Public sector leaders benefit
18 September 2012
Public sector leaders benefit from
business best practice
York St John University
Business School will play host to a meeting of minds this week when
leaders of innovation and change from across the country come
together to share the latest thinking on leadership and change
management.
The 28 attendees are all alumni of the York St
John Business School Masters in Leading Innovation and Change.
The programme celebrates its 17-year anniversary in 2012 and
head of programme, Sarah Crabbe, says the celebration event will
mark a key milestone in the evolution of the programme with the
creation of a network comprising some of the UK’s top organisation
leaders.
The MA in Leading Innovation and Change
(MALIC) was launched in 1995. The programme was originally
designed to support professionals and managers within the NHS
tasked with leading change, but subsequently extended its scope to
include almost 200 senior and mid-level executives from businesses
and Health Trusts throughout the UK.
In 2011, York St John Business School launched
the programme globally in partnership with Robert Kennedy College
in Switzerland, extending its reach to senior managers across the
globe, with participants now in almost every continent.
The aim of the event on 22 September is to
build on the relationships that have already developed among course
alumni and to launch a network for leaders across all sectors.
Sarah Crabbe says the event will focus on
discussions about the ways in which research and thinking about
leadership during periods of innovation and change have developed
over the past 15 years, current ideas on leadership in a climate of
constant change and an opportunity to share examples of how those
ideas are being translated into people development today.
“Leaders are facing new challenges to those
that were prevalent when the MALIC programme launched 17 years
ago,” she says. “The economy was certainly in better shape in 1995
than it is today, but organisations were still facing the upheaval
of reorganisation.
“We’ll be looking at what’s changed; the
skills that leaders need to navigate today’s challenges and the
best ways of leading organisations through difficult times.
“We have an incredibly talented alumni of
experienced leaders working in more than 26 countries, and this
event will provide opportunities for some of those people to meet
and develop relationships. Our aim, starting with this event, is to
create a global network where alumni of the programme can share
knowledge, ideas and experiences.”
Former NHS Education and Development Manager,
Diana Moss, says the MALIC programme, coupled with the threat of
redundancy, helped her create a successful business:
“Starting my own business was never my
intention, but the learning, reflection, support and confidence
that I gained through the MALIC programme led me to draw on my
clinical, managerial, training and development expertise to venture
into business,” she says.
Diana founded her learning and development
firm, Moss Health Skills, in 2007, when her NHS post was made
redundant. Over the last five years, the Nottingham-based business
has developed a client base spanning the public and private
sectors, with a client list including Deutsche Bank and John Lewis
as well as health and social care organisations.
Diana also established the not-for-profit
Health Educators Network with four partners. The network
started as an informal meeting group and has developed into a
70-member social enterprise providing health education services and
peer support for its members.
Diana continues, “I found the peer support I
experienced through the MALIC programme invaluable. It
introduced me to people working in the private sector and
encouraged me to take a view from different perspectives. My MALIC
experience also helped me recognise and drive opportunities
forward, taking the key people along with
me.”
For more information on the MALIC programme
and other Business School courses, please visit www.yorksj.ac.uk/businessschool.