“The Study and Practice of Holistic Leadership” with Nancy Gordon | Ep. 054
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About this Episode:
In this episode of The Transformative Leader Podcast, I’m honored to be speaking with Dr. Nancy Gordon, the Chairperson and a tenured Associate Professor of the Graduate Department of Counseling, Leadership, and Expressive Arts at Salve Regina University. In addition to her role at Salve Regina University, Dr. Gordon has served as co-proprietor of a consulting firm that assisted private, non-profit, and public organizations with strategic thinking and planning, leadership development, change and transition planning, diversity and cross-cultural awareness, and skill development for a high-performance workplace. She has also designed and delivered professional workshops on topics from leadership to strategic vision and handling stress, and has authored several works, including her most recent, Women and Leadership: An Integrative Focus on Equality. (This is a fascinating paper which I highly recommend to anyone with a serious interest in leadership).
Dr. Gordon is one of the first academics in the leadership field that we have had on the show, and it would be an understatement to say that I was blown away by the depth and breadth of expertise she brought to the conversation. Since the the bulk of my leadership education is from the School of Hard Knocks, I found our talk to be eye-opening and extremely educational, and I know listeners will too. It is difficult to even put into words the resonance that I felt with her passion for and appreciation of leadership, and I very much look forward to collaborating with her in the future. This is one episode that you simply cannot miss, because I can’t do it justice by just describing it!
Some topics discussed in this episode include:
Dr. Gordon’s circuitous route to the esteemed position she holds today, and how she became interested in holistic leadership and systems work.
How Dr. Gordon, as a scholar of leadership, defines what leadership is and touches on why sometimes “leaders” are not actually leaders.
What people can do when they are working under unsupportive bosses and feel that things may not get better.
How leaders can use the power of self-organization and self-emergence to foster collaboration without having to wait on a crisis to unite people.
How leadership is a skillset that can be taught and learned, and how it involves the integration of both hard and soft skills.
After receiving her Doctor of Education degree from Harvard University, Dr. Gordon has served as a faculty member at Salve Regina University since 1993, where she now instructs and develops courses such as “Leading Holistically“ and “Leading System Change and Transformation.“ Dr. Gordon is also both Chair and program director for the Holistic graduate programs, with oversight of 5 master’s programs, 5 Certificate of Advanced Graduate Studies (post-master’s) programs and 5 Certificate of Graduate Studies programs. While off campus, Dr. Gordon may be found engrossed in a good murder mystery novel or walking the beach near her home in Rhode Island.
Guest Links:
You can connect with Dr. Gordon on LinkedIn and by emailing her at nancy.gordon@salve.edu. You can also visit the Salve Regina Graduate Studies Twitter and Facebook pages. Salve Regina’s Graduate Office can be reached at 401-341-2232.
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