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IN FOCUSYoung women’s leadership
Learning Boards
Visualized learning
Images of possibility
Lulu—Young Tanzanian woman embraces big leadership dreams in EASUNLulu Meiyan joined EASUN in February 2018, becoming the 6th young woman to receive training and coaching since the start of the Young Women’s Leadership development programme in 2008.EASUN has the privilege of hosting an intern each year under its Young Women Leaders’ internship programme.
Through the Internship Program EASUN introduces one young woman, to the Organisation Development (OD) practice each year. The internship includes acquiring transformational leadership skills that facilitate change and development in organizations and community activities.
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EASUN
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CSO Board trained to be a learning board that effectively leads a learning organization ...
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INSIDE… Young Tanzanian woman trained and coached at EASUN for leadership and professional OD skills ...
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Facilitators as generative agents of change using tools to empower and transform ...
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•••••
ISSUE No. 10 June, 2018
In April 2018 Lulu joined the FOLD training (cycle “Y”) for Kenya and Tanzania which, according to her own confession, she is enjoying very much. “People need to know, understand and participate in the FOLD course. It has made such a difference to my outlook and the way I work.” Lulu is already putting her new learning into practice, using powerful tools such as the Action Learning Model to facilitate development and change. Effective use of such tools is critical for leveraging participation in learning situations related to project and organizational development activities.
Looking at the overall governance terrain in Tanzania.Lulu expresses the view that the “transformational” side of leadership is still lacking.
She observes that there are so many vibrant young people doing great things and taking up positions of leadership, but they are not always conscious of the effects of how they use power. “Such lack of self-awareness does not allow them to grow to be the best leaders that they could become,” says Lulu.
Lulu is conviced that training in transformational leadership will not only change the capacities of young leaders, but may transform the country as a whole. For Lulu, participating in the internship programme is an important first step toward addressing that need. She says: “I am committing to use my time at EASUN to develop all the skills necessary to be a transformational leader.”
From p.1
In addition to skills gained through coaching, the intern also gets the chance to attend EASUN’s FOLD (Facilitating Organizational Learning and Development) training—where leaders, consultants and other capacity building practitioners learn facilitation and other skills related to the OD discipline.
Lulu started at EASUN as a volunteer to complement her Master of Science studies in Project Planning and Management. She was immediately impressed by the reflective nature of EASUN’s practice, i.e.,. always examining methods, personal posture and how a leader or team member is affecting the way others feel and perform.
“I had not seen this before”, says Lulu, “I immediately saw the benefits not only to myself, but for organisations too.”
“People need to know, understand and participate in the FOLD course. It has made such a difference to my outlook and the way I work.” - Lulu Meiyan
2 Turning Points, June 2018
Insisting on possibility: The EASUN logoThe EASUN logo depicts light and shadow in a dance inside a circle. It is also an image of the sun, with rays projected from the lighter side of the logo. It is our aspiration that EASUN can shine a transformative light, in the East African region.
The logo is influenced by the Taoist symbol—Yin Yang, which is composed of an outer circle enclosing two teardrop-shaped halves wrapped around each other. The EASUN logo, however, is a not the exact Yin Yang, because it does not include two white and black dots and has the added sun rays on one side.
In the symbolism of the Yin Yang, the dark and light colours demonstrate creation, balance and harmony, but it’s also about unity in diversity and differences. This is among the symbolic gestures that influenced our choice of the image for EASUN’s logo. Light and dark are dependent on one another to exist and to support universal growth and development. The symbol shows how seemingly opposite or contrary forces may actually be complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world.
The EASUN logo is enclosed in a circle—a symbol that represents inclusion and speaks of wholeness. This has a direct bearing on our values and practice as facilitators of change and development. One of the principles that guide EASUN’s trainings and change management interventions is: “work with the energy and wisdom of the situation.” This is because our methodology insists that every individual in a learning situation is a source and opportunity for knowledge creation. We also believe that new learning gained in this way becomes a spring of belief and commitment to be generative of life and prosperity for all in our world.
EASUN works consciously with both the light and shadow side qualities in its consultancy and training activities. The light side is characterized as fast, hard, solid, focused, hot, dry, and active; and is associated with fire, sky, the sun, masculinity and daytime. The shadow side qualities, on the other hand, are characterized as slow, soft, yielding, diffuse; and is associated with water, earth, the moon, femininity, and nighttime. If these elements become unbalanced, one of the qualities is considered deficient. This is a great metaphor for all existence. Each of us has the capacity to achieve endless greatness. On the flip-side, we all have capacity for extraordinary destruction. Most of us walk that thin line in-between. This is what enables diversity, uniqueness and dynamism to prevail. No moment is 100% day or night, light or dark, life or death.
Duality is found in many belief systems. Complimentary dual forces interact to form a dynamic system in which the whole is greater than the assembled parts, for instance: shadow cannot exist without light. They always have opposite and equal qualities, like men and women.
