The perfect collaborative tools (and even flawless facilitation skills) doesn’t mean much over time if you and your team members are not tending to your personal development work.
Yes, you read that right… Round Sky, the cooperative focused on offering democratic structures and tools for more meaningful and transparent collaboration, said it’s not everything!
Personal development is important in collaboration because it helps us to be more self-aware, confident, and capable in our roles to say the least! We’ve seen teams that make space for personal development can experience this renewed teamwork, connection and confidence in each other.
In fact, when people are actively engaged in their personal development, they are often more open to learning new skills, finding opportunities to grow (so they can grow into their new way), and taking on new challenges. There is a way that doing personal or professional development work together can open up support and experimentation, which can also help us normalize “failing” and learning!
In our cooperatives, this is particularly important. Alyssa, Daniel, and I had a conversation about the power of tending to our individual growth within a collective. Listen in to that conversation on our youtube channel. Alyssa reflected: “self advocacy IS cooperative advocacy”. It is! Working on oneself is important for yourself and your team. It makes sense that self-help and self-responsibility are named as international cooperative values.
As you work on yourself, you benefit from that growth and your team benefits from it as well.
For example, my topic is to find joy in the work. Watch this little doodle-y video about my personal development reflections and work. It makes a difference that I CHOSE that topic. Also, my team can feel when I’m approaching something with joy! Finding the joy brings me renewed creativity and flow, overall more wellbeing and energy for our work together, and more lightness in our meetings and work flows together.
It’s KEY to have agency over your personal development in order to make meaningful change and to more fully engage with that work.
There are many leadership or personal growth programs telling you what kind of qualities you should have and that’s not Round Sky’s approach. And, there are many businesses that either don’t do this type of “evaluation” at all or do it in a dis-engaging way (where people are told what to do).
Round Sky’s personal development approach is about self-advocacy and agency, while also letting in the collective input. If you’re not holding group processes to get feedback, you’re still likely getting some feedback from your team (even if not direct) and other people in your life. An invitation: get curious! Only YOU know how that feedback best fits into how you can grow. And yet, our team members and beyond can have some important insight. With so much of our work, we are balancing the individual with the collective within this personal development practice as well.
Overall, personal development can help you and your team members to better understand and work with your strengths, weaknesses, and preferences. This, ultimately, can help you be more effective in your roles and more attuned to the needs and perspectives of others. Personal development practices (especially used regularly!) can make it easier for people to communicate, collaborate, and problem-solve effectively, and can lead to more effective, productive, and harmonious relationships within a team.
Curious? Stay up to date on the opportunities and resources for personal development that Round Sky has for cooperators! Share your email with us below to get on our list.