I’m a county leadership mentor. You’d think I’d be all over the new system but in fact I only saw it for the first time yesterday. It’s very different and we’re all inclined to rail against it right now but let’s give it a chance.
The new system is at learning.girlguiding.org.uk and you’ll need your usual Girlguiding login to access it. Little detail that they left us to figure out for ourselves at the support session.
Why is there a new system?
In short, because the old one was huge and offputting. The book apparently had 53 pages in it and I know from going through it three times, it’s difficult, it’s intimidating and it’s really easy to lose track of which bits you actually have to do.
How does the new system work?
It’s all going online, on a brand new learning platform. New leaders have as long as they like to complete their “leadership journey” and work through it in their own time. There’s a dashboard to show them which bits they’ve done and how much more there is to do and it’s via a combination of reading, videos, quizzes, webinars and elearnings. The question has been raised of how accessible this is on a mobile phone and also of what happens if your potential new leader just doesn’t have internet access.
What’s good?
What’s good is that it all feels less pressured. You’ll still be learning on the job how to do the day-to-day running of a unit that you just can’t learn any other way than by doing but all the things you have to learn about will be in this online course. It’s all a lot less intimidating and the time limit has been removed. That was something else offputting – “you have to finish this in the next three months because you’ve been too slow!”.
What’s bad?
This is the bit I personally have a real issue with. The mentors can’t see your progress through the new leadership development programme. We have access to the very beginning of it via our own learning area but once you actually dive in, we can’t see what it even involves, let alone where our mentees are up to. I’m used to sitting with the book, going “show me the bits you’re struggling with, show me the bits you haven’t done, ooh, we can do this bit right now!”. How much help can a mentor really be when we can’t see anything?
I think new leaders are going to have to be much more self-motivated. They’re going to have to want to do it and they’re going to have to want to do it alone outside of meetings and while the general vibe of the thing seems less intimidating, I don’t know if “do this course on your own in your spare time with no help or guidance” is the best approach to it.
When can leaders start on this?
Right now. It’s available right now. Leaders-in-training who are using the old book method have until September 2023 to finish and if they want, they can start the ALQ using the book up until December 2022. From January 2023, any new leaders-in-training will use the new leader development programme online.
How do you start a new leader on it?
So, a brand new volunteer needs to be put on GO as a unit helper, as far as I can see. When they have their own login, they go to the learning platform. Existing volunteers – unit helpers who’ve decided to become leaders, Young Leaders turning 18 etc – already have their login and can go to the learning platform.
Then there are two routes, depending on their level of experience. Brand new leaders choose Option 1: you complete two learnings called Getting Started in Guiding and Growing in Guiding and this unlocks the Becoming a Leader section. That sends a message to your local team who will update your role to Leader-in-training and assign you a mentor.
Leaders with some experience, ie existing volunteers, can choose Option 2. You complete a training called Check Your Guiding Knowledge and that unlocks Becoming a Leader. Ditto the role update and the mentor.
After that, you’re into the actual leadership development programme, the online qualification. When you’ve finished, it will ping county who will approve your work (how they do this when they can’t see your programme either is a bit beyond me) and you’ll get your status update to full Leader and someone will arrange your Leadership Qualification badge and certificate to be presented.
What about leaders who’ve done modules 1-3 and want to do module 4 later?
Another work in progress. The concept of full leaders vs assistant leaders is going to vanish but at some point, surely there must be access to the additional material for anyone who wants the safety and finance stuff.
What about leaders who want to change section?
No idea. I believe there’s currently a checklist to save existing leaders having to go through module 1 all over again but I don’t know what’s going to happen with the new system. I’ll do a second post on the subject when I know more.
So what can I access as a mentor?
There’s a mentor area hidden in the new system. I have no idea where it actually is but if you go to the search in the top corner and search for the word “mentor”, it’ll give you the LDP Mentor Area. That’s where you can book onto a 90 minute webinar to become a mentor and access more resources – guidance notes, course checklist, journey map, matching with your mentee and the -all important check-in forms – these are what you’ll use when you make a visit. Your mentee uploads them to their qualification.
At the moment, this is all we’ve got to help us navigate a whole new leadership development programme
So, it’s all quite bewildering at the moment but if it’s better for new leaders, it’s better for the organisation as a whole. It’s just on us to accept that things are different. We know the old system because many of us went through it. We’ll get to grips with the new system and in five years time, maybe we’ll be singing its praises as so much more user-friendly than the old one. Maybe.
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