The Connective Leadership Mirror now available in nine languages
In 2008, an old water mill in the east of The Netherlands welcomed a small and diverse group of engaged scholars, leaders and practitioners to become the founders of a mission that is still alive and kicking after 15 years. We made sense of what connective leadership is about, why it is so important to practice, and how to develop this valuable quality.
Over the years, the members of the ‘core group’ changed constantly. If we would invite all co-creators from the start, the party would probably count up to about thirty people. Once reunited, we would probably have fun, and agree that we really get happy when leaders, managers, professionals take the effort to complete the Connective Leadership Mirror and reflect on the given profile. Based on a dedicated application of the well known Spiral Dynamics© value systems, our free to use self scan is built with the intention to reach as many users as possible. We consider the CLMirror a value-based leadership reflection instrument for the sake of thriving and flourishing organizations and societies.
It is 2023 now and you are reading the first blog on the upgraded and extended version of CLMirror.org. By now, our co-creators represent professional consultants who supplied a CLM translation in their mother language, and joined our mission as highly appreciated CLM ambassadors. Chronologically, from the moment that Edwin de Vos took responsibility for the technical design and implementation of the application, we could say that Edwin and I represent the Dutch and English language. Miriam Subirana Vilanova (Instituto IDeIA) created the Spanish version. Heike Aiello added German, and Sarah Neumann French. With the efforts of Thalia Dragona and final editing of Markos Perrakis, we included the Greek language. Serenella Panaro recently supplied the Italian version. By the summer of 2023 we counted seven countries and a connective group of corresponding CLM ambassadors.
Is it about countries, or rather about languages? Because I am living in the Spanish province of Catalunya, and enjoy the friendship of educational leader Pep Buetas, a Catalan version was in reach. Somehow, I felt that we should emphasize this ‘new’ move by introducing another ‘language not being a country’. Thanks to leadership professor Wim Braaksma and his connections with the Frysk Akademie, the CLM is now also available in the language of Friesland, a beautiful northern Dutch province, proud of its specific roots and culture.
A dream is being fulfilled, and - as it is with realizing dreams - we proceed in small steps. Please try the CLMirror yourself and review your profile. The applications of the instrument are diverse, from coaching to measuring learning results, and from team development to organization wide leadership analysis, which we will write about in the coming blogs. Would you feel like supplying a new language? The system supports this easily for you, and you might become our next CLM ambassador.
Just imagine… that we would launch - of course at the same time - the Israeli Ivrit and Palestinian Arabic as the next two languages. Could it help a little bit? And what to think of an Ukrainian and a Russian version? Do you know of a way to realize this? That would be a great example of connective leadership.