Blog

By Clare Nolan, Engage R+D

My name is Matt Bond and I am Director of Network Strategy for the DentaQuest Foundation. About five years ago, in a crowded room at the National Oral Health Conference, I met a guy named Gary Harbison. As a foundation employee, I’m accustomed to having lots of funding conversations. As a network strategist, I’m interested in connecting with and bringing in like-minded people to the network. Back then, we were in the early stages of network development, so my work had a  heavy focus on a small core group of members. Gary was not among them. Nevertheless, we got to talking. I learned that Gary is a photographer(although his wife is the real artist behind the shots), he loves Glen Miller (who I now have on my iPod and am listening to as I type),
and he still has one of those wooden record player sets that is more of a piece of furniture than a sound system. We exchanged contact information, and I promised to stay in touch.

Three years later, the oral health network was burgeoning and it was time to expand. We designed a series of meetings to bring together people from across the country to develop a set of  comprehensive, national goals to improve oral health. Gary represented his state of Missouri at the first Midwest regional meeting. A year later, he began partnering with other network members to tackle major state and national policy issues. In 2016, he participated in a national  convening on Medicaid where he gained knowledge and skills pertinent to advancing this goal in his home state. This year, Missouri included extensive dental coverage as a standing part of its Medicaid benefit, ensuring that thousands of citizens have access to oral health services.
A big part of the credit for this success went to the Missouri Coalition for Oral Health for its advocacy efforts and influence. And the Executive Director of the coalition is none other than Gary.

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Oct 3, 2017 11:00 AM Pacific Standard Time (US and Canada)

As the need to recognize leadership as process and collective endeavor expands, we need to question as well how the current, dominant cultural paradigm of heroic leadership has permeated organizational life and leadership. We can learn from communities where leadership is often shared and from organizations that have been experimenting with distributed leadership and flattening hierarchies.  Some organizations have been experimenting with a co-directorship model. The Whitman Institute who implemented this model 3 years ago and we are fortunate that Co-Directors, John Esterle and Pia Infante have offered to share their experience in a conversation about why they chose this model, the benefits of being co-directors, the structure, challenges and how they have dealt with them, and lessons along the way. This will be a video conversation opened up to participants for your questions.

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I have been meaning to write a personal article about why I feel so strongly about attending Creating Space in New Orleans this year. I thought for a moment about a catchy top ten list and quickly realized that my spirit these days is anything but light. I was still reeling from Charlottesville while Hurricane Harvey ravaged Houston and the Texas Gulf Coast. Twelve years after Katrina, I am reminded how natural disaster also becomes a social and economic disaster with a toll that hits vulnerable communities hardest.

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Creating Space provides opportunities for experiential learning and sharing regarding what is required to increase the impact of racial equity in leadership development work.

At Creating Space, you will be supported with

• tools that help you identify, challenge and change prevailing systemic racism/white supremacy broadly present in our work.
• conversations with multiple entry points for engaging participants with varying levels of awareness and a rich tapestry of experiences with racial equity within leadership development.
• opportunities for those in need of  defining language and for those already embodying understanding, to practice undoing and eradicating systemic racism/white supremacy.

Recognizing that conversations pertaining to race can trigger past trauma and open new wounds, healing is a big part of this experience. Creating Space offers safe spaces for grounding and healing, which will be readily available and easily accessible. Join us in learning new tools for strengthening leadership development rooted in racial equity, and be a part of these experiences helping you to grow in your own leadership.

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