Alissa's 2018 PSEL Journey

New leadership philosophy statement

I completely rewrote my leadership philosophy statement this weekend. Changed how I view it, as in what it’s purpose is to me. Changed some commitments to myself. I welcome any feedback if anyone is still attempting to read these!

This leadership philosophy statement is an agreement with myself and serves as a reminder for what I value.

I will live my leadership philosophy by allowing my actions to speak for my values.

I will strive to be an effective leader by being pragmatic, direct, and approachable.

I will realize that working relationships are built on trust, which takes time to develop.

I will approach this with the courage to speak up and be an advocate for others.

I will remind myself that participation is the key to harmony.

I will invest time into attending to the fears and feelings of myself and others.

I will take responsibility for my humanness.

And I will always remember to ask myself “What’s my part?”

Leadership shadowing – Debra Thurley

Last week I had the opportunity to shadow Debra Thurley, the director of research compliance and deputy research integrity officer. Debra works under Candice (Candy) Yekel in the Office of Research Protection (ORP). I was interested to shadow in this office because what I do somewhat overlaps with some of the topics addressed within ORP, including broad research compliance. Debra made the most sense because most of the committees they cover fall under her, including one I’ve been participating on as a guest for about a year now (biosafety).

Unfortunately, I had a stomach bug for the first date we arranged, but I ended up getting to see another committee in action that I hadn’t previously given much thought. The Conflict of Interest committee discusses financial interest disclosures for Penn State researchers where there might either be an actual conflict of interest, or the perception of one. You can find more information here: https://www.research.psu.edu/coi.

It was interesting to hear the handful of cases I was allowed to observe. But what I found more interesting was really seeing democratic leadership, in both thought and action, play out. During the meeting it was interesting to watch as each member of the committee was welcomed to give their feedback and ask questions about the cases on the agenda. And it didn’t matter if those thoughts/questions came from the program director, Clint Schmidt, one of the professors on the committee, Debra herself, or anyone else. Everyone’s thoughts were welcomed and valued. Everyone was given time to speak and no one was talked over.

Debra and I talked about it more afterwards, where it was really evident that ORP practices democratic leadership principles. I think she said it best when she said something to the effect that she might have what she thinks is a really great idea, but she doesn’t just come in and say this is how it’s going to be. Changes are talked about as a group and everyone’s ideas are valued. She said this was something Candy modeled for her, and she tries really hard to practice with her people. So while one of her direct reports is the director of the conflict of interest program, a committee she is a member of, she wouldn’t dream of going in there and being directive. It was very evident to me that people are empowered to do what is asked of them, and they are trusted to follow through.

I think this is something, in the realm of compliance, that can be a bit challenging. On the one hand, we operate in the land of musts and shalls. But on the other hand, we’re here to facilitate research and education. To reference the first leadership interview I did, compliance groups and committees don’t just have to be committees to say no. But rather we can work to ask people ‘what will it take?’ Help them learn the boundaries, and see what we can do to help them operate within them. I feel like this is something I try really hard to do with research groups in regards to lab safety, but I definitely don’t see that idea everywhere at Penn State. It can be challenging sometimes when I’m trying to help a group figure out what they can do when all anyone keeps saying is ‘no’.

So while Debra was worried that this might be a “boring” morning for me to shadow, with really only one thing to watch, I ended up getting a lot out of it.

Leadership Interview – Neil Sharkey

On 9/20, six of us did a group interview with Neil Sharkey, the Vice President for Research. It’s taken me almost two weeks to write about mostly because we talked about So Much. Distilling it down to a blog post has been challenging.

I feel like the single biggest thing we talked about surrounded being human. Both acknowledging it in ourselves and others. So that’s how I’m going to try and tackle this, talk first about leadership in terms of how we handle ourselves, then in terms of how we handle others.

