The essence of leadership? NET x Austin McNamara is North East Together’s seventh pop up event where we’ll hear Austin’s reflections on 16 years as a professional interim.
In 2008, following a successful period as a secondary headteacher, LSC executive director and Connexions CEO, Austin stumbled into a new career as a professional interim (who knew such a role existed?) – and since then he has never looked back! He has held a wide range of interim leadership positions throughout England, including local authority assistant director, multi-academy trust CEO and sector skills council director. These assignments have varied in length from 4 months to nearly 2 years, and many of the organisations concerned were facing major challenges at the time. Most recently Austin has taken on the interim CEO role with two charities (The Key and Newcastle Carers), in both cases supporting the trustees to appoint a permanent successor.
During this seminar, Austin will reflect on his learning from the provision of interim leadership in a variety of challenging circumstances. Drawing on two recent case studies, he will share his insights into the unique contribution that a professional interim can make to an organisation. These will then be used to stimulate a discussion on lessons we can all learn from each other about the essential elements of effective leadership during turbulent times.
This session will be of interest if you are
Interested in hearing more about the life of a professional interim
Curious about the added value that interim leadership can bring to an organisation
Open to learning from the experience of someone who has held a wide variety of leadership roles in the public and charitable sectors
Seeking an opportunity to reflect on your own experience of leadership, to share that with others and to identify some of the shared characteristics of the most effective leaders
About North East Together
Our collective mission here at North East Together is to create the conditions, and platform for, collaboration to become the norm in the north east and to nurture a healthier social change system. Together we can do this.
We believe that bringing people together to tackle social injustice will create positive change - in our communities, organisations and the social systems we live and work within. Our network offers mutual support, enables collaboration and inspires social leaders. We offer a series of dynamic network events; whole day events, self-organised collaborative working groups; pathways into coaching; and independent social change events. It’s for leaders from the voluntary, charity, social enterprise, education, public and private sectors. It’s for experienced, new and future leaders of organisations, work, and ideas.
North East Together is hosted by Yes We Can and is a collaboration between Yes We Can and Newcastle University Business School.