Partnership Creates Progress For Leadership Academy

On February 1, 2017, the Richard A. Baddour Carolina Leadership Academy began a partnership with the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) in an effort to reboot after 13 years of programming. The effort have been led by CCL thought partners Joel Wright and Preston Yarborough, as well as UNC's Nicki Moore, Senior Associate Athletics Director/Senior Woman Administrator; Cricket Lane, Associate Athletics Director for Student-Athlete Development; and Shelley Johnson, Director of the Leadership Academy.

CCL's work is not entirely new to the Leadership Academy. It had already borrowed one of CCL key resources: the 70/20/10 Model of Leadership Development which it used as the basis for its Leadership Lab (now, Carolina INCUBATE) programming. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

But if it ain't broke, why fix it?
True, the Leadership Academy is the premier leadership development program in collegiate athletics. That said, it prides itself on staying ahead of the sigmoid curve, namely being as efficient, effective, and impactful in programming as possible and being as responsive as possible to the leadership needs and wants of its Carolina Athletics participants. Moreover, a compelling partnership availed itself with CCL.

John R. Ryan, President and CEO of CCL, echoes the sentiment about the importance of leadership development shared with the Leadership Academy. "The earlier our young people develop their leadership skills, the better prepared they are for the challenges of work and life – and to make lasting contributions to their communities," he says. "As a college student who was privileged to receive extensive leadership development, I can attest to the tremendous power of a systemic approach to cultivating emerging leaders. The Richard A. Baddour Carolina Leadership Academy will help transform the lives of its participants."

Why CCL?
Reason 1 – Simply put, CCL is a top-ranked, global provider of leadership development. By driving results that matter most to its clients, it transforms leaders – at the individual, team, organizational, and societal levels. It offers an array of cutting-edge solutions which are steeped in extensive research and experience gained from working with hundreds of thousands of leaders at all levels. Ranked among the world's Top 5 providers of executive education by Financial Times and in the Top 10 by Bloomberg Businessweek, CCL has offices in Greensboro, Colorado Springs, and San Diego in addition to Belgium, Russia, Ethiopia, South Africa, Singapore, India, and China.

"CCL is the industry standard," Johnson says. "UNC, Carolina Athletics, and the Leadership Academy pride themselves on being the same in their respective fields. Moreover, CCL is locally based but has the resources of an international organization. You can't find that combination elsewhere. It is either one or the other but not both."

Reason 2 – Its CCL thought partners, Joel Wright and Preston Yarborough, bring an understanding of collegiate athletics. Both played sports in college: Yarborough played soccer at Davidson College, and Wright played hockey and tennis at Wittenberg University in Ohio. Their professional and leadership backgrounds are equally impressive.

Wright is the Director of Learning and Innovative Solutions, CCL – Societal Advancement. As such, he leads a 10+ person team in advancing CCL's Leadership Beyond Boundaries agenda. The group works with a wide variety of organizations including youth serving organizations, schools, colleges, communities, and foundations. They create leadership and coaching solutions: off-the-shelf curriculum, train-the-trainers, multi-year systemic culture or organizational leadership initiatives, and robust research and innovation partnerships. Prior to CCL, Wright consulted with the United States Olympic Committee and worked for the YMCA in the U.S. and abroad.

Yarborough is the faculty in Societal Advancement for university-focused initiatives in Leadership Beyond Boundaries. He collaborates with educators on course design, instructional practices, tool development, and course evaluation to help clients leverage experiential methods more effectively. He received his PhD in counseling and educational development with a focus on leadership development from UNC-Greensboro. During that time, he served as the Assistant Director of Leadership in the Office of Leadership and Service-Learning, where he and his colleagues built an experience-based leadership program.

"Joel and Preston have been expert guides and have become friends and colleagues in the process," Moore says. "They are determined to help us discover and apply the brilliance within ourselves, our community and our student-athletes, rather than showcasing their own very substantial expertise – an approach which has deepened our program's foundation while also enhancing our creativity, agility and confidence as program facilitators."

Reason 3 – CCL is about capacity development. CCL will teach the Leadership Academy to build, so it can build for itself and in the process build something unique and authentic unto itself.   As the expression goes, give a man a fish, and he eats for a day. But teach a man to fish, and he eats for a lifetime.

"To date, the Leadership Academy has had to build the bridge as we crossed it," Johnson explains. "CCL is an experienced bridge-builder."

From February 1 to June 30, the two parties wasted no time in getting to work. The partnership has already invested to the following extent: 150 days, 103 hours, 25 phone calls, 24 campus visits, 22 data capture interviews, 2 focus groups and 39 people participating in gallery walks. Overall, 120 Department of Athletics representatives (57 student-athletes, 31 coaches and 24 staff members) took part.

"Everyone's input has enabled the development of a leadership framework that is supported by leadership literature and grounded in UNC values and beliefs," Wright says. "We strive to create a tool that will empower all from student athletes to anyone in the Athletic Department to learn and grow as leaders. Developing a framework that resonates across an entire community isn't easy and wouldn't have been possible without all the history that informs it."

This initiative would not be possible without the contributions of several individuals. The Leadership Academy expresses its deepest appreciation to Director of Athletics Bubba Cunningham for his support of this partnership; to former Director of Athletics Dick Baddour for his initial vision for and continued stewardship of development efforts; to Vaughn Bryson for his generous donation to subsidize the partnership; to Moore for her unprecedented advocacy on its behalf; to Lane for her unflagging involvement and insights; and to CCL thought partners Wright and Yarborough for skillfully navigating it through this process.

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