Co-Creative Leadership with Steffan Surdek
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I was working with a team, a number of years ago, that was in the process of intentionally changing their culture. They had noticed, following a recent merger, that they were starting to see behaviours and issues they didn’t find acceptable seeping into the day-to-day operations of the business.
Things that may have previously been exceptions to be addressed and dealt with on an individual level – so they didn’t spread or become accepted as part of how things worked – were now popping up all over the place.
A big piece of what we were working on would become the foundation of their culture, as well as their “rules of engagement”. As part of both things, we had extensive conversations about what was and wasn’t acceptable, how to address challenges as they arose (since they inevitably would, and did, arise), how to deal with the “living document” nature of everything that was created, and what that meant in terms of the people in the organization participating in the creation of and commitment to the culture as a whole.
A lot of the work that we did was founded on the principle of continuous iteration. I believe the best approach to most things is one that is focused on learning and growing, not on being right or wrong, passing or failing. We built-in cycles of information gathering followed by re-assessing what we had created so that they could change, tweak, and improve upon the work that was done.
In case any of this is sounding sort of familiar as a concept, it’s basically the same as the scientific method many of us learned in school (and some of us thought was snoringly boring because we were too cool for “rules”... oh the lessons we learn in life 😆).
It’s also part and parcel of co-creation in general, a concept my guest Steffan Surdek and I get into on this week’s episode of the podcast.
Steffan is an expert in co-creative leadership, a topic we break down in some detail, including his summary of the 5 Key Skills of Co-Creative Leadership (hint: these are about more than just you, ultimately).
You’ll also ponder (and, perhaps even answer) the question, “How much easier would my life be if people around me took more ownership?” And, come away knowing how to make tiny tweaks for BIG impact.
After all, the end goal of co-creative leadership is to create a workplace where people can be more engaged and take more ownership – and that’s a win for everyone!
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Steffan Surdek has always been driven to expand the notion of leadership to include each member of the team. He is a much-in-demand Leadership Development Coach and Corporate Trainer based in Montreal.
Steffan is often asked to speak at global conferences about the power of co-creative leadership and leveraging the power of teams. His passionate and dynamic storytelling style engages audiences and makes the learning stick.
Steffan is the co-author of “A Practical Guide to Distributed Scrum,” as well as “Experts and Influencers: Leadership Edition”. His upcoming book called, “The Way of the Co-Creative Leader” will be available in the summer of 2023.
Steffan has published content on many major websites such as forbes.com, cutter.com, and wellness.com, among others, as well as on his leadership blog at surdek.com.
You can learn more about his work and connect with him there (at surdek.com), on LinkedIn, and/or Twitter.