With the current innovative changes in information technology, there has been an equally significant change in the expectations, motivations, and emotions that drive individuals to greatness in their day-to-day activities. As a result, studies note that when the emotional needs of workers are satisfied through various aspects of information technology such as social networking, enhanced interaction, and productivity tools, there is the need to change the existing leadership skills to accommodate the ever-changing work environment. This phenomenon of adjusting one’s leadership skills relative to different environmental requirements is better referred to as environmental leadership.
Accordingly, most psychologists note that each person has the potential to bring out different aspects of personal identity relative to various environmental needs by changing one’s emotional perceptions of a particular situation. Here, it is worth noting that environmental leaders are individuals who create avenues such as educational programs whereby other individuals get to satisfy their emotional needs by interacting with others. Moreover, through such interpersonal interactions, people get to realize when and how they are bound to influence the emotional requirements of other people at a personal or team level.
As a result, environmental leadership entails creating a favorable environment within which individuals get to bring out their best through encouraging them at an individual and group level. Subsequently, environmental leadership promotes a culture, which inspires individuals to do what is best for the greatest number of the larger population.
Additionally, environmental leadership does not entail leading others to do what is required, but to develop environments that enable individuals to bring out certain skills and qualities, which support a large group of people to realize the end result.
While keeping the principles of environmental leadership in mind, this research paper reviews the activities of the Environmental Leadership Program (ELP), which is a group of professionals who train environmental leaders from diverse backgrounds, and encourage these leaders to pursue a common goal for the benefit of the community and the country as a whole. Here, the essay looks at the effectiveness of ELP in articulating its goals and objectives by considering the program’s short- and long-term goals from a historical perspective.
The Environmental Leadership Program (ELP) began way back in 1997, and since then the group has remained committed to promoting environmental leadership in the environmental community. In a nutshell, ELP is an educational program aimed at training and instilling environmental leadership in persons drawn from diverse ethnic, professional, cultural, and geographic backgrounds.
ELP as a whole recognizes the linkage between leadership and relationships, and as a result, the program’s vision entails developing certain personal skills, which are very important in creating strong linkages or networks between diverse groups of people. The end result of the program is thus influenced by the collective ability of the networks created between the participants.
Subsequently, ELP recognizes the role diversity plays in terms of influencing the successes or failures in public leadership. As a result, the program encourages the development of environmental leadership groups reflecting the country’s diversity besides encouraging the leaders to develop certain individual skills, which promote cohesion and reconciliation.
Furthermore, ELP encourages its members to take note of the fact that leadership at both environmental and community levels, entails professionalism whereby environmental leaders should be able to take calculated risks relative to complex situations.
With the guidance of the above-mentioned principles, ELP aims at developing a diverse community comprising of environmental leaders endowed with effective leadership skills, which enable them to work across professional, ethnic, cultural, and regional differences. The program’s top management includes an executive director, a board of trustees, and the advisory committee.
Under this framework, the program aims at training fresh environmental leaders with various attributes such as effective communication skills, innovation, diversity, and collaboration. Here, the program targets eligible participants from different set-ups such as non-profit organizations, business communities, academia, and government institutions.
These participants are given training and learning opportunities, which allow them to develop or expand their leadership qualities through the fellowship program. Under the fellowship program, fresh leaders are linked with their senior fellows through various regional and national associations.
Furthermore, the new fellows are linked with senior fellows through interactive networks and other mentoring programs. Finally, the program content and elements are informed by the needs of the larger environmental communities, which require environmental leaders with relevant skills to deal with complex situations.
As a result, to satisfy the community’s requirements for environmental leaders, the fellowship program entails an annual selection of about 15-20 leaders, who are given training and learning opportunities at the regional level. Here, the participants are drawn from different professional and personal settings since the program aims at broadening diversity within the environmental leadership movement.
Another requirement for the program involves selection of fellows with at least ten years experience in different professional areas such as business, academia, non-governmental organizations, and government institutions. After selection, the fellows take part in a total of three overnight retreats for 11 days in a one year course.
Each of the three retreats is designed to instill different leadership skills and competencies, which include strength-based leadership, diversity, coalition building, and interpersonal communication. Here, course assignments include development of individual leadership plans, which also serve as roadmaps in the fellow’s professional and personal career. Additionally, the training entails participating in networking workshops and bringing the fellows to work together in forums, events, and conferences addressing issues of public interest.
As a result, from the foregoing discussions, there is evidence to suggest that ELP offers the participants the opportunity to develop lifelong skills and competencies through collaborative peer support. Furthermore, after training, the fresh fellows graduate into senior fellows who can take part in training other leaders using online materials, events, partnerships, and other mentoring courses within ELP.
Using this approach, ELP fellows have achieved the program’s short-term goals, which include expanding the regional networks across the larger Delaware Valley including Eastern Pennsylvania, the Greater Boston region, Southern New Jersey, the Southeast regions, the New England states, and the Mid-Atlantic region. Conversely, ELP wishes to expand the program to a national level by designing unique training programs and networks suitable for all U.S. Territories.
Overall, the paper has presented an elaborate discussion regarding the Environmental Leadership Program in the Delaware Valley and the surrounding regions. And from the foregoing discussions, it is worth noting that ELP is run by senior environmental leaders who have realized the need to satisfy different human insufficiencies by bringing persons with different skills and competencies together, and encouraging them to fight the common goal.
As noted earlier, an individual becomes satisfied emotionally upon interacting with other individuals in an environment favorable enough to encourage each individual to bring out his or her best. As a result, the ELP program comprises of individuals drawn from diverse ethnic, professional, cultural, and regional set-ups. Thus, the idea of interlinking these people aims at creating an environment whereby every member of a particular group works towards achieving the common good for all regardless of their political, cultural, ethnic, or professional inclinations.
Reference List
Carmazzi, Arthur F., “Environmental Leadership: The new leadership style of the not so distant future,” Directive Communication, n.d. Web.
Environmental Leadership Program, “Environmental leadership program: About us, fellowship program, news and events, and ELP all community retreat,” Environmental Leadership Program, n.d. Web.