LEAD097 - Climate Action and Transition Leadership
Course Description
The climate crisis is often described as a crisis of leadership. Dominant models of leading are failing to adequately address the magnitude, complexity, severity, and uncertainty of humanity’s interconnected climate and sustainability challenges. Course participants will identify and experiment with leadership mindsets and practices needed to contribute towards the transition to a low-carbon, socially-inclusive future.
Please note: This course is not eligible for the Lifelong Learning Alumni Discount.
Offered in partnership with:
Course Outline
This 4-week course consists of 4 modules and combines asynchronous and synchronous (weekly live Zoom sessions) learning activities.
The course kicks off with Module 1, “What Is Transition Leadership?” explores transformative perspectives on leadership for climate action, personal agency, and core competencies including framing and reframing climate challenges. Utilizing Marshall Ganz’ Public Narrative framework, participants will reflect on their own sense of agency and practice storytelling for meaningful change.
Module 2, “Cultivating Inclusive Mindsets and Pathways,” follows with a focus on futures thinking in which participants will experiment with the Three Horizons Framework for facilitating dialogue about uncertain futures.
In Module 3, “Convening Dialogue: From Possibility to Action,” participants will examine concepts like communityship, their role in fostering collective leadership, and what it means to serve as positive, effective leaders during times of crisis.
The final and fourth module, “Fostering Resilience,” focuses on questions of personal and professional resilience, drawing from psychological and social-ecological perspectives and emerging research on resilience as an adaptive cycle. In this final module, participants will experiment with mapping their own resilience cycles, exploring ways to support ourselves and each other through our ongoing work in climate action.
Learner Outcomes
Participants will have the opportunity to:
- Develop influencing skills, personal agency and practice storytelling for change
- Experiment with futures thinking and apply a framework for facilitating dialogue about uncertain futures
- Critically examine the tensions with climate optimism, leadership, and adaptation
- Cultivate personal resilience and map their resilience as an adaptive cycle
Applies Towards the Following Certificates
- Climate Adaptation Fundamentals Micro-credential : Elective Courses