Interim Program Manager Inthascope
Gea Schonewille
As a director in vocational education, I have led various large teams. I still do that, but now as an interim program manager in healthcare and education. What I encountered as a leader is that my intentions were not always well understood. Or I did not always communicate them effectively. I thought carefully about decisions. I had already weighed the pros and cons myself. For me, there was already peace of mind when I shared the decision. But the team became restless. That surprised me. I had thought it through carefully and made a thorough assessment, hadn’t I? false pretense of giving space
Working in two-way traffic
What I do much more now is that I initiate and facilitate the conversation. I consciously sit down for it and am open to my team about what I want to achieve. This makes me very clear about my agenda. Then I take two steps ‘back’ and look at what is happening from a distance. This distance allows me to better follow the process and the content. I also incorporate the opinions of others more into the final decisions.
By involving the team earlier, the decision is sometimes different from what I would have made myself.
I now also do this when I need to decide for myself. Then I go through all the possible opinions much more and incorporate them into my consideration. So I have also become better at making decisions myself. And I continue to grow in this. I also now incorporate the emotions that exist in the group without being startled by them. The check-in helps well with this. I have started looking more richly, as it were. My challenge remains to continue involving everyone even under time pressure or in hectic situations.
Transparency makes you more trustworthy
When I have already made a decision, I am now much more transparent about it. In those cases, I do not give the team unnecessary space by asking for opinions, but I do ask ‘what do you need to go along with this?’. I now make fewer of those false pretenses and take more responsibility for the choices made. This has made me even more trustworthy to my team. And the input I receive on the question of what they need is a rich addition.
I now also more easily question others about the space that does or does not exist. For example, by literally asking my client what space there still is or what influence I or my team still have. This has so far led to more effective and better conversations.
I was already doing things differently the day after the training.
You don’t learn that by just reading a book.
CoResolve was truly a deepening and enrichment for me. My view is that as a leader you must continuously develop yourself. For me, leadership consists of many aspects, of which decision-making and how you get people involved in this is a very important one. Additionally, I like practical and pragmatic approaches, and that appealed to me in this program. Practicing in the setting of a meeting as it happens in practice worked very well. And that proved to be the case. I was already doing things differently the day after the training. You don’t learn this by just reading a book.
