New Report: How to Develop and Support Leadership that Contributes to Racial Justice
by Kathy Grear 09/09/2010
Leadership for a New Era, or LNE, is a collaborative research initiative launched by the Leadership Learning Community that focuses on understanding how leadership can become more inclusive, networked and collective.
We have a rich history in community leadership development and we know the criticality of addressing structural racism and promoting racial healing to remove barriers to opportunity. We are excited because this is an important report that proactively addresses the impact of structural racism on leadership development.
Leadership programs can help solve racial inequalities in access to education, healthcare, income and wealth, but many current approaches to leadership development actually maintain and promote racial inequalities. The report, How to Develop and Support Leadership that Contributes to Racial Justice, suggests that a large number of leadership programs associate leadership with equal opportunity and individualism. This thinking does not recognize that current systems (i.e. policy, culture and institutional practices) can cause racial identity to limit one’s access to life opportunities. It also focuses too narrowly on changing the behavior of individual leaders. Instead, leadership programs should: 1) make their programs more accessible for people of color; 2) help participants understand how race limits the access to opportunities – in other words, the impact of structural racism; and 3) promote collective leadership. This approach will help participants work together to tackle the systems that maintain racial inequalities. Check out the
press release: http://bit.ly/LeadershipRaceRelease.
The publication offers practical methods and recommendations to help leadership programs prepare their participants to bring a more race conscious lens to all policy and service work; and empower people of color to better lead their communities.
The publication is co-authored by:
- Terry Keleher,
Applied Research Center (ARC) - Sally Leiderman, Center for Assessment and Policy Development (CAPD)
- Deborah Meehan, Leadership Learning Community (LLC)
- Elissa Perry, Think.Do.Repeat.
- Maggie Potapchuk, MP Associates
- Professor john a. powell, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity
- Hanh Cao Yu, Ph.D., Social Policy Research Associates (SPR)
This report is the first in a series of publications, the Leadership for a New Era Series, launched by the Leadership Learning Community in 2009 to promote inclusive, networked and collective leadership approaches. The series is funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota Foundation, The California Endowment, David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Evelyn & Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, Kansas Leadership Center, and the W.K.
What People Are Saying about the Report…
| “As racial demographics rapidly change and deep racial disparities grow, we need new ways to develop and support leadership that move us to greater racial unity and equity. The Leadership and Race publication provides concrete tools and recommendations to help leadership programs move in that direction.” (Terry Keleher, Midwest Director, |
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| “Although the Greenlining Leadership Academy has always been committed to training social justice advocates to work across racial and ethnic lines and to build multi-ethnic coalitions and alliances, we never fully understood that in order to impact racial equity, we had to begin by establishing and teaching a racial justice framework. LLC’s Leadership and Race report helped us to see that we needed to incorporate this framework into our strategies to achieve racial equity.” (Danielle Trimiew , Academy Director, The Greenlining Institute) |
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| “The Leadership and Race report is an excellent overview of the deepening conversation among social justice-oriented leadership programs about structural racism and racial equity. The core competencies and recommendations for supporting racial justice leadership neatly distill the key ideas at the forefront of this conversation.” (Christopher Perrius, Director of Development and Communications, The National Equity Project) |
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| “This publication makes clear that there is a need for ongoing intersection between the fields of leadership development and racial equity.” (Carmen Morgan, Program Director, Leadership Development in Interethnic Relations)
“The publication supports our training philosophy quite seamlessly, as if it was written with our training curriculum and participants in mind. We look forward to incorporating it as a |
Contact info & How to Get Involved:
- Participate in the webinar! Join us on September 28, 2010 from 11:00 – 12:00 PM PST for a free, interactive webinar. We will explore the main findings from the report and collectively brainstorm resources and ideas that can help you and others implement the ideas from the report
- Share the report with your colleagues and network through your website, blog, newsletter, and social media channels! (
Twitter hashtag: #LNERace)
- Visit the Leadership for a New Era website for a list of resources
- Check out examples of leadership programs and organizations that are leveraging more inclusive leadership approaches
- Complete a short survey to help us gather data about your current approach to leadership development. This will give us a better understanding of where you are now and how this report can be helpful to you.
- More information about the Leadership Learning Community
- Contact Information:
Natalia Castañeda Chaux
Marketing and Communications Director, Leadership Learning Community
1203 Preservation Park Suite 200 Oakland CA 94611
(510) 238-9080
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