How we handle ourselves

In the course of the interview, we definitely didn’t cover ‘how we handle ourselves’ as a do’s and don’ts list, but I think what we talked about can be divided up in that way. When we look at how we handle ourselves as leaders, it’s really important to be introspective and self-reflective. This hopefully leads to things like being mindful of leading by example, while having the grace to realize that we will learn as we go, which includes making mistakes (as Neil said, “hopefully I don’t make too many!”). That also means practice practice practice those things we aren’t as good at. Something that can help in this process is to make sure we’re not in an echo chamber, that we’ve surrounded ourselves with a diverse group of people (ideally who are also smarter than us!). Hearing opinions from others, including those outside our office, even outside the university, can be helpful to reflect on the decisions we are making. This also includes being receptive to new ideas, even ones we think might not sound good. Sure, some of them will work out fine, but it’s important to allow the space to learn from those that don’t. Taking professional risks is how we grow, and it takes guts as individuals to seize those opportunities.

On the flip side, it’s incredibly important to be mindful of not allowing our biases to get in the way (see: self-reflection and introspection). We all have them, and it can take a lot of work to realize what they are and how we manifest them. This can also lead to knee jerk responses. In many cases, our first instinct of how to handle something may not be our best idea. There are very few things, in the course of regular life, that need a decision Right Now ™. Many decisions can wait a bit, be mulled over, discussed, and refined.

The last piece I’ll mention, which is a bit of a do and don’t: Don’t underestimate your abilities, because you never know where they’ll lead.

How we handle others

As we’ve learned during PSEL, it’s just as important to understand ourselves as it is to keep in mind how we interact with others, particularly in management and leadership roles. Neil talked about that just as it’s important for him to make mistakes and learn from them, it’s important to let others have that process too. It’s really important as a leader to give others the responsibility AND authority to do what needs to be done, get out of the way of it getting done, and let them learn from whatever happens. But with mistakes comes the need to foster an environment where people feel valued and respected, not just adrift on their own island. He finds it important to acknowledge what people are accomplishing and who they are as people. He works to have a work place culture where people feel they can laugh, talk, and be human while still being professionals. Enjoying yourself at work is not a bad thing! He also aims to understand what motivates the people who work with him along with those personal elements, like “how are the kids?”

As a leader, Neil talked about trying to strike the balance between knowing when his silence can be a skill (leaders need to listen too) and when speaking up is necessary. Leading doesn’t always mean being the one who does all the talking. Being a leader can mean sitting back and just listening, or it might mean guiding a discussion without adding your own opinion. On the other hand, it’s a skill to know when you need to speak up, whether that be advocating on behalf of those you are leading, bringing your own ideas to the table, or just acknowledging and sharing the wins of the group.

So I’ll close in saying that I left out a lot in this write up, like humility, different styles of leadership, and I’m sure even more that I just missed including my notes.

Leadership interview – Lisa Bahr

I’ve really struggled with writing this. Not because I don’t know what I got out of this interview. Punchline: people skills are skills, they can be learned. What I’ve struggled with is putting this into logical and coherent words. Hopefully you’ll get something out of this.

Last week I had the opportunity to interview Lisa Bahr, the director of operations for Centre County PAWS. While the general guidance given to us was to interview Penn State leaders, I thought she would be an interesting addition to my list for many reasons. In full disclosure, I am a regular volunteer at PAWS. In my application to PSEL, I even wrote about my experience becoming a dog care shift leader at PAWS this year. I’m there pretty much every Sunday morning walking, feeding, and playing with dogs. In the roughly three years I’ve been volunteering there, I’ve gotten to see Lisa and her leadership at work. I also thought it would be interesting to hear about her experience because she is responsible for helping to wrangle a few hundred volunteers while keeping a few hundred cats and dogs safe (and getting them adopted!).

I really appreciated talking to Lisa about leadership for one really big reason: she talked about leadership as a skill, something you can learn. She talked about the fact that while she came to PAWS with a lot of training in animal management and veterinary care, she has had to be very deliberate in learning “people skills”. Frankly, it was refreshing to hear someone say that. That their soft skills may not have been their strongest asset, and that it is something that can be worked on and show actual results.

Part of this has included being assigned (yes, assigned) a mentor by the PAWS board of directors. While she was a bit resentful when it happened, she said it’s worked out great. Lisa and her mentor laid down clear boundaries when they started working together, which included talking about their titles (they agreed her mentor is her “mentor”, if that makes sense, not some other word or title). They get together on a set schedule to talk about how things are going, how Lisa is addressing known weaknesses, and particularly some of the differences in managing volunteers versus staff. Overall, she’s found the experience beneficial.

