By Rosie Heaton, LGcomms Future Leader
When I arrived back in my university city of Leeds for the second of our Future Leaders sessions, I knew it was set to be a good one.
I’d been lucky enough to learn from Professor Paul Willis at a Wigan Council away day a few years earlier, but with this module billed as an ‘MBA in a day’ (okay, two days), I knew that we were all going to gain a lot from Professor Paul’s expertise.
And I wasn’t wrong!
We had three sessions in total, where we took a flying tour through topics relating to leadership.
From the importance of self awareness and emotional intelligence, to tackling challenging issues like change communication and tricky conversations, the depth of knowledge in everything we learned left us all with plenty to consider long after we’d left Leeds or disconnected from the Zoom call.
I won’t go into too much detail about the theory (I have an essay to write to do that!) as for me, it was the reflection that was a really important part of the experience.
It’s not often when working in a busy local government communications team that you get the opportunity to truly step back, take a breath and reflect.
Of course, we’re continually evaluating our work and considering how we can improve, but we are always on the move and thinking ahead, reacting and responding.
It’s necessary to be one step ahead as communicators, but this move from thinking tactically to becoming more strategic and reflective in my thinking is something I’m going to continue carving out space for.
Paul’s sessions gave me space to look both to the past and ahead to the future.
I found myself actively reflecting on what my personal contribution is, reviewing the way I approach my work and the effect that my working style has on the rest of my team.
Every concept was delivered with energy and expertise.
Paul’s academic approach, twinned with anecdotes from his career in industry, left us all feeling in a stronger professional position than when we first walked into that room in Leeds.
Thanks to Paul, Danni, Eddie and Julie – and of course the rest of this year’s cohort of Future Leaders – for making the sessions so insightful.
Now, back to that essay… I’d better go and dust off my favourite pen!