On February 2 the team participated in a panel discussion on Transformative Leadership, sponsored by the Wilmette Institute and coordinated by Niki Daniels. If you weren’t able to listen to the panel live, we invite you to check it out on YouTube at https://youtu.be/k7gkH8B0uZ4
The panel discussion was followed by a period of questions and answers. Some interesting points that came up in the discussion were:
What the Participants Will Gain from Taking the Course that Will Be Offered from February 13-April 1
(Joan) The participants in the course can experience any of the following results, depending on their own interests and engagement with the course.
- Hopefully, all who take the course will experience some degree of personal transformation in their own lives.
- Since the course also focuses on social transformation, it will be especially helpful for those who want to reach out to community groups, especially youth.
- You will be better able to take part in social action, “contributing to the spiritual and material upliftment of communities.” An example are the local social action projects, incorporating Transformative Leadership that Jess describes during the talk. We have also incorporated Transformative Leadership in long-term projects focused on specific populations or professions that have a duration of a year and a half or two years.
- Finally, the course will help you to better participate in the discourse of society. Today people in all parts of the world are becoming increasingly discouraged with leadership . By participating in the course you will have a productive alternative to contribute to this discussion, rather than just lamenting the problems that exist.
The Relevance of Transformative Leadership Today
(Jess) I discovered the Transformative Leadership book in 2017, and was just overwhelmed and absolutely ecstatic to find it. I had already been engaged in community-building activities, contributing to the spiritual and material well-being of the community at the grassroots level for seven years. Complementing this with the systematic framework presented by Transformative Leadership that encompasses all people, all ages, all backgrounds, was truly transformative. We immediately integrated it into our Junior Youth program. The kids practice the six elements of Transformative Leadership, learn how to engage, looking through the lens of personal and social transformation, the two-fold moral purpose that human beings have.
We had a workshop in 2017 open to the public. An assistant principal who attended commented that ‘Transformative Leadership would benefit educators in all areas: new teachers, new administrators, as well as seasoned veterans.”
We also did some work with a local non-profit called Intercultural Community Builders that hosts workshops for middle and high school students that address bullying behaviors and intercultural leadership skills. We integrated the six elements of Transformative Leadership into their “Find Your Voice, Take a Stand” Anti-Bullying Workshop curriculum.
For the past year and a half, I have integrated Transformative Leadership into a passion of mine, which is photography and the arts, focused on empowering young people. These young people have really been receptive and taken this to heart. Now we have 20-30 students in Northern Colorado engaged weekly in Transformative Leadership.
Our young people are constantly in spaces where divisiveness and adversarial relationships are really taking its toll, so these kids use this framework to navigate these challenges and they are able use their conscious knowledge and passionate desire for justice to make informed decisions, to basically elevate themselves, to not take part in these adversarial relationships. They practice their capabilities in order to make situations more unifying. It’s been incredibly heart-warming to see these kids do that.
Integrating Transformative Leadership into Programs Focused on Particular Professions
(Joan) One of the beauties of Transformative Leadership is that you can integrate it into programs focused on specific professions or populations. When giving a three-semester program for 1000 teachers in Ecuador, we integrated the conceptual framework of Transformative Leadership and its 18 capabilities with academic capabilities directly related to education. Likewise, Transformative Leadership has been integrated into long-term programs on public health and community development.
Online Study Group
(Vahid) A friend of mine reached out to me and asked how they could go about studying Transformative Leadership. She was aware that the model existed and was really impactful, and she was particularly concerned with the situation of the world today. Part of her concern was: How do I go about changing my community and the participating actors? She reached out to a number of friends from different communities and organized a group. I coordinated it, using online webinars. We would get together once a week, talk about the reading they had done and consult on the questions that emerged from the reading.
Relation to the Ruhi Institute Process
(Jessica) Both the Institute process and the Transformative Leadership framework build capacity for personal transformation and also for contributing to the betterment of our world. Looking at the two, they go hand-in-hand. In my grassroots efforts to contribute to the betterment of the community, when I discovered the Transformative Leadership materials in 2017, they just fit perfectly. I really see it as all integrated, looking at it as one, as opposed to compartmentalizing. I think the Transformative Leadership model could strengthen any endeavor, any engagement, complementing the Institute process.
Learning More about Transformative Leadership
From February 13-April 1, our Transformative Leadership Education team will be conducting an online course on the Wilmette Institute platform. In the course you can delve more deeply into Transformative Leadership and develop ideas of how you can apply it in your community. Get more information and sign up at bit.ly/tlcourseinfo. If you sign up as a member of a study group, there is a discount for members 2 through 10.
If you know others who may be interested — either in listening to the Web Talk on YouTube (https://youtu.be/k7gkH8B0uZ4), or signing up for the course (bit.ly/tlcourseinfo) — please share this information with them.
If you have any doubts or questions, please write us at translead9@gmail.com.