7 Thoughts on Leadership

You may remember a few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post about attending the Aspire Trailiblazing Leadership conference. You don't remember? Don't worry: it's here. If it isn't evident from that post, I went to the conference with very clear professional goals that I wanted to explore. But I couldn't do justice to everything I learned. So, instead, here are 7 things I learned from the conference.

1) Everyone is Terrified of Failure

For me, one of the most powerful exercises was early on in the first day. We were paired off, and asked to share with a partner our biggest fear, and accept it.

All the women I spoke to about this exericse said fear of feeling like a failure was at the heart of their fears. What varied is what will trigger that feeling of failure. For me, it would be failing this PhD. For another, her charity not getting funding. For another woman, it was failing to get a promotion. For another woman, it was not keeping a roof over her kids' heads.

But all these fears are necessary if you want to finish a PhD, run a charity, be promoted, house your children. Leaders are the people who welcome the fear, brave the possible bad outcomes. They risk feeling like a failure. But they also risk doing great things.

2) Leaders Start From the Inside Out

One thing that concerned me with this conference was the fear that, really, I'm not a leader. I don't line manage anyone at work (and never have). I'm only four months into a PhD - I haven't organised anything, and don't really know my way around the system.

What was stressed throughout the two days was that leadership is a ripple effect. You lead yourself, then your immediate circle. Maybe then you lead your organisation. Maybe then you lead the world. But those outer circles require self-leadership. Or - as I like to think of it - getting sh*t done. Leaders find something they care about and they motivate themselves to do something about it.

And sometimes, these actions get them titles, or accolades. But often, their actions change things, including the people around them. And so, at the ripe old age of 26, I feel comforted that getting sh*t done is a good start.

3) One Goal Doesn't Negate Another.

As I mentioned above, my aim was to go in, figure out all my professional aims and find people who could help me with them. And then, things about family started coming up. In every exercise I did, my relationship with my family kept coming up. I hadn't even been thinking about it when I went in.  A voice in my head told me to focus on what I was there for. I ignored it, and I've been putting some of what I learned into practice. And it's already improving my overall happiness and - by extension - my desire to work on my thesis.

For you, it might not be family. But I firmly believe that everyone is more than just the sum of their wordcount, their paygrade, or their title. And that working on one area doesn't detract from your desire to work on another: in fact, it's neccesary.

4) If Something Seems Like Second Nature to You, it's Probably Because You're Pretty Good at it.

On Day 2, we split up into groups of 10 and instructed to ask for exactly what we needed to achieve our goals. Again, I thought What can I offer? No one is going to need help interpreting romances, or identifying episodes of the Simpsons by opening scene. Either side of me, women were saying the same. What do I know? But as people shared what they needed, we each realised we did have skill or knowledge to contribute: we just didn't value them because we were already good at them.

I offered my email address, and am already helping people out. And those same women who said they had nothing to offer, they're helping me, too.

5) Surrounding Yourself With the Right People is Vital.

Every person I spoke to was open, interested and engaged. Yes, plenty of us were nervous, but this was the first conference I've ever been to where I felt that people were interested in me. And I can't separate the work I've done (and will do) as a result of this conference from that atmosphere.

As PhD students, we can often be cynics. And I understand why: a PhD is grueling, requires a lot of sacrifice, and the outcomes are becoming less and less certain (oh what, you want a tenured position? ha!) The mental health issues and financial insecurities don't help, and are often not discussed at all.

But, the way we interact is so often based on low-level scepticism about the administration's latest blunder, or the replacement of chairs in the common room. We don't even talk about the big things. And I can't be alone in finding this constant, low-level skepticism tiring, can I? And I can't be alone in finding that my best ideas and aspirations don't come when I'm complaining about the department's foibles, can I?

6) There is another way for conferences.

Here's what the Aspire conference lacked:

• Name tags
• Rows of seats (think circles of 10)
• Formal sessions (more circles)
• A formal conference dinner
• Powerpoint (mostly)
• Jargon (entirely!)

These very simple, very deliberate steps meant people spoke to each other honestly and openly. The sessions were interactive. They invited discussion (and not the kind with destructive, self-focused questions). And, with minimal powerpoint, we focused on the speaker. No formal roundtables. No confrontational questions. No awkward people who came alone and are shut out of cliques.

I know that a professional development conference is aimed at a difference audience. And I know that the ExCel centre is very different from your Postgraduate centre. But all I can think about now is, what would an academic conference look like if we deliberately planned it to be more open?

7) You don't need always second helpings.

