Posts by Paul Costello1
The Social Styles Profile has four quadrants that test whether you lean towards a personal style of Asking or Telling, and spread across sectors named Amiable, Driven, Analytical, and Expres
sive. But there is more. Another critical self learning tool focuses on VERSATILITY – the ability to meet what Harvard Professor Ron Heifetz calls Adaptive Challenges. Versatility, they say, is the best predictor of success and the key to interpersonal effectiveness.
The Team this Friday will fill in some forms that will reveal how they score on the Versatility Scale. When you work with someone, you have your own style, your own preferred way of working. If you are going to be successful, your team have to change and adapt to how you get things done. But that is only half the story. You have to adapt and change to how they perceive you. It is like a dance, and the moves that go with different kinds of music. If all you can do is waltz when the music suggests a tango, then you are literally out of step.
The Project Change team have already come up with work challenges and they are learning to adapt, learning to adjust their expectations and renegotiate some of their roles. We are looking forward to sharing some of those experiences as our expert John Dold takes us through the workshop this Friday.
This Friday, Project Change hosts the Supervisors of our 7 Partner Sites to come and share their experiences and learn more about AmeriCorps and the importance of the role that they play. Since many of them are graduates of Project Change itself, the meeting is also a sort of Alumni gathering too. We will share best practices and explore ways that the Supervisor Team can be the team that stands behind the Team.
got off to a great start, with four Friday meetings during the month of September to get everyone into the AmeriCorps groove. The highlight was our trip to Camp Letts, on a beautiful day where the team braved the dreaded zip wire in the morning and lazily canoed the river in the afternoon, and concluded with a camp fire and stories. Thanks to our guides Meredith and Richelle and a big shout out to the Supervisors and staff from our partner sites who joined us in a fun day.
aster Coach Lynne Feingold introducing the formal practice of Peer to Peer Group Coaching. The team have already started this activitity with the Bells and Whistles check-in time that starts every meeting. If a member has a challenge and they want more feedback, they request time from the group to have a conversation. During that time, the group acts as a coaching team, and asks questions to unfold the situation, then deeper questions to expose the assumptions behind the dilemma, and then to help the person come up with a positive plan of action that they are willing to hold themselves accountable for at the next meeting.
l practice that grew out of last years team, and something that members enjoyed and learned to practice as a life skill that could be applied to other areas of their work.