Skills

Developing perspectives, insight, and understanding about ourselves is something we are often too busy to do. We may not even know how to go about doing it. Illinois Leadership can help. We provide structure and ideas to help you develop skills related to getting the most out of yourself.

Self-development has two main dimensions: self-awareness and self-management

• Developing self-awareness involves assessing your own strengths, weaknesses, values, motivations, passions, and your own leadership style. It helps you verbalize and prioritize what is important to you.
• Developing self-management skills involves learning about your own sense of integrity, initiative, accountability, adaptability, goal setting, and wellness. It teaches you to stop and reflect on how you view things.

The Illinois Leadership i-Program called Illinois Insight specifically helps you work on self-development. Learn more.

Interpersonal skills are always high on the list of characteristics employers and organizations look for in people. They are skills that will help you build better relationships with everyone you interact with at work, at home, and in your community. Illinois Leadership can help you communicate more effectively, be a better team player, and understand the importance of ethical practices.

Interpersonal development has four main dimensions: relationship building, communication, ethical practices, and team development.

• Developing relationship building skills involves improving your ability to be empathetic, inclusive, impartial, and fair. It also stresses the importance of trust in relationship building.
• Developing communication skills is about learning how to listen. It is about effectively communicating within cultures and between cultures in non-verbal, verbal, and written formats.
• Developing ethical practices will build your awareness and ability to empower people and use your own power in positive ways. It will improve your decision-making and help you exert influence in synergistic ways, as well as teach you the importance of integrity in fostering and maintaining interpersonal relationships.
• Team development emphasizes building critical skills for use in team environments such as facilitation, collaboration, conflict resolution, followership, compromise, and assessing group dynamics.

The Illinois Leadership i-Program called Illinois Intersect will help you learn about and practice interpersonal development. Learn more.

Chances are you work for or belong to several organizations or groups. Illinois Leadership® is committed to providing opportunities that encourage development of skills that will make you a better group member, organizational participant, or employee.

Organizational and group development has four main dimensions: leading change, project and program effectiveness, system thinking, and community building.

• Developing skills in leading change is critical to your future as well as the future of others. We live in a dynamic world that demands skills such as visioning, creativity, risk-taking, personal resiliency, and modeling in everything we do. We all recognize the value of leading change rather than being left behind.
• Developing skills in project and program effectiveness are vital to the success of any organization. We can help you develop your ability to organize, budget, plan, delegate, and continuously improve. Because organizations are made up of people, it is important to recognize accomplishment, celebrate success, retain valuable human assets, document progress, and assess the impact of variables that affect your organization.
• Developing systems thinking skills can enhance your ability to analyze the complexity of organizational environments. It can also help you develop perspectives in critical thinking and build competencies in assessing the affect of environmental factors on your organization. It can help you understand how politics play a part in organizational contexts and even show you how to use technology.
• Developing community building skills is inherent to any organization, because every organization is a community of people. Illinois Leadership can help you learn more about citizenship, cultural understanding, and coalition building.

The Illinois Leadership i-Program called Illinois Ignite can help you work on organizational and group development skills. Learn more.

Transitions happen continuously throughout our lives. Graduating from college. Getting a job. Building a career. Getting involved in clubs, organizations, and civic groups. Discovering new places, people, and ideas.

Transitions you plan for and stuff that just happens unexpectedly.

Transitional leadership helps you make the most out of your transitions. It will also help you contribute in the best way possible to your family, coworkers, employees, friends, and people you have never even met.

Transitional leadership has only one dimension. It is an important one. Sustaining leadership. Developing sustaining leadership skills will help you realize your goals. More importantly, it will help others reach their goals.

Sustaining leadership is about networking with others and making sure that perpetual learning is available to all of us. It is about coaching, developing others, and mentoring. It is about sharing experiences, knowledge, and insight.

The new Illinois Leadership® i-Program called Illinois Imprint will develop sustaining leadership. Learn more.