PhD Valerie Davis shares highlights from her study on collaborative culture and collaborative leadership with redefinitions of power and interactions.

1. #BuildingCapacity in a Collaborative Culture
keynote
Valerie J Davis, PhD
#BuildingCapacity | an ebbf international learning event
understanding and developing the latent talent
in people and organizations
to enable adaptive and meaningful workplaces fit for the 21st century

2. ! Background and foundational concepts
! Capacity building in a collaborative culture
! Why now?
The Map

3. Introduction
The Study

4. The Study
! Two organizations practicing collaborative
leadership
! 25 participants

5. The Participants
! 25 people: 13 males, 12 females
! Two distinct generations (DOB from
1951 – 1991)
! Most have post-graduate degrees
! Most have had significant multi-
cultural experiences

6. Foundational Concepts
! Collaborative leadership
! Power
! Capacity building

7. A dynamic, interactive process that occurs
between two or more people, the purpose
of which is to facilitate decision-making
and shared agreement on direction,
alignment to goals, and a commitment to
action.
Collaborative Leadership

8. Power:
! social power in an organizational context.
! understood to be a ubiquitous and animating
force of human organization.
! a benign energy.
! Considered to be intrinsic to leadership.
! “America’s last dirty word” (Moss-Kanter,
1999).

9. Power Over

10. Power To

11. Power With

12. Influencing through mutualistic power or power-
with
! Inspiring
! Role modeling
! Building capacity
Collaborative leaders prefer

13. ! Empowerment?
Building Capacity

14. Capacity versus Competence

15. ! Providing resources, encouraging, and
supporting
! Generating a sense of ownership
! Promoting group unity
Releasing Capacity

16. ! Is a win-win strategy.
! There is no loss of power for the leader.
! The more capacity each person has the more
potential the organization will have.
Releasing Capacity

17. ! When you’re managing people it’s more about
working with folks as individuals and helping them
grow for their own sake . . . If I’m a good manager
that means that I am serving them by supporting
them and being better and growing and
strengthening their skills and achieving what they
want to achieve. I see that if I can do that
successfully then I am essentially extending the
impact that I can have on the world by building up
the ability for others to have that impact.
Benjamin

18. ! A conceptual framework
! Developed by Ken Wilber
! Considers “being”, “doing”, “culture”, and “the
larger system”
An Integral Perspective

19. INDIVIDUAL
COLLECTIVE
INTERNAL
EXTERNAL
CULTURE
Intra-
subjective
INTENTION
Subjective
SYSTEMS
Inter-subjective
BEHAVIOR
Objective

20. ! no one quadrant offers a complete picture.
! All perspectives are needed for a holistic
understanding.
An Integral Perspective

21. ! Prefers mutualistic power
! Abundance mindset
! Balances agency and communion
! Courageous
! Ethical
! Humble
! Minimizes ego
! Trustworthy and trusting
! Views people as full of potential
Intention

22. ! Employs mutualistic power
! Consults others
! Puts others ahead of self
! Shows respect for others
! Works through conflict
! Transparent in communication
Behavior

23. ! Collaborative
! Social equity
! Social justice
! Promote equality
! Principles-centered
! Participatory decision-making
! Safe environment
! Shared opportunities to express power
! Strive for consensus
! Transparent communication
! Values-based
! Value diversity
Culture

24. ! Collaborative strategic framework
! Democratically inspired
! Devolved leadership
! Inspires beyond the organization boundaries
! Learning organization
! Minimized hierarchy
! Promotes sustainability and altruism
! Shared ownership of the enterprise
System

25. INDIVIDUAL
COLLECTIVE
INTERNAL
EXTERNAL
CULTURE
Relational Equality
INTENTION
Abundance
Balanced
Character and Virtues
Moral and ethical
SYSTEMS
Innovative Strategic Frameworks
Seamless between internal and external
stakeholders
BEHAVIOR
Collaborative
Consultative
Respectful
Faces conflict
Transparent
Reflective

26. INDIVIDUAL
COLLECTIVE
INTERNAL
EXTERNAL
CULTURE
Relational Equality
INTENTION
Abundance
Balanced
Character and Virtues
Moral and ethical
SYSTEMS
Innovative Strategic Frameworks
Seamless between internal and external
stakeholders
BEHAVIOR
Collaborative
Consultative
Respectful
Faces conflict
Transparent
Reflective

27. A few observations
! The leaders in this study did not always think
this way
! Some cautioned that negative capacity is as
easily developed
! This takes time and patience
! In the end, mutualistic power and building
capacity are a matter of choice

28. ! People are at varying levels of capacity to
collaborate.
! Leaders require deep self-awareness.
! Contradictory behavior will be scrutinized and
magnified.
Challenges

29. ! Technology
! Information
! Complexity
Why now?

30. Your Thoughts and Questions?

31. A few questions to explore . . .
! Is it possible to “renovate” an organization? If
so, how can that be accomplished?
! What does collaborative leader development
look like?
! What experiences would best serve to develop
the collaborative capacities of employees?
! Your deeper questions?
Learnshop

32. How collaborative leaders build
capacity
! Listen deeply
! Trust as a foundation
! Truly care about others
! Emphasize motivating and mentorship
! Focus on understanding; never blame
! Delegate ownership versus tasks
! Provide stretch opportunities
! Create environments conducive to learning and growth
! Place other-interest equal to or ahead of self-interest
! Participatory decision-making where appropriate
! Practice collaboration
! Promote consultation
! Employ reflection regularly