Leadership Saskatoon, a not-for-profit organization, develops collaborative leaders able to engage others in working together to build an inclusive community.
Leadership Saskatoon has been established on the belief that successful communities require leaders who are flexible, able to engage fellow citizens, and ready to work collaboratively to build an inclusive community.
To achieve this, participants from all sectors of the community, are provided the opportunity to explore the relationship of their own values to the mission of community leadership; what do they stand for (want to be known for) and what are they going to do about it. Values such as engagement, collaboration and inclusion are commitments as much as they are actions.
Boundaries of community are stretched beyond long familiar limits. The complexity of issues and implications for decisions are challenging us to develop new models of leadership and community. The urgency for social participation and effective leadership has never been greater.
Central to Leadership Saskatoon’s strategy for and contribution to community leadership is a ten-month program supporting individuals in their leadership development journey as they embrace the challenge and opportunity of a community leadership role.
The ten-month program involves eleven days from September to June. These consist of interactive seminars, workshops and panels as well as action learning. The syllabus reflects a balanced, realistic inquiry and dialogue based approach. Unique to Leadership Saskatoon is the mentorship component - integral to the leadership development process.
In a mutually supportive context, participants are challenged to think critically, to be self-directing, and to initiate strategies that ground their learning in the realities facing community leaders. Participants develop an understanding of how to frame issues and choices in terms of values foundational to sustaining communities. They are afforded opportunities for individual and group learning. Facilitators, coaches and mentors provide support, encouragement, and interaction in community networks.
The program model combines a number of elements to produce a truly cutting edge learning experience. The Program consists of:
An Opening and Mid-term retreat plus Final Reflection Day
Learning Sessions called Challenge Days are pre-scheduled, approximately six hours long and focus on:
Action Learning Groups
Self organized groups concurrently study leadership through a lens that helps them understand their personal values in relationship to issues relevant to the community
Trainer-Facilitators
A team of professional trainer-facilitators who are committed to leadership development guide participants with group processes that facilitate their leadership journey.
Mentors
Participants are matched with individuals who have a history of strong community leadership to serve as a coach, mentor and guide throughout the second half of the program and beyond.
"For me, leadership is not only personified in the obvious like Martin Luther King or Mahatma Gandhi or Nellie McClung. Leadership can also be the volunteer who always stays back to wash the dishes, and the grandmother who sits on the porch and keeps an eye on the children as they walk home from school. Leadership is not necessarily in the ones getting the awards and the accolades but rather in the ones cleaning up the conference room after the show is over and the ones driving the award-winners home. Leadership is not only in loud, confident speeches and words but also in the broken English of a new Canadian asking for directions to her bus stop. Leadership is not always about leading a group but sometimes it is about holding the door open to let the group through.
Leadership Saskatoon has made me think about leadership in many different ways through many different lenses. The one year program was only the beginning of what I’m sure will be a lifelong process of re-evaluating and re-defining the concept of leadership."
April Sora,
Service Canada
Class of 2007