Seven Orange City Council staff discuss a leadership development program that shifted the organization from technical work toward coaching, psychological safety, and collaboration. Participants gained tools like the Wheel of Leadership and REACH diagnostic, broke down departmental silos, and learned to ask for help instead of managing burnout alone.
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It always occurred to me at Orange City Council in the last decade as I watched things unfold that we didn't really talk about leadership, we didn't talk about culture. We just went to work and we did our work and we were really technical. We did our work well and that's all we ever talked about. We put people in leadership positions with no training at all. That's unfair. We put people in leadership positions in a very, let's say it, a boring way. You might do a Cert IV Certificate in Leadership but we never really talked about it. So what I wanted to do was change things so that we empowered our staff. If we were going to make you a leader, for example, um, talking about leadership, then you would get some training, you would get help, you— but not just structural help, you would get emotional help in, in doing that role. And that is a cultural change, and I'm hearing that from staff that it's become quite a valuable thing. Hey, I'm not just getting thrust into stuff, I can talk, I can break down barriers with people. It's okay to be slightly vulnerable about these things.
It's okay to say, "Hey, I'm new to this, can I get a bit of help please?" But the biggest one would have been the Wheel of Leadership, understanding my weaknesses and strengths as a leader and giving me the opportunity to work on that. I also like the opportunity that we were given to work with other areas within the council. That was great to meet other people and to network with them, and I really appreciated the fact that the Council invested their time in me as a leader.
Yeah, it was a good experience. It was good to catch up with people, meet and get to know people from other divisions. One of the biggest takeaways was just the continuous improvement message and how Council's working on building upon what we've already got.
I thought the program was brilliant. It was well planned, it was timely, it was relevant, and I've just learned so much from the 3 masterclasses that we've been through so far.
My biggest takeaway was the very first session, I was very burnt out. I was burning candles at both ends. I was trying to pretty much judge life and judge the work life at the same time, and Yeah, it just wasn't working for me. So with your help and Natalie's help, I was able to identify that was, you know, holding me back from being a good leader.
I think the biggest thing I got out of it was the coaching side of the program. Good leaders, I believe, are coaches as well. So I'm really looking forward to taking that back into the workplace and helping to coach and develop my team. I think that was the big takeaway for me.
So things that I found helpful with it was, you know, how to go about working with the team that you've got and using advantages from them, from their experiences, and working as a crew, not just going with your own ideas on what it is. You seem to— I found you work better as a group if you involve everybody, make them feel as part of the group as well, rather than just the people that work for you.
We learned about psychological safety for our team, which came in very handy when I had a planning session with my team, knowing that they were engaged, they could put forward ideas, throw initiatives out there, and, and they feel comfortable doing that. Also, it helped me with my leadership style through the diagnostic REACH tool.
Being a team leader, we do, you know, you try and nut out the tasks that you want to try and do for that week. But rather than just myself and talking to my supervisor about it, it's, you know, going back and talking to my team and crew members and finding out what they have seen around the place because I can't be everywhere. So I've got 5 people below me, but if I use them and see what they got. Then we can nut it out and then go through what the priorities are and things like that, but keeping in mind that there is other things that still need to be done as well.
One of the tools that I've taken away also is being able to break down silos during this training. So we've been able to connect with outdoor workers, which has been fantastic, and having a look and delving into the problems and the daily issues that they actually face. And how that is something that I've never been exposed to before. So that has been really fantastic for me to be exposed to that.
The time out, the time to stop and reflect, was something I've been meaning to do with the team for a while. So I saw when this opportunity came along, it ticked a box for me of something and sort of pushed me along a little bit, if you like, something that I've been meaning to do. It was a good process. It allowed others to have a say and build towards some goals.
Yeah, so I've started to take some days off for myself and actually taking RDOs without answering the phone for work or anything like that. I've implemented some goals for my team, so be it work goals and personal goals, just because I'm a goal-driven person. Strive for goals, and if those guys can have that same sort of, "Oh, okay, yeah, he cares about what we want to do outside of work as well," it seems to have made them more efficient to work with.
