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Arataki, the Let's get real approach to leadership: Leading teams

An environment where your team can thrive

This page is part of Arataki, the Let’s get real approach to leadership, which includes resources on leading self, leading teams, and leading services. It is intended for all leaders across Aotearoa New Zealand. This page focuses on leading others or teams and the quality of kia hono – being connected. This is one of the five qualities of effective Māori leadership and decision making. This section provides resources and support for you to support the wellbeing of team members, and connect them to their purpose and colleagues. Several resources are also included to help lead your team through change.

As a leader, how you present yourself and your actions are crucial in fostering a welcoming environment. This is where your team can thrive and make meaningful contributions to people and whānau you work with, and the healthcare system. Your team values a leader who is grounded in self-awareness and able to connect them to their purpose and to one another.

Kia hono – Be connected

Kia hono is a quality of effective Maori leadership and decision making. Kia hono describes leaders who are connected to community and model inclusiveness in their practice. This section can help you reflect on how you lead and model connectedness as you explore the resources below.

Connected leaders have the following characteristics:

  • are of service to their community
  • build whanaungatanga
  • are team oriented
  • model inclusiveness
  • engage whānau
  • are supported by the people
  • are good listeners to all kinds of people
  • can walk in many worlds.

Source: Henry, E, & Wolfgramm, R. Relational leadership – An indigenous Māori perspective. Leadership, 14(2), 203–19. https://doi.org/10.1177/174271.

Reflect on the people you usually associate with.

Are you wedged in a tight-knit group?
Are you surrounded by a coalition?
Are you getting out and listening to people from all walks of life?
What are some actions you can commit to taking to strengthen, expand and revitalise connectedness

These are topics that can be explored when accessing your supervision, mentoring or coaching sessions.

Reflect on your team leadership

  • What do you know about where you come from, your cultural identity and values?

  • How does this knowledge shape your approach to leading your team and your leadership style?

  • How does this knowledge influence your interactions with people in your team?

  • How does this knowledge inform your decisions and actions?

  • How do you apply your knowledge and identity to navigate challenges, coach and mentor others, and to work with your team toward shared goals?

Leading wellbeing

Leading Wellbeing at Work

Leading Wellbeing at Work is a workshop offered in-person and online by Blueprint for Learning. Apply the principles, practical advice, wellness tips, and action plan templates to promote wellbeing and manage various situations that may arise in the workplace.

Leading Wellbeing at Work
Let's get real's Worker wellbeing

Let's get real's Worker Wellbeing provides practical resources, such as YouTube videos, documents, and editable pdfs, to assist your teams to maintain wellbeing and respond effectively to people accessing health care.

Worker Wellbeing
Manaaki: Wellbeing in times of change

Manaaki - Wellbeing In Times of Change - Find out how to have conversations with your staff about their wellbeing when they return to work after a long break.

Manaaki: Wellbeing in times of change

Leading for Wellbeing

Leading for Wellbeing is a webinar series developed by Kāhui Oranga and featuring conversational-style videos with health leaders across Aotearoa New Zealand. The webinars provide insights into topics such as self-care, health and safety, and compassionate leadership.

Connecting teams to their purpose

Values in action

Our values inform everything we do, and Let’s get real values in action resources prompt teams to reflect on the values that drive their approaches and decisions.

The values cards can be used personally or collaboratively – to explore challenges in working together as a team or to create a shared vision to support service development. This guidance page gives some suggestions as to how the cards may be used with teams. This guide describes the full suite of values in action resources available.

Values in action resources
Let's get real peer coaching micro-learning series

Peer coaching is a non-threatening and hugely beneficial approach that empowers leaders to have productive conversations in various settings. Practical support from peers and colleagues is highly sought after by leaders – this way of knowing leads to a more settled, more confident way of being. This peer coaching micro-learning series provides insight into coaching their peers. There are five sessions, ranging from 5 to 15 minutes in length. The series is hosted on Pūkoro - on your first visit, you'll need to create an account.

Peer coaching series
CPSLE guide

An overview of the mātau ā-wheako consumer, peer support, and lived experience (CPSLE) workforce in mental health and addiction settings. It provides key considerations for leaders to create suitable working environments to allow the CPLSE workforce to thrive.

CPSLE guide
Culture change toolbox

Culture Change Toolbox is a collection of tools and strategies for changing culture in health services from the British Colombia (Canada) Patient Safety and Quality Culture. The toolbox provides leaders with ideas, examples, and exercises for changing culture in their team.

Culture change toolbox

Capability development

Real skills online assessment tool

The Real Skills Online assessment tool covers the seven Real Skills of Let’s get real. The tool can be used to identify priorities for building team capability and to make data-driven decisions about your team’s development. Visit the seven Real Skills page to find resources for development.

Real Skills: Online self-assessment tool
Mental Health Act e-learning

A package of e-learning modules to support the workforce in applying the 2022 changes to the Mental Health Act Guidelines. This package supports a person-centred, human rights-based approach. It can help with your questions, concerns, and decision-making challenges.

Mental Health Act e-learnings

Let's get real: Team action plan template

Let's get real: Team action plan template helps you develop your team’s development plan in relation to the Let’s get real values, attitudes and seven real skills.

Leading your team through change

Change is about individual and organisational learning. People and teams are more open to change when there is a workplace culture of ongoing learning. Successful change requires an intentional process requiring strong leadership, proper planning, team building and collaboration, effective communication, and commitment to continuous improvement. This set of templates will provide you with information to inform decisions and actions around change.

Select one of the leadership concepts to find a resource.

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