“Things we would never do or always do.”

“Aspects of ourselves that we adapt to differing circumstances, which aren’t hardwired into who we are as individuals.”

Gary Sullivan, president of Espirer Consulting, facilitates the “Leading with Cultural Competence” workshop this past October.

This is how Julia Middleton, founder of Common Purpose, describes the concepts of core and flex. The inaugural Leadership Institute cohort grappled with these ideas during their first workshop experience. Middleton and others describe cultural intelligence as essential for effective leadership. Members of the institute steering committee and other advisers agree, so “leading with cultural competence” was the focus of the first workshop for the cohort.

The design of the Leadership Institute recognizes three important touch points in a person’s leadership journey. As described in this month’s President’s Corner column, the Leadership Challenge is designed to encourage students and early-career individuals to start on a leadership trajectory. In the future, the institute will also provide support for individuals who have a record of success as they consider and accept new leadership challenges.

The definition of leadership that underpins the cohort experience is “the ability to consistently deliver value to an organization or cause by inspiring people to take a specific direction or action when they truly have the freedom of choice to do otherwise.” This definition recognizes that leadership roles are both informal and formal, so the curricular focus was selected to individuals who were both in formal leadership positions and were emerging leaders.

Since 2014, the short course “Preparing Statisticians for Leadership: How to See the Big Picture and Have More Influence” has been offered at the Joint Statistical Meetings. The long-term plan for the Leadership Institute is to offer a year-long curriculum to build on the skills and knowledge gained during this JSM course.

To begin the curriculum development process, 20 past participants in the JSM course were offered the opportunity to participate in a pilot cohort. On October 12 and 13, the 11 women and nine men who make up the cohort met at the ASA in Alexandria, Virginia, for the “Leading with Cultural Competence” workshop, which was facilitated by Gary Sullivan, president of Espirer Consulting.

The workshop included leaders sharing their stories and a case study to explore the skills and knowledge required of a culturally competent leader. It concluded with each participant completing a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis to assess their current state as a culturally competent leader. With the support of a peer mentor, the participants will continue to work on their action plan to make progress on their journey to become more culturally competent.

Throughout the remainder of 2018, the cohort will work on their leadership portfolios. As part of this process, they have established goals for continuing to develop their cultural intelligence and will collect evidence to document their progress. The group is using an online community to share resources and continue the discussion of leading with cultural competence.

The second workshop, which will begin in January 2019, will be a series of virtual experiences. The topic area for this series will be decision analytics. The anticipated outcome for these sessions is to improve the participants’ ability to identify and use information to guide and influence decisions. The cohort will meet weekly for two two-hour sessions for four weeks.

The final workshop will bring the cohort back to the ASA in May 2019. This workshop will explore how to cultivate executive presence.

Looking ahead, we anticipate establishing an application process for future cohorts with the expectation that participation in “Preparing Statisticians for Leadership: How to See the Big Picture and Have More Influence” will be a prerequisite. If you would like to receive updates about the Leadership Institute, indicate your interest using the form.