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Initiating Leadership Development In a VUCA Environment
Get PDFOrganizations across the world are continuously undergoing change - some of which is by choice; the majority of this change is in response to the pressures the external environment. In today\u27s world, organizations need to be agile. They need to be able to meet the challenges and develop creative ways to attract and retain talent as part of their business strategy. When organizations are strong, their process and procedures are working well in support of their business operations, and their employees are engaged as healthy and constructive components of a high-functioning, complex, adaptable system. Organizational adaptation is imperative in the modern, volatile, unpredictable, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) environment, as without it a firm can become obsolete. Organizations represent and operate as complex adaptive systems. Accordingly, all of their systemic parts are connected and employees within these systems have the ability to influence the organizational and relational dynamics that are needed to successfully meet the adaptive challenges they and their organizations receive from their surrounding environment. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) presents a possible solution by initializing leadership development through an engagement of complexity leadership theory and adaptive leadership within an organizational context unfamiliar with the value of investing in the leadership development of their employees as a form of competitive advantage. Utilizing a postmodern perspective, this OIP focuses on developing a theoretical framework through which a progressive, iterative solution can begin to gradually influence the evolution of largely transactional relationships between employees into increasingly collaborative exchanges through which adaptive work and innovative solutions can be enabled
Fostering and Sustaining an Inclusive and Cognitively Diverse Learning Culture that Promotes Innovative and Agile Thinking
Get PDFThis Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) addresses the problem of practice (PoP) of how leaders in the International School of Central Eastern Europe (a pseudonym) elementary school might foster and sustain a cognitively diverse and inclusive learning culture that promotes innovative and agile thinking. The plan is theory-based, research-informed, and looks to transfer learning into practice. It is built on a foundation of social constructivism and pragmatic-idealism and is firmly grounded in constructivist, ethical, and distributed leadership. Contextually oriented, the PoP grew in response to the need for schools to re-envision teaching and learning so students can thrive in an ever-changing, globalized society. It views change through continuous improvement. Bound by time constraints and the desire to empower faculty to lead change, an integrative approach was generated. The OIP intertwines an eight-step process with the organization’s inquiry cycle and key principles focused on maintaining a strengths-based approach to change. The framework connects the traditional hierarchy with a network structure. The dual operating system supports the cultivation of self-efficacy and collective efficacy fostering innovation in support of continuous change that focuses on improving teaching and learning. The resulting integrative framework, the accelerated improvement cycle, will be leveraged within the elementary division. The implementation of this approach will engage participants in reflective, reciprocal learning opportunities that encourage members to challenge one another’s assumptions to bring about positive, meaningful, and sustainable change. A critical examination of policy and the impact of the school’s dominantly Western philosophy and a workforce that does not personify the underrepresented minorities requires future investigation
Addressing the Skills Awareness Gap through Impactful On-Campus Employment
Get PDFThe pressure and expectations on institutions of higher education to ensure that graduates are equipped with the skills required to successfully transition from a learning environment to the work force are increasing. Growing societal and political expectations to effectively prepare post-secondary graduates for successful career outcomes are intensifying. Ongoing criticism from employers indicates that many new graduates lack career readiness to enter the workforce, due to the absence of required skills, often referred to as a skills gap. These skills are regularly identified as soft, human, or non-technical, and transferrable across multiple settings. This Organizational Improvement Plan counters that position and proposes that the issue is not a skills gap but rather a skills awareness gap, with graduates unaware and unable to articulate the skills gained from various curricular and co-curricular learning experiences throughout university. To address this problem, a solution supported by the literature, and the knowledge and expertise of the change leader, proposes redesigning a large, on-campus employment program at Institution X into a High Impact Practice, increasing students’ awareness of the transferrable employability skills acquired though this experience. The solution is presented through transformational and collaborative leadership approaches and uses the Change Path Model (Cawsey et al., 2020) as an implementation framework. The Plan-Do-Study-Act Model of Improvement (Langley et al., 2009) and a Program Logic Model (Markiewicz & Patrick, 2016) are applied to iteratively monitor and evaluate the change. A detailed communication plan is outlined to garner support from various internal stakeholders to address the skills awareness gap and embrace the proposed changes to an established, existing on-campus employment program
The Strategic Adoption of a new service delivery model within an Ontario College’s Registrar’s Office
Get PDFPostsecondary institutions are continually striving to improve the experience their students have on campus. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) addresses the lack of a strategic approach to the implementation of an integrated services model within an Ontario college’s registrar’s office (RO). Preemptive College (PC; a pseudonym), along with many other Ontario institutions, is facing an increasingly competitive landscape; providing a high-quality student experience has been identified as a way to differentiate the institution from its competitors. The adoption of an integrated services delivery model within the RO is one aspect of the institution’s overall plan to enhance the student experience. This OIP is constructed through the lens of a middle manager within the RO and utilizes the leadership approaches of both distributed leadership and adaptive leadership. A strategic approach to the adoption of an integrated services model within the RO is presented using the plan-do-study-act model and an eight-step change framework. The model and framework are used in combination with a series of guiding questions to outline a plan for monitoring the change effort and evaluating the impact the new model is having on the institution. A detailed communication plan guided by the leadership approaches of distributed and adaptive leadership is also outlined
Military-connected students in higher education: A Canadian approach
Get PDFCanadian military-connected students are adult learners who maintain a significant tie to the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) and who enter higher education without the benefit of purposefully crafted academic and social supports. When CAF service members move from the collective nature of the military to individual pursuits in civilian society, transition difficulties occur. While there is a dearth of Canadian-specific research on military-connected students, the US context can help contextualize this higher education issue for a greater understanding of inclusion difficulties. Based on a transformative research paradigm, this organizational improvement plan (OIP) looks to provide a voice to this underrepresented group of leaners in order to lead to an organization-wide recognition of the heterogeneity of military-connected students. Enabled by a transformational leadership approach at the macro-level of University X and an adaptive approach at the meso- and micro-levels, the OIP presents an interconnected implementation plan. The problem of practice (PoP) that drives the investigation is aimed at recognizing the diverse needs of military-connected students and cultivating a sustainable positive learning environment. The OIP will employ successive quality improvement cycles of a plan-do-study-act strategy to address the PoP. The desired outcome of the OIP is to link military-connected students to a supporting learning environment, peer support, and the local community through a harmonized institutional approach across all levels of University X