Shifts in governmental agencies are beginning to become more common as leaders in the highest offices embrace a culture of Human-Centered Leadership. Dara Barlin, CEO and Founder of the Center for Transforming Culture, is at the heart of this shift, working to transform government management styles away from the traditional top down and compliance orientation to a bottom up and across structure. This new approach empowers workers to become leaders in ways that transform culture, while stoking innovation, quality of work, and productivity.
According to Barlin, throughout the history of the U.S. government there has been a consistent struggle in the implementation of policies that seek positive societal change. This is due to the toxic cultures that are present in many governmental institutions. Barlin says there are many brilliant policy makers who are passionate about fostering social change, but the policies often break down because of a series of culture related issues, such as unrealistic timelines, bipartisan politics, and a general lack of listening to the communities on the ground and the people that know best.
As a result, millions of Americans could benefit from policies that would enhance their quality of life, but instead the policies are left to die with billions of dollars being wasted on efforts to implement them. Barlin says the biggest issue in governments on the federal, state and local level is employee disengagement in which workers feel undervalued, overwhelmed and disrespected.
Barlin is now working with governmental agencies to help them support and effectively implement a transformation in culture. Her passion to work with governmental agencies came after her time working on a peace building project in 2012 that brought together people from 97 countries, many of whom had a history of conflict with one another. After the peace building project, Barlin saw how the problems throughout governmental agencies mirrored those she saw during the project.
She conducted a survey in a government agency that showed only 11% of people in that agency felt psychological safety, leading to a host of issues including mental health problems, lack of transparency, bias, and apathy in implementing policies. Barlin continued to consult with people in different agencies and began to see there was a trend where people are working in a toxic environment that was detrimental to their physical and mental well being. The proliferation of toxic workplaces in governmental agencies has created a culture that is led by fear from people at the top.
To break these types of cultures and guide the future of government towards embracing Human-Centered Leadership, Barlin works directly with people in all types of governmental positions to help them restructure how they operate. This includes empowering everyone to have the ability to feel like they can lead. By breaking down top to bottom structures that are found throughout most governments and replacing them with an all encompassing employee structure, Barlin is working to create psychologically safe working environments for governmental agencies.
To do this, she highlights the benefits of embracing Human-Centered Leadership, which Barlin describes as leaders seeing their colleagues as more than just people to get a job done, but as equals who can create innovative ideas to be implemented. The Human-Centered Leadership approach also fosters open communication in a governmental agency where everyone can come together to share ideas, openly disagree, and still come out the other end with a unified vision for success.
Barlin has developed workshops in which she trains people in transforming management practices, how to create psychological safety and work through conflict. Barlin says one of her most successful methods to instill Human-Centered Leadership is through an inquiry based process that brings together governmental leaders and employees to transform culture through group discussions. In the discussions, Barlin asks strategic questions and provides the basis for the participants to engage in collective decision making and planning.
Barlin says this approach has successfully contributed to creating psychologically safe agencies that embrace Human-Centered Leadership.
Barlin added. “We have effective policies being written that are seeking to improve communities, create a clean sustainable environment, and support the economic security of the nation but if we do not transform the ways these governments bodies are managed, policies are going to continue to fall on their face. Human-Centered Leadership is the vehicle creating a more effective government and stronger results for our communities.”
Media Contact:
Name: Dara Barlin
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