We talked a bit about that difference of working with volunteers and staff. As a volunteer, we generally want to be there. It’s (largely) voluntary. But one of the things Lisa has put time into is developing incentives to help keep volunteers wanting to be there. Staff on the other hand, want to be there for (generally, very) different reasons. A pay check. Regardless of position, one thing we talked about was the establishment of policy. One of these includes email etiquette, that email communication should be appropriate and professional. Lisa said since that policy was put in place, and as people have bought into it, we’ve been largely self policing with only an occasional need to remind people. And I’ll say as someone who gets all the dog shift leader emails (which is my largest source of non work emails every week), I see it in action. We’re generally positive, supportive, and informational. Even when disagreements pop up, for the most part people keep their written communication appropriate. But should someone stray from that, there is written policy to back up the reminder to get back on track.

We also talked about keeping the mission of PAWS focused and deliberate. Pretty much everything done is done deliberately, in the name of a positive environment with the goal of getting dogs and cats adopted. The people side of that includes nipping potential problems in the bud (see: email etiquette discussed above), but also how people handle animals. I don’t know how it happens on the cat side, but every once a while as shift leaders, we discuss how a volunteer is handling the dogs. This way if we see unsafe behavior, we can hopefully stop it before something bad happens. The flip side of that are “caught you cards”. I wish I had a picture of my pile to show you, but these are cards anyone can fill out when they catch anyone else doing something good. I find it to be a great motivation, not just to receive one, but to see how many other people are doing awesome things regularly and that others are recognizing them for it. As Lisa said, “punish in private, praise in public.”

I know you likely don’t see anything in all of this about learning people skills. But we did talk about it. It’s the part I’m not sure how to describe. Perhaps the biggest part is to make it deliberate. Seek out feedback from those who you can hear it from honestly (without getting mad at them). And then work to do something about it. Probably the biggest thing I needed to hear.

Shame and vulnerability – Brené Brown

I attempted to watch a TedX video circulating amongst PSEL, but I just couldn’t get into. At all. So I went looking for some old, almost original, TED talks, the ones that used to inspire me to be a better person and leave the world a better place. I ended up rewatching this one by Brené Brown on vulnerability, and the important role it plays in lives. I think it’s a powerful talk, particularly because it’s based on *data*. Something that I think can be incredibly lacking when we talk about “soft skill” topics.

But it led me to look up the speaker and see what else she’s been up to. Maybe in hopes of finding something I could use for PSEL. Lo and behold I found this blog post of hers from earlier this year talking about shame and failure at work. And it reminded me of an idea I already hold dear.

As many know, I can have problems naming/identifying my feelings. Years ago when a friend and I talked about shame, she said her acronym to identify shame was Should Have Already Mastered Everything. For me, this is incredibly powerful, personally and professionally. Now a days, I’m generally good at acknowledging that I am human, but every once in a while I catch myself “should”ing myself. Asking myself (or telling myself) those questions mentioned in the blog post.

Why didn’t I know better?

Why didn’t I do better?

I should know this.

Usually when I get to that last sentence I realize I am “should”ing myself, I am reminded of SHAME, and the fact that I have not, despite some valiant efforts, mastered everything. And if I haven’t mastered everything, that means odds are likely that I will make mistakes. Many mistakes are ok to make. For most of the stuff I muck up, I can either go back and fix it, or make amends to whomever I might have harmed. Thankfully, none of my mistakes have had a larger professional impact, considering I work in safety!

So maybe the next time you say to yourself, “I should know better”, you can be reminded of SHAME, and know that it’s ok that you haven’t mastered everything (yet). Because I haven’t yet either.

I don’t like the neutral zone

Over the past number of months, how I feel has become sort of a running joke. Not because my feelings are a joke. But because this exchange has become incredibly common: “How do you feel today?” “I feel frustrated.” Seriously. I tried tracking my feelings using an app. It last all of about two weeks, because all I seemed to feel was frustration. About just about everything.

Turns out, I’m in the “neutral zone”. And I’m frustrated by it.

What is the “neutral zone?” The neutral zone is one of the three phases of transition in terms of the internal process. They are the phases of how we handle change. You can see a handy diagram below.

