Collaboration and Leadership – A conversation with Stephani Roy McCallum
As we come close to summer, I look back at the various guests I’ve had the privilege of speaking with on the Cool Collaborations podcast. My first guest, Stephani Roy McCallum, and I had a fantastic conversation way back in October of 2020, and I am re-releasing that very first episode today.
The unifying theme in our conversation is leadership, and how we show up when we collaborate. Here’s a couple of the highlights from the episode:
You Don’t Need to Agree
Steph speaks of her relations with her family for setting the roots of the understanding that we don’t need to agree with someone to be in a loving relationship with them. This is a universal truth, in my opinion, that we should throughout life, let alone into collaboration. It’s ok to have views that are not shared by others and those views don’t define our relationship with others.
“You can totally disagree with someone and be in a loving relationship with them. Like at a fundamental level, you can believe different things.”
What a valuable lesson to have learned at a young age. Our human brains are fond of cognitive shortcuts and biases, so we will often ‘classify’ people by their views. Political party, religion, sexuality and any other viewpoint we might have becomes our identity. I’m reminded of the conversation with Jorge Avilé (Episode #6) who spoke of seeing everyone for their ‘humanness’ and getting past seeing people as labels.
Nobody is Born Knowing
We don’t pop out of our mothers knowing how to have the kind of open conversations that lead to good collaboration. Steph would call them ‘hard conversations’. Now I’ve spoken with a few people, Anthony O’Keeffe (Episode #17) is a recent example, that would tell us that collaboration and socialization are innate; they’re instincts. Listening again to the conversation with Steph, I think she is saying that some conversations go beyond our instinctual abilities.
“No one’s born knowing how to have these conversations. So you know we need support to build our capacity, skills, and knowledge in the ways we show up to have the conversation. But once we do know that, everything changes.”
Be a Whole Person
The kinds of high emotion spaces and conversations that Steph is talking about are difficult and often stomach churning, because there are huge unknowns as to how it might go. But also, it’s about ‘showing up as a whole person’, as Steph would say, and being vulnerable. It is frightening.
Collaboration can be the same, although I would argue not as intense. Putting ourselves out there on behalf of a cause or representing a group gives us a lot to live up to, and we just don’t know what the results will be. Steph speaks to being committed to the people in the room first and putting the purpose second. In a way, it seems a bit counterintuitive to shift the focus away from your group’s purpose in order to be more likely of achieving that purpose.
“When you’re in it, when you’re in that discussion, then it matters more to you and you show up as a whole person. When you show up as a human being, as a whole person, instead of someone in a particular role, you invite others to do the same.”
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It is a real treat to listen again to Stephanie Roy McCallum and I am so grateful that she anchored the beginning of my foray into podcasting. There really is no better first guest on a podcast focused on collaboration.
Happy Collaborating.
Scott Millar, through Collaboration Dynamics, often works as a "peacemaker" by gathering people with different experiences and values and helping them navigate beyond their differences to tackle complex problems together. As the host of the Cool Collaborations podcast where he explores fun stories and insights of successful collaboration with guests from around the world, and then dives into what made them work. Cool Collaborations is currently available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and Spotify.
