One of Minnesota’s most successful businesswomen, Marilyn Carlson Nelson, was looking for some expert guidance on how to better train the top executives in her company.
A self-described “student of leadership,” Carlson Nelson noticed that “people who rise to the top of an organization are those who can connect the dots. They can do it both internally — across different units and functions — but also externally, with governments and by understanding what’s going on in civil society.”
She wanted more of her colleagues at her firm, the hospitality giant Carlson Companies, to be equipped with those skills. So Carlson Nelson turned to the University of Minnesota to find the latest research and training on so-called cross-sector leadership. It was the early 2000s, and she came up empty.
“The answer was that there was nothing ready made on cross-sector leadership, and not a lot of research on it.” She recalled thinking, “we should probably try to create it ourselves. So we did!”
What Carlson Nelson helped create in 2006 is the Center for Integrative Leadership at the University of Minnesota. Originally a partnership of the Humphrey School of Public Affairs and the Carlson School of Management, it has since grown to include three other professional schools: The College of Education and Human Development, the Law School and the School of Public Health.
Carlson Nelson recounted the Center’s origin story at its 20th anniversary celebration on May 18, an event that brought together dozens of founders, faculty, alumni, students and community partners to reflect on two decades of advancing leadership across sectors.
Building trust across differences
What began as a response to a gap in leadership education has grown into a unique, nationally recognized center dedicated to preparing leaders and students to tackle society’s most complex challenges — problems that no single organization, sector or discipline can solve alone.
“[The Center] creates spaces where people can come together to wrestle with difficult questions, challenge assumptions and strengthen the connective civic capacity our communities need in order to thrive,” said Humphrey School Dean Nisha Botchwey at the anniversary event. “At a time when so many parts of our society feel polarized and fragmented, that work matters deeply. Because collaboration is not always easy. Building trust across differences takes patience, humility and sustained effort. But it is also where some of the most meaningful and lasting change happens.”
The Center focuses on creating learning opportunities through courses and programming, cultivating networks for cross-sector community impact, and advancing vital research to serve students and professionals throughout Minnesota and beyond.
These opportunities take many forms: graduate students can take a class or complete a minor in integrative leadership, and anyone can participate in a digital badging program or workshop. Additionally, the Center is about to launch an online course that will be accessible worldwide to individuals interested in growing their skills for cross-sector leadership.
Bringing together young leaders across Minnesota
One of the Center’s signature initiatives is the Minnesota Young American Leaders Program (MYALP), a leadership program held each May on the University’s Twin Cities campus. Begun in 2019, MYALP brings together leaders from six urban regions across Minnesota for an intensive three-and-a-half day program in residence at the University.
The participants, representing the business, government and nonprofit sectors in their communities, commit to working across boundaries to help their cities and the region prosper more inclusively.
That commitment typically lasts much longer than the length of the program, according to Clare Richards, an MYALP participant in 2019. She shared an example from her hometown of St. Cloud and its new children’s museum that opened last year.
“The museum is wonderful. It is the product of a small group of people who started the idea 10 to 15 years ago and worked away at it,” Richards told the event attendees. “Last year’s MYALP group is working on the children’s museum to bring out its full potential to support community life and revitalization of our downtown. They were not part of the generation that dreamed up the museum, but they are helping bring it to life.”
Another example comes from Duluth, where MYALP alumni worked alongside a group of Carlson School graduate students for a semester to figure out how to implement a specific, targeted financing program aimed at the city's affordable housing shortage.
The team consulted with local housing nonprofits, family service agencies and a bank to map out the logistics of the plan, according to Samantha Silker, the Center's director of operations. Despite strong community interest, she said a subsequent change in federal policy changed conditions too much to allow the program to launch.
This type of cross-sector leadership — focused on innovation, collaboration and resilience — is what’s needed to address “complex, thorny problems” that local communities often face, Silker said. “There’s a lot of value in individuals working together and making connections, to lay the groundwork for future collaborations.”
Vision for the future
While the concept of cross-sector leadership has become more widely recognized over the past two decades, the center remains unique.
Kathy Quick, academic co-director of the center and a professor at the Humphrey School, said it’s the only university-based center in the country focused specifically on the topic.
“What makes our work especially meaningful is that it’s rooted in Minnesota. Our state has a long tradition of collaboration across business, government and nonprofit sectors, and that creates a unique environment for this work,” she said. “There’s a spirit of partnership here that you don’t find everywhere. Relative to many other places, Minnesotans are deeply committed to working together to solve problems.”
That same spirit of collaboration will guide the center’s growth going forward. Quick said its goals over the next five years include expanding the MYALP program to more participants and more cities in Minnesota; strengthening connections with alumni and community networks to support additional problem-solving initiatives; and offering consultations to external entities. “The demand is definitely there,” she said.
Marilyn Carlson Nelson continues to be an active and thoughtful advisor to the center’s leaders. Her original premise remains as relevant today as it was two decades ago: the most effective leaders are those who can connect the dots, and bring together people from different backgrounds, perspectives, and institutions.
“The center’s work to help people in communities to bridge across sectors is a resource for all of us to do better, together,” she told the anniversary event attendees. “I am so proud of the Center for Integrative Leadership, for giving my dream wings. I had many hopes when we first talked about this, and the center has far exceeded them. And our work is not done, so let’s keep going!”
