Leadership in Focus: Gordon Floyd
By Elisa Birnbaum
December 7, 2009
This month in our Leadership in Focus series we feature Gordon Floyd, executive director and CEO of Children's Mental Health Ontario (CMHO). A unique leader in the community, Gordon's experience is not only vast, it crosses the sectoral spectrum of public, private, and nonprofit. Among other roles, Gordon was the chief of staff to three Leaders of the Opposition in Ontario before moving to the private sector. Then came a 12-year stint as VP of public affairs at the Canadian Centre for Philanthropy followed by his current role at CMHO which he's held since 2004. A testament to his strength as a leader, Gordon was honoured the Award of Excellence in Policy Leadership by Ottawa's Carleton University in 2002.
CharityVillage: What are some of the challenges working with children and youth facing mental health problems?
Gordon Floyd:
There's no question that the number one challenge facing anyone involved with mental health issues is around the stigma. And the combination of shame and blame that prevents many people from coming forward and asking for help when they need it, seems to get in the way of offering the appropriate kind of help, even when people see it's needed. At some subtle level, that challenge influences government policy or, at least, contributes to government's lack of attention to this health crisis that exists in our society, one that is really under-addressed. If there was any other set of health conditions that were being ignored and underserved the way mental health problems are, there would be torches burning on the lawns of all the provincial legislatures.
CV: What are some ways you and Children's Mental Health Ontario are working to overcome those challenges? What are some of your objectives moving forward?
GF: We're starting by building a higher level of public awareness of the extent of mental health problems and the nature of mental health problems in children. Very few people know that one out of five children in Canada have a diagnosable mental health disorder. Yet, most Canadians, I think, are very concerned about some of the consequences of those disorders. There's a high level of concern around bullying, youth violence, underperformance at school and high dropout rates etc. But we can tie all of these issues to a common cause: undiagnosed and untreated mental health problems.
The best way to combat the stigma is with knowledge and I think that whenever we understand more about the things that frighten us - and there's no question that mental illness frightens all of us - we're better able to confront those fears and address problems in a better way.
One of the other areas we're putting a lot of effort into as an association is improving the connections among community and government organizations that work with kids who have mental health problems. Because the same kids are being served well or badly by the school system, the justice system, the child welfare system, as well as the health and mental health systems. But none of those systems talk to one another right now. So we're working very hard to ensure that children with mental health problems are dealt with as whole people rather than just in slices depending on the professional designation of the person seeing them or the sub-sector specialty of the organization they go to.
"When I think of the changes that's happened in the world of AIDS and the world of cancer, particularly breast cancer, it's almost mind-boggling. I believe we can have the same kind of revolution in attitudes toward mental health, in particular, children's mental health. " |
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We've come to realize the importance of speaking up about experiences in the mental health system and about mental health illness in the family. In the last 20 years or so we have seen a couple of remarkable examples where stigmatized diseases have moved into the mainstream because people who were directly affected were brave enough to identify themselves and talk about their problems. When I think of the changes that's happened in the world of AIDS and the world of cancer, particularly breast cancer, it's almost mind-boggling. I believe we can have the same kind of revolution in attitudes toward mental health, in particular, children's mental health. CV: What do you see as the main challenges facing the nonprofit sector today? Are they any different than those of 10, 20 years ago?
GF: Certainly the financial challenges are huge. When you talk to leaders of charities and nonprofits across the country, it's the concern about their financial sustainability that comes to the top every time. Beyond that, I'm hearing more and more about concerns with volunteer recruitment, particularly around board members - governance volunteers. And I think many organizations are finding that the year-long, and often multi-year, commitment that that entails is a real barrier for a lot of potential volunteers. And there are growing concerns about a range of liability issues. That may be something I hear about more often because, of course, in the children mental health scene where I've been working, we deal with a lot of vulnerable people and so the issue of liability comes up a bit more often than they do in other sectors.
In terms of other challenges, I'm acutely aware that many voluntary organizations are struggling to keep up with technology changes. They're finding that sometimes their so-called competitors in the private sector are moving well ahead because they are better able to invest in technology.
Having been in the sector for 16 years, I've noticed that technological challenges have became much greater than in the past, as have the challenges around volunteers. The financial challenges ebb and flow and we all know that this is a particularly tough time and will be even tougher for the next couple of years or more.
