Tell us about the leadership program.

Well I was part of the Leadership Program, one of I think seventeen participants. My memory is that it lasted about eight months, and involved a range of activities, some based here on campus at the Mater, others based off site, and some offsite residential programs that helped us, I guess challenged us, to look both theoretically and practically about the way in which we approached our leadership.

What was the extra workload like?

It was a significant extra workload—one that was clearly flagged for participants before we entered into the program. As usual you sort of hear those words and you go, “Yep, ok” but you don’t actually really realise the extra amount of work that is required. And I think the fact that it’s embedded in your work, and it’s with colleagues, provides that extra drive to invest yourself on another sort of higher level. I guess the fact that it is an organisational program, that it is supported by the organisation, helps I think to carry the workload, the additional workload, that it did. If it hadn’t been embedded in the organisation it would have been a lot harder.

Were there lots of physical activities?

Yeah, we certainly did a lot of physical activities. Some were: we learnt to juggle, which was both fun and challenging and helpful I guess in terms of being a metaphor for developing new skills. We had an activity which was called the Red Machine, which I guess was, had us broken into small teams and having, helping us to think about the roles we play within those teams. Quite a number of sort of activities that made us look fairly strange I think to passers by.

How has the course impacted on your work?

The program has impacted me in a couple of ways: one, I’m much more conscious when I’m thinking about planning and moving forward, much more conscious about how that what’s planned connects to the values and the mission of the organisation. So that’s much more in the forefront of my mind, and I found myself doing things and people comment on did you learn that at the leadership program, are we guinea pigs?