The most effective form of Leadership Development?

Here’s a quick run-down on Emergent Learning:

• A Challenge or Opportunity emerges in the work itself
• Learning from that work is shared…
• … to be Tested and further Refined by others in the organisation…
• … which leads to more individuals approaching work challenges as potential learning experiences, which leads to more sharing, more refining… And so on.

Emergent Learning is the most natural way that we learn as humans…

Our brains are built for it. We thrive on social connections and have far better retention for learning once we put it into practise. It’s how you are learning every day whether you realise it or not.

Which means it’s mindboggling that modern Leadership Development has not caught onto that framework yet.

Why? I can only imagine because it seems almost too organic. It’s impossible for most organisations to picture how Emergent Learning can become a recurring, manageable practise. Seemingly, it requires giving up control over what knowledge will be taught.

But what is really being giving up is an assumption of control. These organisations have to give up the assumption that their Leadership Development already knows everything that their leaders need to know.

It’s an archaic mindset. We’ve all been students, so we all assume that the best way to learn is from one ‘teacher’, who must surely know everything important that their students will ever need to know.

We NEVER assume that we know everything

We don’t assume what knowledge is out there in the organisation. In our Emergent Leadership Development communities, our role is not the ‘teacher’. EVERYONE is a teacher and a student at all times.

Successful Leadership Development looks more like a Curator. The one who facilitates this emergent learning, opens the floor, spots potential wisdom and brings it to the foreground.

Here’s a 1-minute video of me talking on this subject (excuse the dorky face I’m pulling). We have 10 years experience curating award-winning online Leadership Development communities built around Emergence and the Wisdom of Crowds.

Tags: collaborate, collaborative leadership, community, community of practice, emergence, emergent leadership development, emergent learning, leadership development, social learning

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