November 8th, 2017

Dr. Sean Lessard—Keynote Address, North Grenville Municipal Centre

  • Young people are the way forward.
  • Relationships are a transactional experience (you give but also take back what you learn)
  • Deficit stories aren’t the only stories – shift stories, tell a different kind
  • There are all kinds of possibilities if you hang out with good people
  • How can situations be looked at as a gift?
  • Internal fame should always be celebrated (what is that fame?)
  • Move in a different way – build the shift.
  • Figure out the solution, don’t get stuck on the barriers.
  • Disrupt what we know to recognize a different perspective.
  • NO SPACE (what space do disconnected people need and what does that space look like?)
  • Shift the language – co create the space, reciprocally work to imagine and work differently
  • Learn to listen, look sideways instead of looking at what pats right in front of you – try to understand what might be happening – change the language.
  • When somebody believes in you and guides you, then you can.
  • How will you create dialogue and connections?
  • If we find a reason or reasons to become connected, we are more likely to start and be a part of the journey.
  • Intentional conversations – create and sustain visions.
  • What sustains, not retains people? Kids in school… people at work… people in relationship…
  • How do you make more circles than squares in the spaces you create and move within?
  • There are no straight lines…many pathways exist.

Sean’s Session with Students

  • We are all indigenous (from the earth)
  • Take time to think, you can never do enough to think.
  • Sometimes stories can lift your spirits, because stories can do many things for you, for your heart and mind and spirit.

What does leadership mean?

  • You can make things happen.
  • Turn leadership into action and movement. Don’t let it be a noun.
  • What are the possibilities you can imagine? What conditions need to exist for these possibilities to be realized?
  • There is a difference between leadership and noble acts – leadership considers perspective and space and voice and possibilities. Leadership is about listening and connecting. 
  • Mistakes help us learn.

Documentation by Carrie Seguin