ILG- one of my most challenging collaborative groups.</

Taking the Coursera course on Innovation and Creative Diversity from Penn State has taught me a lot about working as a group.  This year I am working as a Co-ordinator of International Relations in Japan (a 1 year sabbatical from my position as head of counselling at Bishop Carroll High School in Calgary Alberta Canada).  Due to this change of position I have been able to take a step out and back from my previous position which is leading me to fabulous self reflection.

For the four years prior to this year I have been the head of the counselling department at Bishop Carroll High school. Part of my role was to come together with other department heads in our building to act as a advisory council for our school community (Integrative Leadership Group). At times I would leave these biweekly meetings feeling very frustrated… it felt like we talked in circles without really making change or progress. I felt that others who disagreed with me were personally attacking my department.

Based on the lectures https://class.coursera.org/cic-001/wiki/view?page=ex_creativestyle I’ve discovered that I have a Moderately Innovative style, which means that I like throwing ideas out there, no matter how practical, and challenging the status quo. The majority of the older and most vocal members of my staff have a Moderate to Strong Adaptive style.This means that they like to maintain status quo and tradition.

While I may have interpreted their reactions to me as not having confidence in my ability to lead my department, I now realize that they may have interpreted my suggestions as a  threat to the traditions of our school. Things had always “worked” in the past so they did not have the same motivation as I did to change or make something good even better.

 I started laughing this week when I heard about the difference between the “yes and” and the “yes but” responses to collaboration. I’ve come to realize that all of the department heads want to make our school successful, otherwise we wouldn’t apply for the position, however reframing our responses could lead to more collaboration because they would demonstrates respect for each others positions and values. I will definitely try to implement the Yes And position when I return to my role next year.

Another change will be listening to the whole message of each member of the group and trying to be more explicit about my membership. Taking into account the values of all members and acknowledging them for ex “I know that the traditions of Bishop Carroll are important to you and I would like to continue to show Carroll pride by….” may help to move conversations into a more positive realm.

Finally I may try a number of mini experiments (fast failures) before I come to the table. That way I will be able to element or weed out some of my less practical suggestions.

Department Planning with Susan- one of my more successful collaborations.

Susan Spellman Cann and I have very similar styles when it comes to creativity styles and levels. We both like thinking outside of the box and “tinkering” with new ideas even if we are not sure if they will be successful. I enjoy working with Susan as I find her passion and energy regarding counselling issues are similar to mine. We are both able to “feed off of” each other`s energy and ideas. Although I know it is not realistic to always get to work with someone so easily I will embrace these opportunities and use them as a way to recharge

It is important to be able to collaborate with both those you who are similar to you and those who are different. Working with someone similar may have less conflict as you are both in sync, however being able to overcome the challenges of working with someone different can lead to large group shifts which can benefit whole communities. 

Erin Luong