In short, the internal process of transition goes from endings (What will happen? This can’t be happening. I don’t understand why this is happening.) to the neutral zone (I’m confused, but oh, I could do that. I’m frustrated.) to beginnings (Let’s do this! I’m so glad that’s done. I really hope this helps.). So, A LOT of my life is in the neutral zone right now. And the vast majority of it, I can’t control.

My work unit hasn’t had a director in 16 months on top of being short staffed. And I’ve done the duties of essentially two people for the past year while we restaffed one position. I’m also married to a postdoc, which means whole bunches of uncertainty of what comes next. Where will we live? Will he get a job? If we have to move, will I get a job? We also still rent a house, and my car needs to be replaced (like, before winter starts).

So it’s no wonder I feel an overwhelming and constant sense of frustration. I can’t do anything about my work unit not having a director. I can’t do anything about us being understaffed. While I certainly had a choice in not taking on some extra duties, I also ethically thought not doing certain things would be a Really Bad Thing ™. The only thing I can do about my husband’s job uncertainty is be supportive. I can do certain things that will help make me more marketable, should we need to move. And I’ve been working really hard on that, which includes doing things like PSEL. There’s nothing I can do about renting right now. And, well, I’ve got a short list of cars to test drive, but that will take time.

But if we zoom out even further, my whole life has been nothing but transition and change for about 5 years now. I’m tired of change and transition. I’d really just like some stability. I’d like to make real concrete plans for the future.

And that’s all I’ve got right now. Perhaps not surprising, but this is something that I don’t have any real closure for right now.

Book review: Make Trouble, by Cecile Richards

I’m way behind on posting content, and even further behind on commenting on anyone else’s blog. Considering I’m working from the “quiet” of home while my landlord is supposed to be fixing something (spoiler, he was here for an hour, left, and said he’s coming back, but didn’t turn the water back on…), I thought this might be a good time to try and review one of the (only, first) books I read for PSEL.

I’m not sure who suggested this book to me, but “Make Trouble: Standing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding the Courage to Lead — My Life Story” by Cecile Richards was a great read. It’s also the first nonfiction book I’ve finished in quite some time. I took the opportunity last month on a trip to help my parents, who have no cable or internet, or real cell phone reception (I could send and receive text, but that was it), to bring my Kindle with me (with the book already downloaded, of course). Considering my dad is someone who has “made trouble” throughout his life, I thought it would be fitting.

If you aren’t familiar with Cecile Richards, she is a past president of Planned Parenthood Action Fund and Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Considering the focus of this blog, I’m going to try to keep politics out of this post, and write more about some of the underlying themes I found in the book.

People: Cecile’s background is in organizing labor movements and she spent a fair bit of the book talking about how important people are. Including the little stuff like getting out there and shaking hands, bringing coffee and donuts, along with the big stuff, like meeting people where they are. I have no recollection where this was in the book, but one of the quotes I wrote in my notes that I think embodies this, which was attributed to George Tiller, was

It is never the wrong time to do the next right thing. It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.

I think a big thing I took from this theme is that you can push boundaries and make trouble, but it doesn’t mean you have to be unprofessional or yell in people’s faces. It’s good to challenge the status quo, but it can be done with dignity and grace. It can be challenging to be the “adult” in the room when tough topics are discussed, but that doesn’t mean we abandon our values in the face of adversity.

Purpose:

Nietzsche wrote that ‘The most common form of human stupidity is forgetting what we were trying to accomplish.’

Cecile also writes a fair bit about needing to be reminded regularly what she was making trouble for. Why the labor movement was important to her, why women’s healthcare was something she chose to focus on (including some very controversial topics). My goals aren’t nearly as big. But this is something I remind myself at work of over and over and over again. What’s my goal? Why am I doing this? What purpose does this serve? I think some people in academia, especially those on the “back” side of the house, can lose this focus. At the end of the day, my job is to be support for education and research. Not safety for safety’s sake. Not paperwork because someone said it should be done. But doing the things that I can to help keep people (faculty, staff, students, visitors, etc) safe in the name of education and research while they are at Penn State.

Facing fear: I think this was probably my favorite theme of the book (and one I’ve been exploring in my personal life). Two quotes stuck out to me. The first was in the context of Ann Richards, Cecile’s mother, who was the first female (democrat!) governor of Texas.

