Collaborative leadership for complex contexts – hierarchies, networks and a butterfly

A leader’s key role is to develop a positive and sustainable organisational culture. Over the past few decades, the leadership paradigm has expanded, shifting from traditional hierarchical approaches to more networked, collaborative models. In these modern approaches, leaders play a crucial role in empowering colleagues to collaborate and utilise their collective strengths to enhance student learning.

While these collaborative models can promote empowerment, inclusion, belonging, and engagement, they also carry the potential for inefficiency, lack of clarity, misalignment, and even conflict.

In this workshop, we’ll explore the benefits and challenges of both hierarchical and collaborative leadership approaches. We’ll focus on the judgment skills leaders need to effectively navigate the tension between these two polarities, enabling them to lead effectively in various situations.

We will investigate how leaders can visualise the positive team cultures they want to create. Introducing four practical leadership tools that leaders can apply to foster an environment where every team member can thrive and contribute their strengths to the team’s success.