No-one needs two fudgy chocolate brownies. You will just feel sick.

Trailblazing Women 2015

(Isn't it just the way? Not long after I resolve to start posting on a weekly basis, things get busy and I get behind. It’s not strictly PhD-related, but I wanted to use this post to talk about a conference I’m attending soon. I should be back to PhD-relating things soon.)

The Aspire Foundation aims to create a world ‘where women and girls are empowered and authentic leaders in both the developing and developed world for the sake of equality, justice, balance and success.’ They’ve worked with over 1 million women since they were founded by Sam Collins in 2001: as part of their aim to reach even more women, they’re running a two-day Trailblazing Leadership event. Which I am absolutely honoured to have managed to secure a scholarship for.

At this point I should give a shout out to Karen, my former colleague (hi!). Without her insistent encouragement, I would never have heard of Aspire. Last year, she suggested I attend an Aspire webinar. I was starting to get cold feet about the prospect of quitting my job, moving across the country, taking on 6 years of self-funded study and then having no guarantee of security afterwards. (Can you blame me?) I think the webinar was ‘Strategic You 2015.’ The aim was to discuss what goals you had in mind for the year ahead, how to implement them and how to balance them. That webinar really helped me: by the time that hour was up, I felt this quiet, diamond-hard certainty that I was ready to take this chance.

Between then and now, I’ve learned a little more about academia. And I wasn’t comfortable with everything I learnt. Some of that diamond-hard certainty was being undercut by the feeling I’m getting (at this early stage) that academia isn’t for people like me. 

So, when I got an email about the ‘Trailblazing Leadership’ event in March, I naturally thought “that sounds great, but it isn’t for me.” I don’t think of myself as a leader. And I certainly didn’t have enough money to fund my attendance. But the more I read about the conference, the more it seemed to me that people like me are exactly the sort of people who don’t have a voice in academia. And when I heard that Aspire were offering scholarships, I felt that same diamond-hard certainty that I should at least apply.  So I sent an email. I was invited to apply. And I did.

I applied because I’ve had female mentors for most of my academic career. These people took an interest in me. They challenged me. They held me to account. My personal and intellectual development has been thanks to them. The only problem is that there seem to be fewer and fewer women available to lead, or to mentor. I’m very lucky that I like and respect my supervisors immensely, but academia doesn’t encourage a culture of mentoring outside of that supervisory relationships. If I look to my peers (fellow PhD students) we’re all competing for finite resources: funding, conference papers, jobs. And I don’t think that this intense culture of peer competition and lack of mentoring makes for happier graduate students, better researchers, or improved academics. In fact, I feel the opposite is true.

I applied because the whole thing about this PhD thing is that I’d quite like to be an academic. (I know, I know. It’s unlikely. But I could post a whole other post about my issues with that. So humour me for now.) So, I’d like to be an academic. Which means I’m effectively training for a career that favours people who aren’t like me.  Peer reviewers will assume my work is biased because I'm a woman. So, this means that when I am trying to publish and get a permanent job I'm less likely to get a permanent, full-time contract than a male. And if I do have children, I’ll be seen as less productive than my male colleagues: in fact, they’ll gain a net benefit from having kids.

 

I applied because this is all depressing and awful. But it isn’t just a broad political point. For me, it’s also intensely personal: my husband is an academic. And he’s a brilliant academic. (Again, I could write an entire post singing his praises but I’ll save that.) He’s an innovative, supportive, dedicated teacher. He’s a flexible, incisive researcher. He’s an engaging, personable presenter. All of these things mean that – as far as I’m concerned – he should have all the accolades in the world. But he should get them because of his qualities, not because of his gender. But as things stand, no matter how much we support each other, he is likely to do better because of something he can’t control.

And that’s not fair. So I applied. 
And I was accepted.

And now I’m nervous! At first, it was about what to wear (business casual? Conference wear? What are either of those things? I can’t afford to buy new clothes!! Will people know if I wear second hand stuff? What do I do??)  Luckily, Aspire have clarified that there’s no formal dress code, smart casual is fine. 

 So now I have to be nervous about the usual things. Like the fact that I’m awful at remembering names, and there are no name tags. Like the fact that when I get nervous I talk a lot. And a lot of it’s nonsense. But I’m also nervous about something specific to this conference: all these women are contributing amazing things to the world. And me? I’m contributing a potential thesis that I don’t have a research question for. What can I contribute?

I hope to find out that answer to that question at this conference. And I’d love to let you know how it goes, if you’re interested.

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