Happy Holidays!

Hello friends. This will be our final Blueprint of 2020, and like many of you, we are ready to kiss this year goodbye! We’ve learned a lot, but most of all we’ve been humbled and inspired by the leadership, resilience, and commitment of the extraordinary people we have the privilege to work with — and you, dear readers! Our entire team wishes you joy, peace, and rest during this holiday period. We hope you’ll find ways to connect with loved ones and restore your energies for whatever is next.

Embracing 2021

At GLP, we’ve always looked ahead to anticipate what learners of all ages need. We named and explored the “VUCA” environment long before schools were engaging with the acronym or related possibilities. Now we are living in it. In that spirit, we offer some inspiration and future-focused resources to guide our conversations in 2021.

Strategy Schools are beginning to lift their heads out of the sand to look to the future and a post-pandemic world. In that spirit, we want to return to our ongoing conversation with organizations about what strategy is (and is not). As this HBR article reminds us, and as we describe with our “Strategy on One Page” approach, clear choices about where and how you want your organization to play are what set you up for success. The other essential element is engaged and involved people who put their talents to work, driving bottom-up execution, design and experimentation. Our work at Drexel University’s College of Engineering is a great example of how this happens, as showcased in their new strategic plan. We partnered with Drexel to listen to stakeholders, design processes, and build strategy, and they harnessed their talented faculty and staff to design initiatives and drive execution. We’re inspired by their vision for the future — and we hope that it inspires you too!

Trends to Watch On a related note, mission based organizations and schools need to stay on top of how social, political, and economic forces may impact their organizations and the lives of their clients and students. We especially like this overview from the Economist outlining ten key trends to watch in 2021. For educators, your students are entering a rapidly changing world, so you want to check out this report from the World Economic Forum on the future of jobs and this piece from Fast Company on the most in-demand skill on job listings right now.

The Evolution of Governance We are passionate about helping nonprofit boards assess their processes and structure in order to help them achieve their goals and stay true to their missions — and in 2020, we worked with several nonprofit, K-12, and college boards to reimagine their work. McKinsey recently published an article about how university boards should transform themselves in order to better meet the challenges of the current operating environment, and we are excited to see that McKinsey lines up with us in their take on what needs to happen. They outline three key steps for boards to take: “improve cooperation between the board and the administration, redefine board structure, and set clear board processes and norms.” Their guidance echoes some of the key points that we made in our 2018 white paper on how boards might evolve to drive higher-value governance work.

Leadership As Problem Solving Readers who know us know that we love to ask “WHY” — or as Stephanie says,“We like to ask the dumb questions.” One reason is to test fundamental assumptions about how your organization operates, as a way to surface new opportunities or limiting (but changeable) factors. Another reason is to ask why is to ensure that you have what you need to problem solve effectively. We love this article from HBR, which offers a simple and straightforward, four part approach — one that gets at root causes, insists on useful and well contextualized data, and opens you up to better, more innovative solutions. We especially like the fishbone framework, which is an easy way to visualize “what’s really going on here." Try this approach next time you’ve got a thorny problem!

GLP Tidings! Presentations, Conversations, and Coaching News 2020 offered GLP many opportunities to talk with leaders and share our expertise in wider formats. After a spring 2020 surge of webinars and presentations in response to Covid, the fall brought new conversations - signaling progress and adaptation that comes from crisis! A few examples of where we enjoyed facilitating or presenting this fall include:  Independent Schools Chairpersons Association (ISCA) where we talked with board chairs about how they can lead their boards forward, support their leaders, and reimagine structures and practices for greater impact.   Wintrust where we spoke with a wide range of not for profit board members and leaders interested in strengthening their partnerships and leveraging the opportunities revealed in the Covid crisis.  The Cru where we are leading workshops in coaching skills to help Cru members support each other in achieving their intentions and pursuing their goals. The Cru is a not to be missed opportunity for women! Tiffany Dufu, a dear friend and longtime collaborator, is the visionary leader at the helm of this extraordinary organization advancing women by creating a vibrant ecosystem of relationships, with peer to peer learning, expert wisdom and inspiration.

Katie Knowlton Earns Her Coaching Certificate! We’re proud to share that Katie has successfully completed the Columbia Coaching Certification Program Front End Coaching Intensive. The Columbia Coaching Program prepares executive coaches for effective and high-impact work with leaders and organizations. As a GLP team member and a trained Immunity to Change Facilitator, Katie was already a great coach — but now she’s truly a powerhouse! Next up in her professional learning: certification in the use of the Neethling Brain Instruments suite of assessments (Stephanie is certified in these tools too). If you have aspiring leaders who are interested in developing their capacities, we invite you to talk to us about leadership coaching. We’d love to partner with you as you pursue your ambitions and grow your talent!

Tidings of Joy From Middle Earth And to leave you with some merriment, we offer a creative reprieve. If you are a Lord of the Rings fan, we think you’ll love this!