The Human Rights Leadership Lab
A Live Online Course for Human Rights Leaders
The Human Rights Leadership Lab is a supportive and reflective learning space to develop your leadership presence, skills and impact.
This is not a generic leadership course: the Human Rights Leadership Lab is designed to meet your specific needs as a leader in the human rights field. In small groups (cohorts of no more than 11 people), we will co-create a safe, reflective space to explore human rights values-based leadership and how to put it into practice in our organisations.
Apply by
18th April 2025
Starts on
29th April 2025
Format
Six half days over 6 weeks
(a total of 24 hours live training)
Fee
Sliding scale – IGOs, NGOs and HRDs
Get in touch!
The America’s Edition
Our April Lab has been scheduled to coordinate with Western and European time zones. The Lab will be delivered in an online live, interactive format, split over six weeks. View schedule.
This is a practical professional development course. You will acquire concrete tools to practice human rights values-based leadership and take your leadership ability, skills and presence to the next level.
We will explore organisational culture and different leadership styles and competencies. We will learn how to better motivate, empower and lead our people and build healthier and more sustainable working environments using a human rights values-based leadership approach. Together we will reflect upon some of the practical challenges and dilemmas that you face as a leader in a human rights space, including how to deal with traumatic content and the stressful nature of the work. You will acquire new self-leadership strategies, skills and tools and be empowered to lead more mindfully and do more impactful human rights work. Click here to view the Leadership Lab Modules course content.
The Lab was a fantastic space for self-reflection and growth. I am profoundly thankful that in the short yet meaningful time we shared, I was able to lead so many tools to be happier while making an impact in organisations and the human rights field. The balance between factual information and peer learning is exceptional.
The lab is a therapeutic space for human rights leaders who have spent years feeling like unheard, alone or helpless. It is a space that is cathartic and allows for you to find a community that has been through a similar journey. The space provides you with a structured set of people tools that you can use to solve issues that we face as leaders each day. It provides a school of thought to lean on.
You will learn how to…
- Put human rights values-based leadership into practice in your daily work
- Take your leadership presence and impact to the next level by learning new competencies and skills
- Further develop your leadership style and be more effective in responding to different situations and the diverse needs of staff
- Enhance your leadership ability and emotional intelligence though greater self-awareness and self-reflection
- Empower, motivate and support staff using a coaching approach
- Implement strategies to lead yourself and others in ways that improve organisational culture as well as individual and team health and wellbeing
- Formulate and implement individual and organisational strategies to prevent, mitigate and respond to vicarious trauma, stress and burnout
Leadership Lab Modules
The idea that human rights values and principles motivate, inform and inspire us as leaders is the central theme of the Human Rights Leadership Lab and shows up in all six 4-hour modules.
Module 1: Values-Based Leadership & Organisational Culture
Learn about human rights values-based leadership and how you can put your values into practice as a leader.
Gain a clear understanding of the challenges and opportunities of organisational culture and the interplay between culture and leadership.
Module 2: Leadership Styles & Emotional Intelligence Framework
Learn six different leadership styles as well as how and when to use them to get results in different situations and support the diverse needs of staff.
Understand emotional intelligence and why it is a superpower for human rights values-based leaders.
Module 3: Coaching to Empower, Inspire & Motivate Staff
Learn how to use a coaching approach to empower and motivate staff to reach their maximum potential.
Develop key coaching competencies including active listening and powerful questioning while learning how to create an inspiring and reflective space.
Module 4: Open Space Leadership Lab Work
Share and reflect upon real leadership challenges and/or opportunities brought by members of our cohort, that we work though using a group coaching approach.
Module 5: Leading Yourself & Others Doing Human Rights Work
Understand the occupational hazards of human rights work and its potential negative impacts on the mental health of you and your staff.
Learn how to formulate and implement individual and organisational strategies to prevent, mitigate and respond to vicarious trauma and burnout.
Module 6: Self-Leadership & Self-Care
Understand how great leadership starts with leading yourself.
Formulate a practical action plan to hold yourself accountable for your own self-care as a foundation for preventing burnout and chronic stress at work.
