This workshop was aimed at aspiring leaders/leaders/those interested in models of wellbeing and resilience. VUCA stands for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity, a leadership model based on the theories of Bennis and Nanus from the late 1980s (https://www.vuca-world.org/). Leaders are often required to navigate uncertainties, paradoxes, conflicts, pressures and ambiguities. The VUCA model calls for new approaches to management centred on a personal approach and is extensively used in intercultural business masterclasses (University of Cambridge; MIT; Jagannath International Management School Kalkaji, India). The model inspires and encourages leaders to move from the idea of the leader who ‘knows all’ towards a vision of developmental leadership. This approach clarifies the leader’s ability to develop others’ capacity to handle problems and make difficult decisions, based on the idea that every individual can contribute their skills. In strategic terms, leading in a VUCA world requires Vision, Understanding, Clarity and Adaptability/Agility. Learning development is starting to embrace this model of leadership, with a new ALDinHE Leadership CoP offering a platform for sharing both theory and practice. The overarching aim of this approach is that of conveying positive energy into the development of meaningful approaches. The VUCA model relies on six key skills, all of which connect to the values of learning development: Developing a shared purpose. Learning agility. Self-awareness. Leading through collaboration and influence. Confidence in leading through uncertainty. Growth mind-set. This was a creative discussion-based workshop and we aim to co-create a JLDHE article with interested participants. We have interested participants from the ‘International Women’s’ day workshop we ran, and we wanted to further broaden out this scholarship opportunity to the learning development community. The ALDinHE Leadership CoP are considering how best to feed into notions of a leadership toolkit to support the community. Attendees of the VUCA workshop were asked to read the following two articles prior to the session: ‘Lessons leaders can learn from those living through change’ (HULT Education). ‘Leading in a VUCA World: five essential skills to learn in a VUCA world’ (Culpin, 2018).
The change to online delivery in March 2020 provided an opportunity as well as a requirement to change the way we work in Higher Education (HE), from a traditional stance focussed on hierarchy and roles to one that embraced individual core skills and competencies. The Transformation Academy (TA), Solent University's response led by the Solent Learning and Teaching Institute (SLTI), had as its goal the preparation of 1100 modules for online delivery in September 2020, delivered via institutional cross-team collaboration to ensure success within a narrow timescale. Collaboration is by necessity situated and dialogic, and most effectively driven by an affective and trust-based connection between collaborative partners as well as to the project goal. In bringing together previously disparate and siloed teams, the TA project’s success relied upon new collaborative partners quickly forming those connections, despite the prevailing neoliberal emphasis in UK HE on performativity and pressure from senior management to complete the work within 12 weeks. Adopting a qualitative empirical research design and single, local, exploratory case study approach, data is derived from 11 semi-structured interviews with project members who collaborated with colleagues outside of their usual team structures, to explore the personal value they perceived obtaining from the TA project. Preliminary findings suggest that Learning and Teaching (L&T) collaborations in a pressured environment benefit from authenticity in emotion and interpersonal affective connections, which in turn are engendered by openness and clarity in communication, a flattened hierarchy, and a sense of ownership for all participants.
The morning tea break performs several useful and evidence-based functions, in providing a space for networking and exchanging information, for building relationships, and for reducing stress. However, in a higher education context predicated on outputs and performance, the time spent in talking to colleagues over a cuppa is often considered a wasteful indulgence, and even harder to organise meaningfully with our post-Covid hybrid patterns of working. In an audit culture, how can the qualitative value of social relations be recognised, cultivated and strengthened, so that we might all benefit from the productivity that inevitably follows? Questions: How do we make space in our week to get to know each other as people? What are the best methods for developing and maintaining a collaborative workplace community for hybrid workers? Is coffee ever an acceptable substitute for tea?
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.