As the sun moves across the sky, light and darkness gradually trade places with each other, revealing what was obscured and obscuring what was revealed. The EASUN logo is a perfect sign for balance, harmony and moderation. We employ it to help us understand the duality of nature…the duality of ourselves, and to deploy the power of such duality to enable us to become effective exponents of transformation.
4 Turning Points, June 2018
Transformational leadership for a learning boardin Pangani, TanzaniaIn October 2017 EASUN had the opportunity to train board members of UZIKWASA, a civil society organization based in Pangani, Tanzania. The board was pleased that UZIKWASA management and community outreach staff had acquired facilitative leadership skills, which they were using well to contribute to the growth of UZIKWASA as a learning organization. There was also a concern that the board was not matching such development in its own leadership growth. In the words of the chairperson: “the board is left behind and will soon not be able to provide credible leadership to the parts of the organization that have moved so far ahead.”
The UZIKWASA board itself requested the October training and suggested that it should include creating awareness about organizational learning and impart skills that would enable the board to provide effective leadership to a learning organization.
UZIKWASA has, since 2016, made significant steps to establish systems, instruments and relationships that facilitate organizational learning. At the core of this is a consciously constructed organizational Learning Site, which is currently working well to keep UZIKWASA at the innovative cutting edge in facilitating change and development in local communities. UZIKWASA has demonstrated effective management of its transition to become a learning— organization, in terms of:
•Expanding staff skill sets, particularly around facilitating learning, change and development in organizational practices;
•Transforming organizational culture to integrate organizational learning structures and processes;
•Strengthening its ability to address gender based violence (GBV) in local community situations of Pangani, as well as in the outlooks of staff members.
Sustaining organizational learning depends much on relevant systems and processes, as well as skills and the will of leaders to support structures and leadership styles that support learning as a governance practice. The training facilitated by EASUN strengthened board members’ resolve to engage with the learning and changes that were being implemented by UZIKWASA. It also equiped them with self awareness that will enable them to address needs that are unique to a learning organization. Critical aspects of the training included: 1) exploration of leadership practices likely to promote UZIKWASA’s learning culture and practices; 2) Facilitative leadership skills and essential governance practices that nurture a learning organization.
What is organizational learningBoard members reflected on what might be their role in sustaining organizational learning as a culture in UZIKWASA. These include:
•Facilitating growth of individuals in the organizational context in accordance with the organization’s identified development needs;
•Supporting reflective learning practice to thrive in the organization;•Encouraging team member to access the board for consultation, mentorship and coaching;•Un-learning and re-learning (“emptying ourselves in order to receive”).
The board members of UZIKWASA seemed to have become conversant with the idea that a leader who supports organizational learning is a mentor by inclination and is best served by having coaching skills. An important new learning for them, however, was that of listening skills as a important factor that determines whether a leader will commit to mentoring and coaching others for their own leadership growth.
New skills and processes for board leadership
UZIKWASA board members identified ten (10) new skills that they needed to develop in order to lead a learning organization. Sixty percent (60%) of these were about strengthening the conscious use of “self”, which is a vital aspect of enabling leaders to become conscious change agents. They included:
•Openness to giving and receiving from colleagues with varying temperaments and capacities;•Strengthening facilitative leadership skills and practices;•Listening to others without judging them;•Willingness to work with the contributions of others;•The culture and skills for active listening;
•Building positive relationships between board and staff.
Processes that will enhance the role of a learning board include:
•Reviewing organizational structure and systems to ensure sustainable organizational learning;•Having regular board & management reflection and mentoring activities;•Board participation in organizational activities.
Turning Points, June 2018 5
Some UZIKWASA board members in Training
Visualization - a Creative way of expressing your ideas “Sketch everything and keep curiosity fresh!”
It is well established that much of our creative expression is birthed in the unconscious mind. To use creative expression and solutions in your everyday life, it is necessary to dip into the unconscious at will. Visualization and Sketching is one way of doing this. Sketching allows the unconscious to render in symbolic expression. Symbols have universal as well as personal meaning. When you are stuck for an answer to a problem or looking for creative innovation, the technique of sketching will unleash the hidden symbolic powers of the unconscious mind.
Sketching allows our intuitive feelings to express themselves in pictorial symbolic form. Interpreting these symbols can help to unveil meanings that are not apparent to our linear mind.
What is Visualization or Sketching? Visualization is any technique for creating images, diagrams or animations to communicate a message. This has been an effective way to communicate both abstract and concrete ideas since the dawn of humanity. A sketch is a rapidly executed freehand drawing that is not usually intended as a finished work. A sketch may serve a number of purposes:
• it might record something that the artist sees• it might record or develop an idea for later use or• it might be used as a quick way of graphically
demonstrating an image, idea or principle.
