Leadership

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I spent this morning feeding back on a Willow Creek conference on leadership that I went to a couple of weeks ago.

To be honest, I was disappointed. There were good bits, but generally more style than content.

However, I have had my fill of good leadership training from the unlikely source of Jamie Oliver. Jamie's School Dinners has been compulsory TV in our house. And there's a lot to learn. Jamie walks into a new environment (a school kitchen) and it's clear that Nora the dinnerlady would not have been his first choice for a deputy (we get to see his number two at his restaurant). But he has no choice and as he invests time and energy into Nora, he comes also to rely on her.

It's not that everything Jamie does is right. Trying to train up a borough-full of dinner ladies in three days is ambitious to the level of idiocy. And there are endearing moments when it finally dawns on Jamie that berating kids for not knowing the contents of a greengrocers is not the best way forward.

But there's much to learn about how Jamie takes his good idea and boldly puts it into action. As he does so he needs to bring others along with him, to share the goal and own the task.

Four hours of Jamie beat two days of Willow Creek for me.

PS

More information on Jamie's ongoing campaign and sign the petition for better school dinners here.

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