Four Steps Toward Leadership

We're currently in conversation with a leading visual art school about doing a day of Critical Response work with their freshmen. Our contact there asked us to explain how CRP would help the students to build leadership skills. Here's part of my response -- with a bit of bold type for added emphasis:

If we are preparing young people to take positions in the world as artists and to get the most out of a higher education experience in artistic practice, it seems to me that we want to prepare them for a variety of functions: to be articulate in representing their own work; to collaborate effectively with fellow artists, clients, curators and commissioners; to both lead projects and to be an effective team member; and to teach.

Liz Lerman’s Critical Response Process enhances leadership and collaborative capacities by enabling us to recognize and manage bias; by helping us be more articulate about our own work and that of others; by enhancing and constructively channeling our capacity for self-criticism; by sharpening listening skills and assuring that others will listen to us; and by imparting solid, easily grasped techniques for effective communication.

'Nuff said ... for now.