We will start with a deep dive into our underlying values, recommitting ourselves to our individual and organisational human rights missions. Next, we will explore different leadership styles and competencies. We then turn to explore how to motivate and empower staff using a coaching approach, we will practice our coaching skills on some real-life leadership challenges brought by members of the cohort. The latter part of the Leadership Lab focuses on leadership strategies to mitigate the mental health risks of human rights work. We will finish by crafting our own practical action plans for self-leadership and self-care.
We will start the course with some ground rules so we can co-create a reflective yet practical space. As we go, we will play with different methods to find out what works best for our cohort. We will also engage in some traditional training exercises, group coaching, facilitated dialogue and preparatory self-reflective work.
Before each four-hour session, you will have about an hour of preparation material, including short readings, assessments, and reflective questions. If you engage with the preparatory work a few days before we meet, you will arrive with some nicely marinated reflections!
The April 2025 Cohort will run through the Human Rights Centre, University of Essex.
The Human Rights Leadership Lab combines reading, sharing, self-reflection, and group discussion to deliver a course that has equipped me with new knowledge and skills to apply in my work. The course content was thought provoking and also practical. Participating in The Human Rights Leadership Lab has validated some my experiences working in human rights over the past decade. That combination – feeling validated and equipped with new knowledge and skills – is incredibly empowering!
The Human Rights Leadership Lab is THE leadership course for human rights professionals!
You will get…
- Six 4-hour live group sessions ( a total of 24 hours of training) with your peers and a course convenor, Liz Griffin
- A 120+ page Leadership Lab Workbook, which contains preparatory materials, key information from each module, reflective questions, engaging exercises, and leadership development resources
- A leadership framework self-assessment tool to determine your current leadership strengths and identify areas to develop
- Email office hours with the course facilitator to share reflections, ask questions, and explore your leadership development
- An option to sign up for 1.5 hour individual leadership coaching sessions (for an additional fee). These laser-focused individual sessions will help you create a personal plan tailored to accelerate your leadership development and growth. Find out more about individual coaching.
Is the Human Rights Leadership Lab for you?
You want to…
Elevate your leadership
Become a better, more self-aware and confident leader by developing your leadership presence, skills and ability, drawing upon various leadership styles and human rights values.
Gain new leadership skills
Learn how to empower, motivate and support your staff to reach their maximum potential and do more impactful human rights work.
Build healthy organisations
Gain practical tools to build healthier and capable organisations as well as formulate self-leadership strategies and action plans to support the health and wellbeing of you and your staff.
Grow your network
Interact with a diverse group of like-minded human rights leaders developing their leadership presence and skills to add value to their organisations and staff.
You are a leader who is…
- A manager or supervisor working in the social justice sector seeking professional development
- Seeking confidence, new skills and a broader peer network
- Looking to take your leadership in the social justice / human rights sector to the next level
- Working to develop your self-awareness, self-reflection and wellbeing
- Seeking practical tools to support teams dealing with traumatic content and high levels of stress
Organisations and foundations wishing to offer the Human Rights Leadership Lab internally to staff or grantees please get in touch.
Important Dates
Registration Open!
Registration Closes: 18th April 2025
Early bird discount if you apply before 31st January 2025
Module One
Tuesday 29 April
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Module Two
Wednesday 30 April
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Module Three
Tuesday 6 May
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Module Four
Tuesday 13 May
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Module Five
Tuesday 27 May
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Module Six
Tuesday 3 June
London 14:30 / Europe 15:30 / EST 09:30 / CST 07:30 / PST 06:30
Please make sure you can attend all the dates before submitting your application. Thank you!
The cohort is limited to a maximum of 11 participants.
The Human Rights Leadership Lab provides you with a reflective learning space to explore how you can put your human rights values into practice in your organisational processes, leadership style and daily work.
The Spring Cohort will run through the Human Rights Centre, University of Essex.
Course Facilitator – Liz Griffin
Liz Griffin has over two decades of global leadership experience working for the UN, NGOs & academic institutions, rising to the level of professor of international human rights law.
Liz Griffin is Fellow at the Human Rights Centre, University of Essex and Extraordinary Lecturer at the Centre for Human Rights, University of Pretoria. In addition, Liz is a Partner of the Human Rights Resilience Project.
Liz is a professionally trained and certified leadership coach and mentor who empowers leaders in human rights, humanitarian and climate justice spaces. She helps leaders and organisations to make bigger strategic social and climate justice impacts, nurture leadership ability and skills and foster healthy organisations and people.
You can find out more about Liz here.