What would you have done differently if you knew you were going to be a one-term governor? She just grinned and answered “Oh, I probably would have raised more hell.” I decided it was time for me to start raising some hell of my own.

This second one is Cecile reflecting on her own life.

Looking back on my life so far, the moments I regret most are the ones when I was too scared to take a chance – the moments when I didn’t know what to do, and so did nothing.

I think when we talk about leadership it’s also incredibly important to talk about how to handle fear. Fear that we’ll make the wrong decision, fear that other people won’t like us (or our decisions), fear that we aren’t “doing it right”, etc. I’m sure there’s a long list we could come up with. Being someone who can overthink anything (curtains? dinner? how to word an email? check!) I find it really helpful to hear how other people have handled their fears in a professional context. It can be really scary to try to push for the next right thing, especially when you experience push back. It can be really scary to tell someone what they are doing is wrong. And in the context of my work, that can literally cost lives (and money). Add in some big personalities, and it can be really fear inducing for me sometimes. I’ve gotten a lot better at it in recent years, but it can still be really scary to take a chance, make a decision I’m not sure will be popular. To do something in the face of fear, rather than do nothing. To tell someone they have to go fix something. These days, I don’t have to “fake it til you make it” as much, but if I have an idea of my purpose, I’m reminded to be graceful and kind, it’s a little less scary to speak up for what I think is important or right.

In summary: As with everything else I’ve read for PSEL so far, the theme of people being the focus keeps coming up. But I really enjoyed this book because of the reminder that I don’t have to make other people comfortable if I know why I’m “making trouble”.

Leadership Philosophy Statement, v1

I’d meant to do this last month, when I actually wrote the first draft of my leadership philosophy statement. But didn’t manage to have the memory to do this task in conjunction with my notebook AND an electronic device with which to post. No time like the present.

So here’s my first draft (from 3/21/18):

My mission is to be an effective leader in laboratory and research safety by being honest, forthcoming, and pragmatic. I aim to do this through reasonable and practical solutions to common safety problems in research while also addressing nonstandard practices in a sustainable fashion.

I’m open to comments, both positive and constructive.

I’ve also got lots of thoughts on todays session on ethical leadership, but I think I need to digest it a bit more to make those thoughts more understandable outside of my head. And I’m sure some of it will impact future versions of my leadership philosophy statement.

On a personal note…

With how incredibly busy I’ve been at work, it’s been hard to set aside time to really focus on some of the tasks PSEL has asked of us. But being the good doer I am, I did download our “homework” for Thursday. And found it really ironic.

This month is 5 years since the proverbial fecal matter hit the fan in my PhD, and life has not been quite steady since then (a year and a half of that included writing and defending my thesis, finding a job, supporting my SO through his thesis, planning a wedding, SO defending, getting married, moving twice, and finding two more new jobs). A lot of that I think is a large part why I do things like PSEL (or go to trainings like Stand for State, which you should totally do!).

If you polled the entire PSEL2018 cohort, you’d probably find two very broad categories of people. Those who have experienced good leadership and want to learn how to do it themselves. And those who have experienced poor leadership and want to learn how to make a difference.

I kind of fall into both categories. The end of my PhD did not go well (see: writing and defending a PhD thesis in 4 months). And some of that was certainly on me, not asking for what I needed earlier, nor looking elsewhere when certain things became apparent. But I also experienced what it felt like to not get clear leadership or effective mentoring. I think those experiences will probably continue to drive me for a long time.

These days I see an interesting mix of leadership and mentoring. For the first time in years, I feel truly supported in my development. I am given a reasonable amount of resources for professional development. I am encouraged to attend all sorts of trainings on campus (within reason and while getting my actual work done). I am empowered to make broad reaching decisions. I am trusted to do my job (and let me tell you, it feels awesome).

But our work unit hasn’t had a director in over a year. And I’m still coming to appreciate what it means when senior leadership says “stay the course.”

I won’t air our dirty laundry here, but I had to laugh when I read the homework assignment. Three questions about a hypothetical search for a new work unit leader. We’re well past the “writing a job description” step in my work unit, but maybe I’ll be able to turn some of these thoughts into some good questions, should I be given the opportunity to participate in the interview process.

As someone else said, leading isn’t about putting out day to day fires (that’s management). I want to know how our new person will lead us, and Penn State, forward.