Dave Green, Charles Lord, William Ratcliff, and Dick Riddle
Region 3 is working to address issues and solve problems at the "root cause" and not continuously treat the symptoms that keep reoccurring year after year. The Leadership by Developing Others (LDO) is one of the initiatives and the subject of this article. How many of us became volunteers within IEEE as a result of someone in our company who took an interest in our career? Over the months and or years filled with their urgings, suggestions, observations or even less covert counseling... dragging us to IEEE meetings we found ourselves on a committee or running for an office within the section or technical society. Is that a predominate practice in Industry today? Part of our analysis in developing strategic direction led us to the conclusion that there is a root cause connection between the amount and quality of mentoring activity and the number of volunteers available at all levels in IEEE.
The first phases of LDO will concentrate on revitalizing the concept of mentoring as an active method to address volunteerism but also instill other values associated with helping each other including collaborative work skills.
LDO is a joint project of the Region 3 Strategic Planning Committee (SPC) and the Leadership Development Committee (LDC).
SPC will provide mentoring expertise and Quality Control of all products and training. LDC will provide development of training material, training of pilot teams, and coordination of future training. The LDO Project Team will provide project management and guidelines.
A Project Team has been formed consisting of David Green, Charles Lord, Bill Ratcliff, Dick Riddle, Bob Duggan, Joey Duvall, and Bill Harrison.
Two basic textbooks have been selected and distributed to the Project Team for study and course development suggestions. The title of the books are "Making the Most of Being Mentored - How to Grow from a Mentoring Partnership", and" Mentoring – How to Develop Successful Mentor Behaviors" authored by Gordon F. Shea.
In February, the first Pilot Team to be trained will be selected. The proposed members of Pilot Team 1 are: Region 3 Officers, two- Area/Council Chairs, and two-Committee Chairs. Pilot Team 1 has been deliberately limited to a small cross section of the ExCom. After commitment has been obtained from the Pilot Team 1 members, they will be invited to collaborate with the Project Team on the R3 LDO Virtual Community.
In March, a joint face-to-face joint meeting of the Project Team and Pilot Team 1 will be held on Thursday, March 25, 2004, one day prior to the start of SoutheastCon 2004 in Greensboro, NC. This meeting will start the formal training of the Pilot Team. The meeting will start at 12 noon Thursday and will continue until 12 noon on Friday, March 26th. The final training session has not been developed yet, but we plan to use the Region 3 Operations Manual and the two books by Gordon F. Shea.
From April through August 2004, the Project and Pilot Teams will continue working together to further define the training module and evaluate the results of Pilot Team 1.
In September, it is planned to obtain the commitment of Pilot Team 2. The long-range plan is to provide LDO training to all that want it and in particular the ExCom. However, there will be funding and physical limitations on just how many can be realistically accommodated as members of Pilot Team 2. After Pilot Team 2 is formed a face-to-face meeting is planned to be held in conjunction with 2004 Fall ExCom meeting.
The future of the Institute is directly dependent on the volume and quality of the volunteers. Leadership by Developing Others is not the only initiative needed to address these issues at a "root cause level" but we feel it is a logical starting point. The Institute at all levels is dependent on the member / volunteer in order to function and achieve the Strategic Vision / Direction. In the final analysis we need each other to be successful.