North East Together 21: Leading in uncertainty: where are we now? (June 2021)
North East Together’s summer 2021 whole network event focused on us — North East Together members. We brought NET members together to share what’s going on for us, to come together and reconnect with each other from where we are now, to look forward to the future with hope, and think about our needs. It was the first event in our theme for 2021 of leading in uncertainty.
Our ‘why, how, what’ for June’s North East Together was
- Why…We are leading in uncertainty. We are starting to look to the future. The purpose of the event is to work out together what we need now — individually, as organisations and as a region — and how, as a network, we can support each other
- How…By working together, sharing and learning from our experience and drawing on our knowledge and understanding to generate new ideas
- What…We are all speakers and contributors this time! We’ll work in pairs, small groups and as a whole group responding to a sequence of questions to help us think well together. We’ll capture and share our findings so we can all think about how we can contribute.
We used our me (as a leader), we (as an organisation), us (as a sector or region) framing¹, and these questions to guide our conversation:
- How are you feeling now? What are you thinking now?
- What’s changed or is changing?
- What are your needs as you start to look to the future?
We think this gave enough structure to have a good conversation but also enough space for us all to focus on what’s important for us in the moment.
And turning to the how, we worked in pairs and small groups for networking and reflecting on these prompts. And we experimented with Zeetings to create a fully interactive session, to gather and share each members’ thoughts in real time. The event’s advance information pack tells you more about the event.
Me (as a leader) leading in uncertainty
In pairs, we answered the following questions together: How are you feeling? What are you thinking? What has changed or is changing? What are your needs as you start to look to the future? And shared back responses and insights.
In one word, what are you thinking or feeling?
In the context of you as a leader: Please share one insight from your discussions
The comments focused on how individuals were feeling in themselves (overwhelmed, disconnected, needing stability, struggling with face to face meetings) and what they were thinking about their work and others (collaborative, noticing resourcefulness, opportunities to do things differently), and included
• feeling overwhelmed can be positive or negative • not moving enough • feeling quite disconnected from people including you all in the network • resilience has been key • desire or need to be more collaborative • the importance of equality • people are more resourceful than one may usually expect • when everything is changing it can bean opportunity to do things differently • collaboration as a way forward • I am struggling with not being able to meet face to face without a mask • called to a higher standard with more amplification of social justice matters • time to challenge how to effectively WFH • more emphasis needed on business models • the need for order and stability
We (my organisation): leading in uncertainty
In small groups, we shifted our attention to our organisations and reflected on the following questions: How are things now? Thoughts/feelings?, What has changed or is changing? What challenges and opportunities are there? What are your organisation’s needs as you start to look to the future?
In the context of your organisation, what has changed or is changing?
The insights were a mix of positive (virtual working bringing new opportunities, more collaboration, increasing awareness of social value, starting to feel positive), negative (less collaboration, staff with new caring pressures), and neutral (?) noticing.
• Wider context in which we operate, structural and key leadership changes across our system • Not too much, other than finding staff now combine business with caring • The way we work and deliver services • Productivity of virtual working • Working virtually has opened up new opportunities around the world; face to face can limit progress • We have moved to fund people in public health and social care • Less collaborative mindsets, feels more closed, territorial, sadly :-( • More collaborative models of working • The expectation of working back in the real world means we cannot attend back to back meeting as we were • Way some services are being delivered • Increasing awareness of social value perspectives • Challenges of returning to work in office • Things are starting to look more positive after a year of going down • Passion play needed
In the context of your organisation: What are the challenges and opportunities?
Learning to be more critically reflective • Challenges: funding. Opportunities: to re-imagine how we support our beneficiaries • Lack of infrastructure • Widen our reach but virtual is holding us back • Opportunity to work differently and smarter • Handling the need for growth and generation of social enterprises • Opportunity to influence system change; challenge is short window of said opportunity! • Challenges: short term funding and re-commissioning; opportunities: a larger pool to work in virtual •Survival and funding! And time for all of this, exhausting! • Take learnings of last year to improve way things are done • Challenge: shifting competitive mindsets; opportunity: embrace complexity through collaboration • Establishing/proving myself in a new role and the only person in said role in the organisation • Meeting demand (challenge and opportunity)
Us (as a sector or region): leading in uncertainty
And finally we worked as a whole group to use our biggest lens — us — to focus on our sector and our region: What are we thinking and feeling? What has changed or is changing? What challenges and opportunities are there? What would help now? What does our region need?
Reflecting on our region as a whole….. In one word, what are we thinking or feeling?
Reflecting on our region as a whole, what has changed or is changing?
• Lockdown led to less connection with other organisations as we looked inwardly to deal with Covid • The political outlook is no longer guaranteed to look the same • Less forgiving, lots of negativity • Partnership working hindered • The whole structural environment is constantly changing • Shared need • Communities are either totally switched on or off • A lot of pressure on schools • Reduction in regional structures • Do more with less, competitive resources • Shift in support for political parties • Political landscape • It feels hard to answer as feel disconnected from others in this WFH/Zoom world • Lots of togetherness at the start, less so now? • Power and influence is always in play…
Reflecting on our region as a whole, what are the challenges and opportunities?
