The Tällberg New Leader Program gives people in early positions of responsibility an opportunity to think through their wider role in society.
This will be the fourth year that about 40 younger leaders from all over the world come together three days before the official start of the Tällberg Forum. Through powerful and engaging facilitation, presentations by invited experts and experienced practitioners, the program focuses on understanding the complexity of global systems
New Leader Programme, Tällberg Forum 2009
Actors of the Future: facing a web of inter-related global crises
The Tällberg Forum aims to help individuals reconsider their wider role in a globally integrated society. This society – we now also know - is on a direct collision course with nature. During 2008 it became clear that global financial and governance structures are not in place to guarantee stability for coming generations. The challenges of the day call for a radical transition in the way we organise ourselves. This poses new strategic demands to organisations in the private, public and civic spaces, and asks new questions of those leading them, at both a personal and professional level.
In this increasingly alarming and interwoven landscape of challenges, understanding the interplay between institutions is becoming as important as understanding the dynamics within them. Learning to read the complex natural, social and political dynamics of the transition become crucial skills. And in times of greater complexity, having a clear and evolving vision, and the courage to act on early intuitions grows in importance. This in turn requires personal strength and emotional maturity.
The Tällberg New Leader Programme gives people in early positions of responsibility an opportunity to think through their wider role in society. It seeks to improve the sensitivities and skills that will make them more effective leaders in their organisation and in society. Successful leadership stems from seeing the early trends, understanding the path forward and having the courage to act.
The Challenge
The ways in which we currently provide wealth, jobs and security are undermining the planet’s life supporting systems. Our global production is on such a scale that its cumulative impact is altering critical natural cycles with unknown consequences. Yet despite this scale of activity, and the size of the global economy, we fail to protect ourselves from financial and economic crisis. Even in times of stability, we do not yet deliver adequate standards of living, health and security to a large part of the global population. We need a new path.
The complexity of our globally integrated society, however, means that the room for manoeuvre for each organisation or individual may seem severely restricted. We are tied by limitations of our own design; voters’ priorities, shareholder demands, or the funding structures of civil society. Short term stakeholder interests thus make sure we do not stray too far off course. Over the past decades we have also perfected techniques for enhancing efficiency within organisations. In providing ever stronger incentives to satisfy these short-term interests, the screws around us are further tightened.
We now need widespread leadership – with the personal characteristics, the right models and tools - that can help us break out of the straightjacket. The crises of the time do not demand a return to structures of the past, but the creation of better structures. This crucially requires a new mind set, where strategies are formed in the context of a systems perspective of the world. But “systems thinking” is only half the answer. We need to move into “systems doing”. This requires a much greater sensitivity to the dynamics between sectors and organisations, and to the complex interplay between natural, social, political and economic forces. And it requires the ability to act proactively in this complex landscape. As an integral part of the Tällberg Forum, the Tällberg New Leaders Programme seeks to help emerging leaders build these skills.
Objectives of the Program
The purpose of the Tällberg Foundation New Leader Programme 2009 is to heighten the awareness of the challenges facing coming generations of leaders and to help individuals formulate their long-term role and identify where they can act to stimulate the necessary transition to globally sustainable communities, organisations and society.
A programme that is both intensive and reflective will address managing cross-sector complexity, practical use of systems thinking, recognising system tensions and breaking with existing paradigms. The programme will be structured to bring high level inputs in critical areas and combine this learning with exercises that focus on personal development and goal setting, while encouraging innovation and systems thinking.
Set up and Process
During the three days before Tällberg Forum 2009, young leaders between 30 - 40 years of age will be guided on a personal journey to grasp the implications of global thinking and global leadership. This journey will also prepare them for the Tällberg 2009 conversation.
The faculty will consist of a Programme Leader (Tom Cummings, Executive Learning Partnership) and a Moderator (Rebecca Oliver, Tällberg Foundation). Marcello Palazzi and Christine Loh from the Tällberg Foundation Board will be available for coaching, together with author and philosopher Charles Handy. North American Indian elder, Chief Oren Lyons* of the Onondaga Nation, will lead an early morning reflection out in the beautiful Swedish nature that characterises the Tällberg experience.