When can sketches be powerful and supportive?There are diverse possibilities to use illustrations in your daily work, for example:
• Illustrating your work easily through exploring images and concepts
• Energize people and drawing attention to key points• Supporting engaged team work • Energizing reflective learning • Simplifying an abstract idea
The obvious positive effects on memory and the possibility of expressing our intuitive feelings made us curious, at EASUN, to learn more about this methodology. We are always looking for supportive methodologies that help us enhance the effectiveness of our roles as facilitators who are supportive and inspirational. That’s why we started this year with practicing sketching and learning how to create, for ourselves, a simple and easily understood visual language.
6 Turning Points, June 2018
Every artist dips his brush in his own soul and paints his own
nature into his pictures.”
(Henry Ward Beecher)
A tool for generative change agentsFacilitators of change use a number of tools to move processes of learning forward. The Action Learning model is one of those tools which, however, is increasingly considered to be essential for any meaningful change management effort.
Many such tools work perfectly well for purposes for which they are intended. The skill lies in seeing what to use the tools for. The Action Learning Model, for instance, is an extremely powerful tool for generating transformative competencies in individuals, organizations and communities. However, just as facilitation practice could borrow the ALM and improvise it for radical transformative purposes, the tool may also be tamed by those who, for purposes of personal profit, may use it mainly for control and manipulative purposes that justify and maintain the known paths in the development enterprise. An example is the fact that many innovative ideas come and go simply as “flavors of the month” in development work. This ends up demystifying anything that is innovative and disruptive of the traditional order encased within boundaries of continuity. Many “development consultants” today present themselves as facilitators of change, while playing the role of mainly patrolling boundaries of their own privileged continuity and screening anything that threatens the treasures encased within.
Effective use of ALM, for empowering transformative processes, puts specific demands on the facilitator. Participants will demand quick answers, or confirmations of their own discoveries. It is also quite tempting for the facilitator to want to offer such confirmations, or extensions of participants own new learning. This is an area that needs careful treading. Succumbing to the allure of the expert power of the facilitator can undermine any emerging capacity for ownership and commitment, by obstructing participants’ ability to perceive their own role as creators of knowledge. This is likely to negatively affect the resilience of a change process.
As an empowering tool in change management, the action-learning model allows the facilitator to pool creative possibilities from diverse memories and identities of participants. Quite significantly, action-learning does so successfully by affirming the experiences and discoveries of each individual in the learning process. Use of ALM in a way that affirms the creative role of the learner is energizing and motivating because it allows individuals to enhance their self-esteem in the learning situation. ALM is transformative because the process it facilitates is meant to always create something new, from which to learn and adjust. Every individual in the process is a source and opportunity for knowledge creation. This transforms possibilities for development because it increases the openness and readiness of individuals to “let go” or “unlearn”, in order to learn.
Turning Points, June 2018 7
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five ways to be a transformational leader...
EASUNCentre for Organizational LearningP.O Box 6120 Arusha, TanzaniaTel: +255(0)272548803Fax: +255 (0) 272548289
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Become a transformational leader and change consultantApply now to attend EASUN’s FOLD trainingFOLD training will make you a professional facilitator of learning and change in complex organizational and community situations (see stories inside). Contact EASUN now for information and application materials for 2019 modules. The training is available for heads of organizations and senior programme staff of Civil Society Organizations in Eastern Africa. Write to : [email protected]
Be a role to inspire
others
Adapt style toaccommodate skills
in your team
Foster safeenvironment forexperimentation
Transform yourposition into
power for change
Developspirit
of cooperation
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Effective Communications for successful organisations Communication seems like such an obvious thing that we all do every day in one way or another.
Talking to our colleagues, sending emails, waving at our neighbours. Rarely do we pause to consider whether we are being effective, and whether our message is getting across in the best way possible, so our communication can have a positive impact on organisations, colleagues and staff.
Before we can talk about effective communication, we should define “communication.” When EASUN staff were asked what they thought communication was, they came up with a wide range of words, including “Influencing, Relating, Sharing with a purpose, Transmitting, Creating impressions and Connecting.” All of course are true – communication is all about passing on a message to an audience and making sure it is understood. Communication within organisations, therefore, become easier when we realise it is all about people relating to other people. An organization is more likely to be successful when its team members are functioning cohesively and bringing their enthusiasm to work.
Communication is at the core of all organisational functions. Emails, phone calls, meetings, letters – all convey messages, and all can be done well, or badly. Good communication is the keystone to keeping a team motivated. A well-informed person will feel part of a greater whole and see and understand their part in it.
Good communication is a two-way street, meaning listening as well as speaking or sharing. Within an organisation it is important that people feel their opinion is valuable, being heard and acted on. In meetings for example, simply telling staff about changes, or work to be done, without offering an opportunity to voice their thoughts, can create resentment and undermine trust.
Communicating with a common goal and with a language everyone is comfortable with breaks down barriers and makes interactions easier and more fruitful. Few organisations review how they communicate internally and externally, but it is an easy exercise to start. By looking at how staff are responding and feeling, managers can see how effectively they are communicating, and how this is impacting the effectiveness of the organization as a whole.
EASUN appreciates sustained funding from www.facebook.com/easunfoundation