• Greater inequality • People focussed on communities, so need to make sure this means true public involvement • To rebuild whilst minimising duplication • How to nurture and develop new political structures • Challenge: any progress around reducing inequality has been rolled back • Govt housing homeless hinders them seeking to turn around their lives. Short term good, long not so good • Collaborate for impact on social inequality • We can link into All Party Parlimentary groups to influence policy change • Participatory work with communities, how can we do this better? How can we inform and educate peers? • Opportunity: to come together across organisational and sector boundaries, with a shared purpose • There is a real opportunity for more collaborative models of local delivery to meet needs • Challenge: fluctuations in politics; impact of gov spending more in Tory areas • Zoom really opens up opportunities for collaborative working and dialogue for grassroots organising and policy
Reflecting on our region as a whole, what would help now? What does our region need?
• Community wealth fund alliance to get access to the dormant billions • Pulling together, sharing projects and collaboration. Bringing MPs and councils onboard • Authentic & heartfelt convening of cross-sectoral sharing, discussions & action with shared purpose • For people to be pro-active and not wait for things to happen to them ie take control • Getting people outside more … appreciating the impact of this • Facilitation of support, partnerships, resources
Guided networking activity: Check in and check out
We used check in and check out as our paired guided networking activity this time.
Our check out and networking question was: What do you/your organisation need now as we look to the future?
• Genuine collaboration frameworks • Connect more and learn from one another • Connectivity with others • Shared best practice of looking after ourselves as humans • Thematic collaboration eg children and young people • To improve management reporting to the trustee board with relation to social enterprise • For me: A chance to rest and recover; for organisation: Openness from others to collaborate • Good internal communication some space and time to reflect on the future • ME: courage so I can lead well; WE: longer term work to allow us to make a meaningful impact • Build on the ‘good work’ of the past year and understand why and what made it good • Ability to post ideas for collaboration so we can hear what is going on that we can get involved in
And finally, how might we as a network support each other to lead well in uncertainty?
Our community is built on mutual support, and we wanted to give an opportunity for people to share what they thought we — together — might support each other in our leadership.
• Be genuine in our offers as often we don't give ourselves enough time for collaboration • Keep in touch, connect, support each other • A space for conversation, advice and support • Allow for “failures” and “mistakes” to be shared safely • Sharing experience and supporting each other • Reach out through the network to ask for support • Creating safe spaces for honest reflection and to be vulnerable as leaders leading in uncertainty • Collaboration Champions Network • Sharing our leadership practices • Continue to focus on convening, in different ways, different configurations, different times and places • Understanding what each organisation needs and what they can offer
Who came along
We were really pleased around 30 people were able to spend a couple of hours with their fellow NET members. We asked how many NET events have you been to…the two biggest groups were those who answered ‘16+ (I’ve been to so many I’ve lost count!) and 0 (This is my first one). We also asked what sector people worked in…the biggest group was VCSE (as usual) then education/university, private sector and public sector.
Our friends’ news and updates
The event pack includes news and updates from friends of the network Clore Social Leadership, Common Purpose UK, Community Foundation Tyne and Wear and Northumberland, Connected Voice, KEDA Consulting, MVDA, North Tyneside VODA, SSE Yorkshire and North East, VONNE, Youth Focus: North East.
Thank you
Thanks to all our members for showing up and being there for each other, and contributing to our collective understanding of how we’re doing in June 2021, our second summer in the pandemic. This is what it’s all about and we appreciate being part of this community in the north east. We’re also grateful to Dr Joanne James and Cissie Tsang from Newcastle University Business School for continuing to collaborate with us with North East Together. Thank you all.
2021 events: Leading in uncertainty
We have two more events coming up in 2021
- 20 October, our autumn whole network event (NET22)
- 17 November, a one day Leading Together event
We’ll confirm whether these events are online or in person nearer the time. Please save the date in your diaries and watch this space for more details!
About North East Together
We believe that bringing leaders together to tackle social injustice will create positive change — in our communities, organisations and the social systems we live and work within. Our network inspires social leaders, enabling collaboration and mutual support. We offer a series of dynamic network events; self-organised collaborative working groups; pathways into coaching; and independent social change events. The whole network events hear from inspirational speakers who provide new insights into social change. They are a supportive space where leaders can meet one another, explore issues of social change, network and begin to collaborate. It’s for leaders from the voluntary, charity, social enterprise, education, public and private sectors. It’s for experienced, new and future leaders of organisations, work, and ideas.
¹ We’re grateful to our friend George Thompson from Volunteer Scotland for inspiring us to use the me, we, us framing.
