Role models
• People of high values/standards/ethics
• Well known/famous
• Operate exclusively with formal authority,
  usually by coercion

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According to Webster

• Leadership is the position, office, or term of a
  leader
• A leader is one who
• Directs
• Guides
• Is in command
• Has influence

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Thats Sort of a Useless Working Definition!

• It ignores values/ethics
• It does not describe the work of leadership
• It does not distinguish between a shift worker at
  a restaurant and 4-star general!

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Key Facts About Leadership

• Leadership is inexorably tied to values,
  morality, and ethics
• We shape our values early in life, and thereafter
  our values shape us

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Key Facts About Leadership

• Leadership seeks positive outcomes to benefit
  others a servant viewpoint

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• We make a living by what we get we make a life
  by what we give." - Winston Churchill

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Key Facts About Leadership

• Leadership is called forth by crisis and
  challenge, but is not produced by it

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Leadership The Deeper Meaning

• Does leadership mean influencing a community to
  follow the leaders vision?

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Leadership The Deeper Meaning

• Does leadership mean influencing a community to
  follow the leaders vision?or
• Influencing the community to face its problems
  mobilizing, motivating, organizing, orienting,
  focusing attention, and then acting together?

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Leader of a Baseball Team??
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Leadership and Management

• Leadership and Management are very different,
  though some confuse them as being nearly
  synonymous
• Few people are effective leaders and managers

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Leadership and Management

• Management
• is about coping with complexity
• brings order and consistency out of potential
  chaos
• applies knownsolutions andstrategies

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Leadership and Management

• Leadership
• is about coping with or planningchange,
  especially if its sudden

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• "Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder
  of success leadership determines whether the
  ladder is leaning against the right wall."
  - Stephen R. Covey

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Leadership and Management Parallel but Not Equal

• Management
• Creating a plan
• Defining steps
• Establishing astructure
• Allocating resources
• Executing the plan
• Controlling situations and solving problems

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Leadership and Management Parallel but Not Equal

• Leadership
• Developing a visionand setting direction
• Defining strategies
• Aligning, motivating,and inspiring people
• Testing reality
• Delegating work

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Important Facts

• Management controls people by pushing them in the
  right direction
• Leadership motivates people by drawing them in a
  way that satisfies the basic human needs for
• achievement
• recognition
• self-esteem
• a sense of belonging

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Major Tenants of Leadership

• Leadership involves coping with or producing
  useful change in response to challenges, problems
  or opportunities
• Leadership can be exercised with or without
  formal authority

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Major Tenants of Leadership

• Leadership involves coping with or producing
  useful change in response to challenges, problems
  or opportunities
• Leadership can be exercised with or without
  formal authority

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Producing Useful Change

• Problems -- when circumstances do not conform to
  the way we think things ought to be
• Two solutions
• Apply a known technical fix (management)
• Develop solutions that previously were unknown
  (leadership) known as adaptive change

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Adaptive Change

• When no set of technical fixes or authoritative
  directive will work
• The solution is adaptation to changing
  circumstances and norms
• Adaptive work is needed when
• Deeply held beliefs are challenged
• Legitimate yet competing views emerge
• ERCs are perhaps prototypical for having to do
  adaptive work!!

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Adaptive Change

• The learning required to address conflicts in the
  values people hold, or to diminish the gap
  between the values they stand for and the reality
  they face
• It does not mean passively giving in to
  circumstances
• It does require that one clarify what matters
  most in balance with trade-offs
• People want independence from foreign oil but
  dont want to drill in ANWR
• Trade-offs happen frequently in ERCs and often
  they leave people angry!!!

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Major Tenants of Leadership

• Leadership involves coping with or producing
  useful change in response to challenges, problems
  or opportunities
• Leadership can be exercised with or without
  formal authority

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Leading With Formal Authority

• Conferred in exchange for protection, direction,
  conflict control
• Based on a set of expectations or a job
  description
• Essentially a formal contract it can be revoked
  or walked away from
• Pros and cons
• Breadth and completeness of information
• Must operate within specific bounds
• Must operate at a distance from the front lines

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Leading With Formal Authority
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Leading With Informal Authority

• Based upon trust, reputation, civility,
  admiration, creativity and availability
• It can never be revoked, though the trust
  relationship can be broken and the reputation
  damaged
• This is the most powerful type of authority
• Can deviate from norms of decision making
• Can focus on hard issues
• Can get closer to the experiences of the
  stakeholders down in the trenches, where
  relationships are developed

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Leading With Informal Authority
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Key Characteristics of Leaders

• A true leader is likely to be one who has no
  desire to lead, but is forced into a position of
  leadership by the press of the external
  situation.
• I believe it might be accepted as a fairly
  reliable rule of thumb that the man who is
  ambitious to lead is disqualified as a leader.
  (A.W. Tozer)
• The true leader will be as ready to follow as to
  lead, and when a wiser and more gifted man than
  himself appears, he will step aside.

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Is Leadership A Part of Who You Are, or Can it
be Learned?
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The Key is Intelligence!

• Part I Intellect
• Intellectual capacity (IQ)
• Technical expertise
• Knowledge and experience

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The Key is Intelligence!

• Part I Intellect
• Intellectual capacity (IQ)
• Technical expertise
• Knowledge and experience
• Part II Emotions
• 90 of the difference between outstanding and
  average leaders is due to emotional intelligence
  (EI)
• Its twice as important as IQ and technical
  expertise combined
• It is THE differentiating factor in leadership

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Yes, Emotions!!

• A lot of really smart people have zero
  sensitivity
• There are many smart people in the world MUCH
  SMARTER than any of us!
• What distinguishes each of us is our personality
  and emotional make-up
• Emotions are not a liability, but an asset!

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• People are persuaded by reason, but moved by
  emotion the leader must both persuade them and
  move them." - Richard M. Nixon

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Emotional Intelligence (EI)

• The capacity for recognizing our feelings and
  those of others for motivating ourselves and
  others for managing emotions in ourselves and in
  our relationships
• Understanding yourself (self-awareness)
• Managing yourself (self-regulation)
• Understanding others (empathy)
• Managing others (motivation, social skills)

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Emotional Intelligence (EI)

• All of the great US presidents had high degrees
  of emotional intelligence
• You need intellect to get in the door it is a
  threshold requirement
• But EI is the differentiating factor BY A HUGE
  MARGIN
• It is developed from emotional competencies,
  which are learned capabilities that contribute to
  effective performance and satisfying
  relationships in life
• Like competencies in math, physics, but on the
  emotional side

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This Professor Has it Wrong!!
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This is a Glimpse

• A great deal more can be said
• A great deal more NEEDS to be said and infused
  into ERCs

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Next Steps

• I propose that leadership is extremely important
  to the ERC enterprise and that leadership
  development should be included a formal part of
  its portfolio
• Many centers already include leadership in
  various forms but we should consider taking it to
  the next level
• ERCs should be the standard by which other
  programs are measured