Opportunity and Engagement
My own research in leadership development discussed in depth in Chapter 5 shows that leadership skills and abilities will grow when opportunities are present to take on leadership responsibilities. Actively pursuing opportunities for developing your leadership practice aligns closely with your engagement with the organization and taken together they can be a powerful source for leadership development. Given this, use your practice perspectives to be on the hunt for opportunities to advance your leadership skills. On any given day, if you avail yourself, you will find there are multiple instances that can serve as an opportunity to develop your leadership skills. This can be something as simple as volunteering to serve on a committee, being willing to take on a specific responsibility for the team such as organizing an event, agreeing to take minutes, offering to pursue a fundraiser, or any number of activities, including representing the organization with external stakeholders.
If you are willing to step up and take it on, then you will quickly see that your fellow team members—including your supervisors—no matter the level, will begin to gravitate toward you and think of you as a go‐to person for activities that can lend themselves to additional leadership responsibility and, more important, your capacity to develop as a leader. Actively pursuing opportunities to develop your leadership skills will provide you with invaluable experience so that you can practice and refine your leadership skills.
For example, I can think of a newly minted entry‐level leader within a nonprofit multiservice agency who was seen volunteering for any number of activities. First, he offered to keep track of his program's monthly vehicle safety checklist. From there his director asked him if he wanted to serve as the safety coordinator, representing his program for the agency's corporate safety committee. Soon the committee discovered that he had graphic design skills and he began churning out a wonderful safety committee newsletter—while along the way being promoted to assistant director. It was clear that he not only possessed leadership skills but was actively refining them while building his reputation as a go‐to person. He is on a journey, and it will be interesting to see where the journey takes him.
Pursuing opportunity and working to be fully engaged not only benefits the individual, but also the entire team. In my formal leadership role, I know that creating multiple opportunities for employees to be engaged and to develop their own leadership capabilities not only helps them learn and grow but also benefits the organization. An organization that has multiple opportunities for employees to develop and express leadership is an organization that is vibrant and dynamic.
Nonprofit agencies, when organized well, can help to ensure that there are multiple opportunities for employees to become engaged in developing their leadership capabilities. Clearly there are the traditional notions of leadership training programs which in and of themselves have a positive impact, and then there are a multitude of other strategies that can help to build your organization's culture of leadership development. As mentioned, committees are an easy way to help people develop their leadership capacity. In particular, ad hoc committees that are working to address a particular project can be useful as a strategy to connect employees to a level of leadership practice. There are other structural strategies as well. For example, how the organization pursues its continuous quality improvement (CQI) practices can help or hinder the development of leadership practice. Is the effort pursued by a single department or employee or is there cross‐organization participation for employees at various levels within the agency? Providing opportunities for various parts of the organization to work together on functions beyond the individual's day‐to‐day responsibilities makes it possible for individuals to step up and take responsibility that not only benefits the organization but also helps the employee build their own leadership practice.
For example, rather than simply relying on a quality improvement director, you might develop a peer‐review process that engages interdisciplinary team members from across the organization to share in continuous quality improvement visits, CQI goals, and objectives as well as practices. In this way there are multiple opportunities for employee engagement and leadership development that are built into the organization's practices.
Strategies of this type can be pursued across the organization, covering various agency functions. From continuous quality improvement practices to employee training and development to information technology to events planning, the use of systems that provide the framework for employees of the organization to pursue opportunities to develop their leadership capacity are many. As an individual, watch for these opportunities; as a leader within an organization, strive to optimize the number that are available, knowing that done well these opportunities will build leadership practice across the organization.
Become an Advocate for Leadership Development Practice
As you strive to pursue as well as enhance your organization's leadership and engagement opportunities, I want to be sure that you prepare yourself to become a wholly committed advocate. An advocate not only for your own leadership practice but also at an organizational level as well. Building leadership practice for yourself and for the team is something that must be intentional and the desire to develop yourself and the team around you must be articulated. Advocates give voice to a cause that without their public support might not become a reality. Similarly, you must give voice to the desire to develop your leadership skills. This is true as well for those who hope to grow leadership capacity within the organization.
I recall early on in my career having the flawed belief that if I worked hard and developed myself that someone would notice, and I would be provided with greater leadership responsibility. It did not take long before I realized that no one truly noticed. They did appreciate all that I would do, but simply thought I was content with the status quo and had no idea that I had a vision of where my leadership journey might go. Once I started to say affirmatively that I desired to grow as a leader and have greater responsibility, then people began to intentionally consider how I could contribute to new efforts that would represent a greater and more in‐depth leadership role.
It is also critical to advocate for leadership practice across the entire organization. If you do not articulate the importance of everyone developing their capacity to share in leadership practice, then you will have a hard time establishing an agencywide leadership development perspective. Other norms or patterns of behavior can take hold that could ultimately hurt the agency's capacity to be a place that is vibrant and, as Raelin (2011) would say, Leaderful.
Within organizational life there are multiple places where your advocacy can pay off. Annual evaluations become a time when future goals and professional development can be clearly articulated. If you desire future leadership responsibility and growth this is a perfect place to articulate how you hope to grow. Regular meetings with your supervisor become a natural place to talk about future goals as well as professional growth and development. Consider training opportunities that are geared toward your leadership development, as well.
As you pursue each of these strategies, recall the practice perspectives we explored earlier in this chapter. Be sure to have the long view in mind, do not forget to enjoy the journey, remember to use your compass to stay focused on your True North, and be sure to leverage serendipity. For example, you might say if you write about your desire to have more leadership responsibility in your annual evaluation that your current supervisor will see this as a threat. First, my condolences for having a supervisor with this view, but beyond that recognize that this individual is a point in time in your journey and there are other strategies to pursue in your development. While you will encounter obstacles in your leadership journey, your practice perspectives make it possible to pivot around just such a barrier. We know because we have taken the long view that our tenacious nature will help to overcome each challenge that is encountered.
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