CV: You've worked in the public, private and nonprofit sectors - how would you say leading in the nonprofit sector differs from the others?
GF: I've been very lucky, having led organizations in all three sectors. And I've also had a chance to work with senior political leaders, business leaders, and those across the voluntary sector. There are certainly some characteristics that play out in very similar ways across all those sectors. To a certain extent, a leader is a leader is a leader. But I have been very much struck by some of the differences in the nonprofit sector. First, the leadership model that works most often in the nonprofit sector is much more of a consensus model. There are far fewer opportunities to rule from the top as one can in hierarchical organizations. I actually believe quite strongly that the leadership style most common in the nonprofit sector - consensus, consultative style - is the most effective and most powerful type of leadership in our society because it requires taking the time to bring people along and build strong teams. Someone who knows this very well, who's exercising this kind of leadership in another sector right now is Barack Obama. He learned his leadership skills as a community developer and in his political life he's been using the exact leadership approach that those of us in the nonprofit sector know well.
CV: But can that style translate as effectively in other sectors?
GF: It takes time for it to translate and for people to understand what's going on. Certainly in larger organizations, even those in the voluntary sector, there's a need for more hierarchical decision-making style. But I think that a huge part of Obama's political success derives from the way he is perceived to be such a good listener and his willingness to find solutions that work for all the parties. There will always be people, particularly in politics, who will look at leadership and governance as a winner-take-all situation but I really do think that the style of leadership - the consultative, consensus-building style - that is the norm in the nonprofit sector, leads to better decisions and a better ability to execute because your team really is on board. It is ultimately more successful no matter what sector you're in.
CV: Do you feel organizations are doing enough to foster young leaders? What do you feel they could be doing better?
GF: No I don't think they're doing enough but there are certainly pockets of good examples. The most exciting ones are those where young people are not only given tasks but a field of responsibility and opportunities to make mistakes, to learn, to grapple with some of the more complex challenges so they can develop their own judgements and experiences. I think one of the traps that many of us who've been in the field a long time fall into is the belief that young people need to learn the things that we learned through years of experience. And, in fact, I think we're finding that the most effective way to engage young people is by saying, “listen there's this problem that we haven't been able to tackle successfully and, clearly, whatever we've been doing hasn't worked. You come at this from a completely different perspective, why don't you have a run and teach us something?”
We've been having huge success in youth engagement initiatives of that kind in developing effective anti-stigma campaigns. We're doing this in partnership with the Provincial Centre of Excellence for Child and Youth Mental Health. We have a program called the new mentality, a youth engagement program where we support youth-led groups in Ontario develop and deliver anti-stigma campaigns to their peers. And we're seeing really exciting stuff. Leaders are emerging within these groups. We're currently supporting seven groups across the province and I can pretty much identify seven people right now who will someday be running voluntary organizations in this province and this country.
CV: Are there specific traits that make great leaders?
More about Gordon Floyd... |
First nonprofit job: Director of public affairs at the Canadian Centre for Philanthropy
Education: BA at University of Toronto
Annual budget: 1.8 million
Number of employees: 14
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GF: Leadership requires vision but it requires quite a bit more than that. It requires formulating a vision in consultation with the people who are going to be led and identifying with them what they need, as a collective, to achieve that vision. A leader then helps mobilize the resources needed and mentors those working with him/her to keep them on track toward the vision. It's an approach to leadership that is untraditional in our society because it's not the top-down leadership that all the leadership books talk about. It's not the heroic leadership that we usually hear about from corporate titans or military leaders. It's much more in the model of the servant leadership that somebody like Robert Greenleaf writes about. The central notion is a style of leadership that is much more about facilitating your followers to discover what it is they want to accomplish and working with them to get there. I really believe that it's the most effective style of leadership.
CV: Who are your mentors when it comes to leadership?
GF: Someone who taught me an awful lot about how to lead an organization is Patrick Johnston. He was my boss for about eight years at the Centre for Philanthropy and I grew to understand how his approach to his job made my job such a delight. He always saw it as his role to bring out the best in me and to make sure I had the tools to succeed. That was the way he pursued his job. He led an organization that was very strong. It made a significant impact and that impact was very largely due to his style of leadership.
Elisa Birnbaum is a freelance journalist, producer and communications consultant living in Toronto. She is also president of Elle Communications and can be reached at: info@ellecommunications.ca.
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