We need a quantum leap forward in civic leadership

The note taped to my monitor simply says, “enough.” It’s there to remind me when I feel overwhelmed that I actually have enough time, energy and resources around me to complete what needs to be done. It works, much to my surprise each morning.

Another reaction comes to mind, too. Most of the time, I feel as though I’ve had enough of our current political and civic leadership, especially at the national level. The whole ridiculously partisan, small-tent, smaller-vision, non-fact-checking, un-innovative, fiscal-crisis-ignoring, democracy-diminishing bunch. We’re dancing toward the fiscal and democratic cliff, and it feels like they just want to turn up the music.

But I’m also tired of the pity-card being played by people like me who know better: who have enough time and energy and resources around them to do something differently; who recognize the silliness of whining and civic victimhood; and who realize that our leadership is a reflection of all of us and of a civic culture that has become too passive and a political culture that has become too toxic.

Much of what passes for leadership development today isn’t enough either. We worship the heroic and charismatic leader, when all of the evidence says this charisma can’t produce the changes we need. And we spend our time in technical leadership development, forgetting that the practice of leadership really does require a broader civic vision.

The failure of this current leadership approach is an opportunity for innovation — and for the Citizens League. What can balance the need for big-picture vision and aspirations about what being a citizen means with practical skills-building and support?

Quantum Civics

Quantum Civics™ is the Citizens League’s new approach to civic leadership development.

We’ve always been in the business of developing civic leaders — from Verne Johnson to Dave Durenberger to Jean King. All of them made my current leadership opportunity possible by deliberately reaching out to me and others to mentor and provide leadership opportunities.

This is the template we need, because the fundamental role of a civic leader is the desire to build the capacity for others to be active citizens and civic leaders: to do for the next generation what Verne and Dave and Jean continue to do for ours.

But where this civic leadership happens today is different from the past. We don’t need to wait for people in formal positions of power to do something, and we don’t need to become those people to have an effect on our communities. The days of hierarchical leaders being able to control things are over.

Imagination and capacity

We need a new imagination about civic leadership. We need citizens in all sectors and types of organizations, and in all positions of authority, to see the opportunity they have to be civic leaders where they are. The first step is reclaiming the word “citizenship” from the current toxic discussion about legal status and recognizing that we all play a role in a democracy as citizens, and our individual actions relate and have impact on a larger scale. All of the bad habits that I complained about in our national leaders were learned somewhere, from someone: in their families, workplaces, schools, places of worship or communities.

On policy issues, we have to imagine the connection between the day-to-day problems we face and larger, more complex challenges. How we as consumers use electricity affects energy grid efficiency. How we all save for our later years affects Minnesota’s budget crisis. How businesses structure their training programs and relationships with schools affects post-secondary education. And how we all choose to ride or drive every day affects our transportation system’s sustainability.

Quantum Civics takes this big civic imagination and role and builds the capacity to be leaders in our everyday interactions: how we run meetings, how we build accountable relationships within and across organizations, how we learn to analyze problems, how we learn to ask critical questions while remaining open to new ideas and opportunities.

A quantum leap

The use of the word “quantum” is not accidental. Quantum mechanics wasn’t just an improved version of Newtonian mechanics — it was an entirely new way of viewing the physical world that could explain what was actually going on.

These small steps eventually add up to larger policy change — and we need change on a large scale. Civic leadership requires a critical mass of leaders inside all institutions that are committed to working — together — to develop the innovative civic policies that we need to confront the challenges we face in Minnesota, and to create a state worthy of being called The Star of the North.

We hope our Quantum Civics program is not just an improved version of leadership development but also a new way of viewing the civic and policy landscape around us.

The policy issues we all care about aren’t out there in the ether. They are right in front of us. And the leadership I complained about didn’t emerge from the ether, either.

It’s not enough to settle for the status quo, or to complain about how awful it is in politics and public policy. We all have enough — vision and resources and opportunities — to take another quantum leap forward in Minnesota’s policy and political landscape. It won’t be easy, but discovering a new way forward will be worth it.

Sean Kershaw is the executive director of the Citizens League and a member. He can be reached at skershaw@citizensleague.org, 651-289-1070, @seankershaw (Twitter), or Facebook.

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