Inclusive Leadership Program
Promoting Better Workplace Culture
The Inclusive Leadership Program was a research and training project aimed at maximizing performance and building future capability in Australian science.
The program has been designed by academics and professional leadership coaches from the Centre for Ethical Leadership (CEL) specifically for teams working in a medical research institute (MRI) environment. The key premise of this pilot program is that inclusive leadership can facilitate higher productivity, retention, engagement, morale and innovation.
What were the key outcomes of the pilot project?
Thirty teams (220 employees) from the five WiSPP institute participated in the training and evaluation program. In post-program and follow up evaluations, participants reported more engagement with concepts around inclusivity and respecting differences, demonstrated through practices such as improving the format of group discussions, delegating important growth opportunities such as external stakeholder engagement, and proactively seeking feedback from team members.
What are the key learnings from the pilot project?
Researchers who reported greater control over decisions about how, when and where their work was done also reported more positive work attitudes, including job satisfaction. Additionally, researchers who reported greater access to flexible work arrangements also reported lower levels of work-family conflict and lower stress.
Teams should explore opportunities for increasing individual staff control over the decisions as to how, when and where their work will be done and providing flexible work arrangements, without negative reactions from peers or the forfeiting of development opportunities.
“ It’s all been useful just to make people aware that their actions and personal motives and their subconscious thoughts can impact on others. I have seen much better dynamics in my team since starting this program.”
“It has made me self-reflect on how easily we all slip into our expected roles and that we not only need to challenge ourselves to be aware of these, but to make sure that we encourage others in our group to participate and be involved in decision making.”