Greenleaf Centre for Servant-Leadership UK Conference 2007
Reflections on the Greenleaf UK Servant-Leadership Conference: Building Relationships, Getting Results
Day One
This was the twelfth conference held by the Greenleaf Centre UK. I have been to most of the conferences and enjoyed them all very much. This one was no exception.
I just wanted to say a big thank you for yet another thought provoking and really enjoyable conference. VictoriaBoth days started with a pre-conference workshop by John Noble on the principles and practicalities of servant-leadership, principally designed for those as yet unfamiliar with the subject. The main conference programme was introduced by Terri McNerney, who engaged all the conference delegates with a warm-up session in which each group summarised its views in the form of a drawing. This “broke the ice” and encouraged everyone to cooperate and interrelate with each other.
The first main session was led by Judith Leary-Joyce, a fascinating workshop on Inspirational Managers, giving us examples of inspired management that she had encountered in the research for her book of the same title. She tied the threads of these stories together in a conceptual framework, linking key concepts such as vision, communication, belonging and responsibility - underpinned by management and leadership values.
Judith clearly differentiated the ease with which we can understand what makes an inspirational manager and the difficulties of actually achieving it in practice. But for each of us to strive towards it, we should tackle four things; playing to strengths, telling the truth, being consistent and building exceptional relationships.
The session was instructive and informative and led to some lively and useful discussions round the tables.
Stella Smith then ran a beautiful session on Creativity and Intuition, describing the different ways of knowing, and the value of tacit knowledge as well as explicit knowledge. She invited us, for example, to picture in our minds a musician conducting a circus orchestra playing for a troupe of performing elephants. Whilst it may at first seem as though the elephants are keeping time to the music, the reality is that the music is keeping time with the elephants!
With these and other poetic analogies we were gradually brought to the realisation that much of our decision-making is intuitive and that that is where we should be looking for creativity. We apprehend rather than analyse. We often, if not usually, make what appear to be explicit decisions, but which are in reality based on our gut feelings - and our intellect later finds a seemingly rational justification for them.
We were invited to learn more about our tacit understanding and to use tacit knowledge. We need to be detached from yearning for a particular outcome, aware of our prejudices, and prepared to halt our in-built censor - the thing that filters the thoughts that keep welling up when we give them a chance.
After a very enjoyable session we were left valuing our tacit knowledge more. It is an underrated resource.
Bruce Nixon talked about building a relationship with the natural environment - one that didn’t exploit. To do so, we need to listen to the messages the environment is sending us. Bruce hears these messages more clearly than most, and the messages push him to action. In his turn he encouraged us to action, both in our personal lives and also in our interaction with governments. We need to lobby.
Sadly the message Bruce gives us concerning the future is a rather uninviting one, but the session was carried out in such good humour that one couldn’t help feeling somewhat reassured that Bruce and others like him are on the case, and striving for a better future for us all.
Day Two
On the second day Sarah Hill presented her work in prisons in the form of a dialogue with her colleague, Bob Henry.
I think most of us were amazed at what is happening in prisons and enthralled by Sarah’s description of the dialogue process in which she is engaged. In difficult, and potentially dangerous environments, prisoners and staff are all tempted to keep things under wraps and expressions of emotion can be unwelcome. But this perpetuates an atmosphere where no one benefits. The prisoners and the warders are at loggerheads, and learning about self and life is reduced to a minimum.
I really enjoyed the event (conference does not feel like the right word, somehow). I met some really interesting people who spoke to me from a place of depth within themselves and that is rare in such a short time. Cecelia Sarah explained the importance of seemingly simple things like eye contact and recognition in breaking down the barriers, and allowing dialogue to start. In the early phases of her work only the governor and warders were involved, but, as the communication developed, the dialogue gradually expanded to include the prisoner, and later the police, when they felt brave enough to participate.
This enlightening introduction was followed by an example of the sort of dialogue activities carried out with prison groups. The experience was moving, and in the group discussions that followed we felt encouraged to be far more open about ourselves, and to find that less threatening that it might have been beforehand.
It was pleasing to know such valuable work is being carried out for a very disadvantaged group. Preliminary evidence shows that prisoners who have been involved in the dialogue process are less likely to re-offend. Persistent offenders tend to spend longer periods at liberty before being readmitted to prison.
Japp Huttenga from The Netherlands presented the final session of this year’s conference, a wide ranging, philosophical and thought-provoking consideration of spirituality in the workplace.
Just a quick note to say thanks very much for the opportunity to come to the conference last week. It was a fantastic experience, and a wonderful opportunity to meet some like minded folk in London. ClaireSpirituality was not treated as a religious subject, although the two fit well together and Jaap was giving us his views from a Christian perspective. We were amused by one analogy that each religion is a sort of operating system to the infinite. Just as some people prefer Mac OS and some Linux, so some people choose Christianity, others Buddhism etc.
Managers in all situations in organisations have to develop a set of social relationships that mirror the greater social relationships of society and the world. Key to this is building a feeling of Meaning and Belonging. Just as you need to know where you belong in the world and what meaning your life has, so you need to know how you belong in the workplace and how you achieve meaning in this context.
Servant-leaders seek to meet all the needs of their people, and to help them to grow and develop. This sort of nurturing must make sure people know that they belong and that their work has meaning. This desire to build a supportive workplace where people can be content and yet have the opportunity to grow is a spiritual environment.
During his session, Jaap invited us, literally, to walk in the dark. This was for some quite an unsettling experience, yet left us with a sense of enlightenment.
There followed a short session by Charlie Foote in which he listed some of the possible ways forward for the Greenleaf Centre UK and asked for involvement and cooperation from the delegates. The invitation to comment received an immediate, enthusiastic and positive response.
Terri McNerney then rounded of the conference with our now traditional “reflections” session.
We have always emphasised the importance of participation and discussion in our conferences, but this year the depth of our conversations together and the atmosphere of sharing and trust that this generated took us all by surprise. We were all aware that something very special had happened, but exactly what it was defies definition.
During our reflections session at the end of the second day one of our delegates even challenged the use of the word “conference” to describe what we had experienced together.
He said:
“This is not a conference, with the usual sterile expatiation – there is too much humanity and intimacy for that. It is what those of us who were young in the sixties might call a “happening”. As Bertrand Russell said at the end of his Reith Lecture in the fifties: “Remember your humanity, and forget the rest”.
Roll on next year!
Charlie Foote