The Power of Followership

One of the earliest lessons we teach our children is to “lead and not follow.” In fact, a great deal of time and resources are spent using evidence-based practices to train leaders to effectively mentor and guide their teams. However, we rarely spend time talking about the other side of the leadership coin – followership, and there are significantly more followers in most organizations than positional leaders. Research shows that both leaders and followers often struggle to seamlessly navigate in and out of their roles as leaders and followers, likely because little attention has been shown to helping followers follow well. Followership and leadership are two sides of the same coin.

This session will encourage attendees to reflect on their own typical followership behaviors and identify strategies to practice engaged followership, as well as encourage positive followership behaviors amongst their teams.

The Art of Taking Away

When something is broken or not working in the way it should, we tend to add stuff. In fact research has shown that when asked to improve something – an organization, travel itinerary, writing assignment – fewer than 30% of people considered removing a step or process. Most propose solutions that involve building in more stuff. This tendency to innovate by addition is our go-to approach to solving professional and personal problems. However, if the last several years have shown us anything, more isn’t always better. On the quest to do more in an uncertain time, we’ve achieved an unprecedented level of collective burnout, and it isn’t going away.

Let’s start thinking about innovation – in our professional work and in our personal lives – as an opportunity for subtraction. This doesn’t mean doing ‘more with less.’ That approach is what got us into this mess in the first place! Instead, we’ll explore the counterintuitive practice of innovation by truly taking away – steps, processes, and maybe some old rules – to find renewed joy and meaning in our personal and professional spaces.

Generations At Work: A New Take On An Old Conversation

For the first time in America's modern history, there are five generations interacting in the workplace. This diverse and sometimes frustrating demographic provides for many opportunities to work together – well and poorly! This interactive session will address mainstream media myths of generational warfare in the workplace and provide insight about each generation’s preferences and strengths. While each generation has their own propensities, the session will also focus on how we might meet people where they are, in their “onlyness,” with the reminder that our generational cohort is only one small piece of what we bring to work each day. Participants will leave with concrete strategies to create a positive and productive work environment for themselves, their coworkers, and their guests.