21inc. - Day 1

This week is my provincial tour with 21inc... and so far its been quite the experience.

For those who have been following the blog, you probably read that I am participating in 21inc. a New Brunswick leadership program which spans over 10 months. Check out the website, I was pretty excited to have been selected to be part of this group: www.21inc.ca

So far, the program has included one leadership accelerator, which was held in Fredericton over 3 days. I was really afraid that this was going to be just a feel-good program with a little fairy dust in the pink clouds about how we all love NB, how great it is and how we are all little leaders that can change the world. How useless. And thank goodness it isn't. It's been good discussions so far about the future of the province, policies and their directions, the realities, the various communities and industries, why we still struggle as a province... and why we still want to come back home. My co-leaders are great career-driven and passionate about their province and their industry and/or community. And bonus: I'm not the only one pregnant!! Out of 21 selected individuals, 3 are expecting! woot-woot!

We have 2 more of these accelerators to go through, a tour accross the province over the span of a week and a group project from a community NGO to deliver.

So Day 1 of the tour was just this past Saturday... I'm a bit late in updating the blog. I'm writing from Moncton right now, on day 3... and I'm pretty tired. We start at 7:30am... and we get back anytime between 8-10pm... and it's none stop. So if some of this makes little sense: I'm tired.

So Day 1 was pretty laid back. We met up in Fredericton over lunch at NRC to discuss technology, leadership and the future of NB. We had the GM of Knowledge Park and 2 IT entrepreneurs/business leaders. This was our first panel discussion...we were pretty tame as a group but it was nice to see everyone again since the Fredericton accelerator which was in... september?

We then had an hour and half with David Hay, the CEO of NB Power. We talked both leadership from his perspective and discussions/debates on the future of NB Power. This guy has his leadership skills masters, we were all eating out of his palm when he was done... hey, are we not suppose to have some tougher discussions here? Ah, just learning from the way he answered questions and manipulated the group was a great learning experience.

We then went to the Department of Education to have a chat about illiteracy in NB. We did not have enough time to get into this discussion. I really wanted to get into early childhood. Even if this period is not covered by the Department of Education, the Departement has to deal with al the issues that stem from not investing enough in the ages 0-5. Are we not addressing illiteracy too late in the game by grade 1? Habits are already created, individual family culture is already created. What about tying the community in? How do they work together on that? Well, they don't really that much in NB. And the ADM was good at not answering questions... or rather not knowing how to. Understandably I guess. The vision will not come from senior public servants... I was just so encouraged by the commitment of early childhood education in Saskatchewan, and the partnership the group of parents, community and school has (speaking from my experience on the fransaskois side)... rediscovering NB in this sector was a disapointing exercise.

Then, it was a nice family gathering; 21inc alumi met up with us for supper and it was a good time... and the pregers in the group headed to bed early. ;) I really could have used a glass of red wine or two... 2 more months... 2 more months...

I'll keep you posted on each day...

Chris
;)