Courtesy: University of Chicago News
When Mark Peters participates in strategic planning at Argonne National Laboratory, he often draws on an exercise from the Strategic Laboratory Leadership Program (SLLP) he took three years ago. The exercise called on participants to think of leadership as performance art.
“It made you think about how you see yourself—and how others see you—as a leader,” says the Deputy for Programs. “Which of your qualities and characteristics should you, as a leader, employ ‘center stage’ and which are best used ‘backstage.’ The exercise really clicked for me.”
So did the whole program, which Peters credits for helping him progress from mid-level to senior-level manager.
SLLP is a non-degree, executive education program developed by the University of Chicago’s Office of the Vice President for Research and for National Laboratories, Booth School of Business Executive Education, Argonne, and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The program is part of the University’s Lab management contracts with the U.S. Department of Energy. Its main objective is to expose scientists and professional staff to best-in practice tools and theories for effective leadership, strategic thinking, change and innovation.
“You could read a book about any of these topics, but it wouldn’t be the same,” Peters says.
Creating Better Leaders
Brendan Casey, PhD, Associate Scientist in the Particle Physics Division at Fermilab, is equally convinced that SLLP helps form better leaders and managers.
“I look at this program as a defining moment in my career,” he says. “It made a difference of night and day in how I address challenges at work.”
As SLLP prepares for its fourth year beginning in May, managers and potential leaders at the two Labs are being nominated to participate. Each year, 15 Argonne employees and 10 Fermilab employees are selected to join the cohort. A few seats are available also for faculty members who are interested in leadership education and who have existing, or potential, collaborative projects with Laboratory researchers.
Tailor-made Program
SLLP is a customized program that includes eight days of knowledge sharing and skill building split into three sessions. Participants may also take as an elective their choice of the many open enrollment executive programs at Chicago Booth ranging from finance and negotiations to marketing. Each cohort receives a project assignment and project teams are formed. On the last day of the program the teams present their solutions to top management from both Labs.
“The great thing about the teams, “ says Holly Raider, Client-Faculty Liaison, Executive Education, Chicago Booth, “is that they not only reinforce leadership development, but they also bring together people from all three institutions and help cross-fertilize ideas.”
The first three projects were:
- build a publicly funded research Lab from scratch;
- design a business to disseminate scientific research that serves the needs of science and makes money;
- structure an accelerator R&D program that satisfies the needs of the academic, national security and commercial communities.
“The project is the thread that connects the three sessions,” says Harry Davis, PhD, the Roger L. and Rachel M. Goetz Distinguished Service Professor of Creative Management at Booth. Davis is the faculty director of the SLLP and a member of Argonne’s Board of Governors.
“The scientists really benefit from this program,” says Davis. “With their deep intellectual curiosity, they see that leadership has scientific aspects in that it can be analyzed, measured and improved.”
Building Relationships
“Another benefit is that the program creates an environment in which participants build relationships with scientists and professional staff within and across Labs and functional areas,” says Michelle Terry, Director, Operations and Education Programs, Office of the Vice President for Research and for National Laboratories. “This type of network-building can be drawn upon for years and has resulted in reported examples of increased management-effectiveness.”
For example, at Argonne, past participants continue to exchange information via weekly management-related emails and quarterly forums to discuss leadership topics and issues.
Davis’ leadership is also invaluable to the program says Terry.
“Harry’s commitment and dedication to the program go beyond the job description,” she says. “He brings a keen understanding of Argonne’s strategic initiatives, challenges and core strengths and spends an extraordinary amount of time engaging individual SLLP participants from Argonne and Fermilab.”
Bruce Chrisman, Chief Operating Officer at Fermilab, would like to see the program continue beyond its five-year timeframe. “SLLP helps us identify in a more systematic fashion those people who have leadership potential,” he says. “Individually, participants come back from the program saying they think about their job in a broader context. Collectively, the program has focused our mind on Lab management.”
“I’ve heard very positive things from leadership of both Labs about the value of this program,” Davis concludes.
- Greg Borzo
