Leadership by Rosie Moore
For many years I thought leadership was about authority – that those in positions of seniority or ‘power’ were automatically the leaders. And sometimes they are, and sometimes they are not. I thought leadership was more to do with your job title, than your personality and mind set.
Leadership has many definitions, can take many shapes and forms. For me, leadership is about doing what is right, and not what is easy. It’s leading with a moral imagination and cultivating the humility (and audacity!) to take action to do things the way they should be done.
Using this broad definition of leadership, I have been a leader in one way or another for over 15 years now. Starting out in a ‘Children in Care Council’, (England’s’ early 2000s equivalent of a Champions Board), to president of the Social Work society at university, the advisory group of Life Changes Trust, a co-chair of the Independent Care Review, and most recently in my policy and participation role at CELCIS. In some of these roles I recognised I was in a position of leadership and in others I didn’t.
Now, as a professional adult I can look back and realise that this was because we didn’t consistently recognise and encourage young leaders, invest in them, support them, and help them develop both personally and professionally. Too often, we still fall back on the traditional definitions of leadership I spoke about at the start and conflate leadership will being solely about authority and seniority.
There are many great examples across Scotland of where care experienced leaders are given the voice, platform and influence that is needed to drive much-needed change. And other examples where there is still work to be done. Here at CELCIS, we are on a continual learning journey to ensure that our offer to up-and-coming leaders – and anyone with lived experience – is as authentic, genuine, and meaningful as can be. Like others, we have learned much already and are striving to continually improve, based on feedback and evaluation from those who work with us in a participatory way.
At CELCIS, one of the ways in which we try to support and help create new leaders, is through our sessional consultancy model. We have several full-time members of staff who are CELCIS consultants, but we also have a growing pool of sessional consultants with wide ranging lived and professional experiences who support us with our work. We always try to ensure that our working relationships with sessional consultants are reciprocal; they invest their time and energy into supporting our work, and CELCIS invests our time into supporting them in return. This is often through the work being paid, but equally importantly through providing opportunities for personal and professional development. Skills building, training, networking, shadowing, and leading on pieces of work are just some of the ways in which we try to continually upskill the young leaders and professionals we work with.
One of our biggest values is being asset-based and valuing the whole person. Part of the criteria for joining our consultant’s group is lived experience of the issues we may be working on, but we know that no-one’s experience is limited to any one life experience. People with care experience have shared with us how they do not want to be defined by any one experience – be that care or any other. They have shared that, at times, this has felt limiting, and they have been involved only in the articulation of issues, rather than the design of solutions. We all bring a range of life experiences, skills and passions that inform our thinking and make us who we are. Using an asset-based approach, we are interested in our whole life experience. The opportunities we offer draw on all the experiences, skills, and talents each individual brings. Lived experiences are valued, but it is on their terms how they wish to share them. We would never ask anybody to share their story unless they wanted to.
Leadership in this sector should never be about any one experience alone; it should be the cumulative sum of all of our life experiences and skills together. Care experience is merely one part of us, just one of the ways in which we can influence change. When I think of our consultants, the leaders who CELCIS are privileged to work with, I don’t just see a group of people with lived experience. I see a trainee solicitor, student paramedic, a foster carer, civil servant, parents, volunteer mentors, PHD student, a director of a charity, and many, many more incredible roles, talents, and skills. This is what makes leadership. Diversity, inclusion, respect, and a common goal. Our next generation of leaders are going to be nothing short of fantastic.
9 November 2022
