I am not one for "I Heart" anything as a public declaration. We have been inundated with bumper stickers, mugs, hats, license plane frame that declare a wide variety of "I Heart" messages...from "New York" to "My Husband " to "My Terrier". Call me cynical, but they all make me cringe. "Really", I think, "That's just great...any why is it important that you let me know?".
I'm one of the last people you'd find wearing an "I heart" T-shirt, and yet I did so today.....at work.....in front of colleagues and students. It was a particularly worthy cause.
The Messiah College Concert Choir coordinated a tribute/fund-raiser for our College President, Kim Phipps. And for that, I donned an "I Heart K P"...T-shirt. And I did so because I am a big fan of the Concert Choir but also because I really do love the leadership of KP.
I was lucky enough to work directly with and then for her for a number of years and I was blessed with some very real but all too rare lessons in higher education leadership.
KP Lesson One: Invite Feedback Early and Widely. I was terrified of criticism when I began to work for her, but she taught me to see that feedback early was something to be invited not feared. I've learned, as a result, that feedback not only strengthens proposals but also helps to broaden a sense of ownership. It really does take a village...some strengthen through editorial revision..details...while others identify holes in the argument that need to be filled....still others note gaps in the proposal that need to be filled. This process broke down my perfectionism and, equally important, enhanced my productivity. Leadership does not happen in a vacuum. Good leaders don't sit in their offices and craft perfect policies in isolation. They draft...they get feedback....they fix.....they get feedback. In the process, the policies themselves get instituted but the team itself strengthens its work as a team....everyone contributes and sees him or herself as part of the whole. And the proposals get reviewed and critiqued by campus committees in such a way as to make them better. That is the essence of shared leadership and its core purpose.
KP Lesson Two: Encourage Ownership. This is one of those "I don't know how she does it" items, but someone Dr. Phipps creates a broad network of people who are enthusiastic and productive supporters of her vision. In fact, she is a visionary but her vision is crafted in a shared context. Somehow you'd find yourself working on a project that you loved but also knew that it fits into her larger vision. Her vision, too, is permeable...as new and good ideas come to her attention, they get incorporated into the larger whole. There is a strong sense of "we" in serving within her organization. Leadership, if it is to be effective, must be shared in higher education. Otherwise, there is no leading at all.
There are lots of reasons to love Kim Phipps as President, but these are a couple around the theme of higher education leadership that come to mind from my own experience. She's broadened my capacity to lead and fanned the flames of my enthusiasm for Messiah College.....for proof of her influence, look no further than my T-shirt....not to mention the T-shirt of hundreds of students on campus today.
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