The ethos of the 28 year old Tällberg Foundation is to create uncommon encounters to enrich insights and perspectives. Thus the New Leader Programme will give participants the opportunity to meet global thought leaders attending the Tällberg Forum, such as, among others, Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Prime Minister of Norway and Secretary General of the World Health Organisation, Poonam Alhuwalia, Director of Youth Employment Summit, India; Anders Wijkman, Member of the European Parliament, Sweden and Johan Rockström, Executive Director, Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI). These and other visitors to the Tällberg Forum will be available either during the New Leader Programme or the Forum itself to engage with participants to encourage system thinking, breadth of vision and mutual learning.
The Mentoring Programme:
At the New Leader Programme, mentoring is informal - an accord between two people at the Tällberg Forum to share experiences and expertise to help with personal and professional growth. Each New Leader Programme participant will be paired with a senior member of the Tällberg Network, and while the Forum is a busy time, and it is difficult to find a tranquil moment for traditional mentoring, we try our best to ensure the following minimum:
- A connection by email 2 weeks before the start of the Programme for a first introduction to plan their first meeting and exchange details
- A physical meeting: lunch or breakfast together during the Forum
- An attendance together with their mentor to at least one workshop session together – as a learning experience and to provide material for a common interest discussion
- A telephone, Skype or physical meeting at least once after the Forum to monitor and evaluate the outcomes of the forum.
The Still Life Exercise
In the seventeenth century in Holland it was the custom for successful people to commission what came to be called a vanitas Still Life painting. These paintings depicted a collection of objects symbolizing the individual’s status in life. They were called ‘vanitas’ because the early ones often included a skull, or a candle or some rotten fruit as a reminder of the brevity of life and the ‘vanity’ of earthly possessions. The results were both aesthetically beautiful and meaningful.
Elizabeth and Charles Handy, the producers of this programme have built on this tradition by devising a modern Still Life. In their version they ask people to choose objects that reflect, not their status, but what or who is important to them in their life, including their hopes, dreams and values. These Still Lives will be professionally photographed rather than painted and will be used as a basis of discussion within the group.
The purpose of the exercise is to encourage New Leader Programme participants to deepen their understanding of who they are, where they are coming from, what they stand for, where they are going in life and their purpose for their work– their personal identity and their professional purpose or intent, two crucial ingredients of leadership. To be able to communicate this to their peers, Images, often say more than words because they are the triggers to a significant experience or to a yet unrealized dream.
Programme
Monday, 22 June 2009
17.00 Opening Session
Welcome to Tällberg
Marcello Palazzi, Tällberg Foundation Board
Rebecca Oliver, Tällberg Foundation
17.30 Ice-breaker Workshop
Provocation…Navigating a web of global crises
Carl Mossfeldt, Tällberg Foundation
Ice Breaker…Who are we? What is our action potential?
Tom Cummings Executive Learning Partnership (ELP)
19.30 Dinner for four: Our World View
After dinner: Guide to the Still life exercise
Charles Handy, Author & Elizabeth Handy, Photographer
Tuesday, 23 June 2009
8.30 Part 1: Reconsidering our structures & approaches
Tom Cummings (ELP)
10.45 How I make sense of the system
Christine Loh, CEO, Civic Exchange, Hong Kong, China
11.30 Part 2: Creating the futures we want
Moderators: Tom Cummings & Rebecca Oliver
14.00 Voices from the field, ring of reality
Anders Wijkman, Member of the European Parliament, Sweden
Poonam Ahluwalia, Youth Entrepreneurship and Sustainability
15.00 Group work and nature programme
19.30 Dinner & group preparation
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
8.00 Listening to our Elders
With Chief Oren Lyons, Onondaga Nation
Breakfast Picnic (hilltop site overlooking lake)
9.30 Guide to Powerful Conversations
Users guide to Mentorship and on making the most of the Tällberg Forum. With Charles Handy, Author
10.45 A morning with Gro Harlem Brundtland
13.00 Lunch & Preparations
Afternoon The Theatre of the Future
Groups present their vision in theatre
18.00 Dinner
With an after-dinner interview with Bo Ekman
Evening concert with Forum participants
Thursday, 25 June 2009
8.30 Breakfast at Hotel Klockagården
Conversation: With Jan Eliasson, Former Foreign Minister of Sweden
Introduction to the planetary boundary thinking
Johan Rockström, Stockholm Environment Institute, Sweden
10.00 “Your still life”: An exercise in self perception
Charles Handy and photographer Elizabeth Handy
16.00 TÄLLBERG FORUM STARTS