Creative Leadership Program
A program promoting broad prosperity in the context of renewable abundance
This program brought together transformational leaders from all over, to develop their leadership skills broadly and to connect with a like spirited inspirational community in a 12-day immersive experience, spread over three on campus modules.
program overview
The program wove together three dimensions – personal, professional and planet transformation – and curated a safe space for participants to reconnect with their own purpose, assisted their resulting transformational needs and supported the redesign of their life paths, fuelled by their regenerative energy.
The prevailing mindset favoured inclusion on the basis of value alignment, encouraged diversity and complementarity, promoted creative collaboration and co-creation, invited humility and peer to peer learning and celebration. Agendas were transparent and intentions were shared every day – all in the hope to promote broad prosperity in the context of renewable abundance.
The Creative Leadership Programs started in 2015 under the THNK brand and starting in autumn 2020 transitioned to the REBUNDANCE brand.
It was a highly curated breeding ground for transformation of participant’s contribution to planet regeneration. While exploring and connecting with real, pressing and inspiring societal challenges, some of the concepts developed during the creative leadership programs took shape with real impact in different parts of the world!
One of these projects, fully embedded in Lisbon’s ecosystem, is the Zero Waste Lab.
Facilitation Language: English
program description
WHAT WE OFFERed
The REBUNDANCE Creative Leadership Program ran over 9 months, with in total 12 days on-campus (pandemic permitting), divided over three modules (four-day each). It was an immersive experience, deeply rooted in the greater Lisbon ecosystem, addressing global challenges that were strongly embedded in the local reality (supported by institutional partners). Some modules were rolled out online due to circumstances.
Walking the talk of planet regeneration and community resilience, the program supported a holistic mindset shift and sense making in these times of unpredictable and radical change, while learning by doing.
WHOM WE SERVE
Participants in the Creative Leadership Program were leaders seasoned through the ups and downs of innovation and business. They worked with our faculty as peers, co-creating the program and helping each other on their individual pursuits.
This program kick-started a lifelong journey of creative leadership and resulted in a global creative community, engaged in articulating the relevant questions and in finding solutions for true societal needs in the context of building a “totally good future” for all.
Although professional and personal backgrounds were highly diverse, each class grew its own unique, common identity and raised the level of commitment to the necessary transformation.
thank you!
- To Lisbon THNKers
We thank you all for trusting us to lead you on this learning journey and for embracing the class, faculty and team as well as the full experience with its contents. We honour all the wonderful moments we spent together and your Challenge concepts! - To THNK global brand We are deeply grateful for entrusting the use of the THNK brand to us between 2015 and 2020, allowing us to build our own interpretation of all the purposeful intentions so we could build resilience while rolling out creative leadership programs.
- To Oceanário de Lisboa
We are humbled and grateful for this wonderful organization’s generosity in hosting all THNK Lisbon cohorts, and for adding stability, purpose and magic to our leadership journey. - To Turismo de Portugal
We are empowered by your recognition of our contribution to society and to our ability to stimulate creativity in teams. - To Câmara Municipal de Lisboa
We are touched and grateful for the vision and support of Graça Fonseca and Duarte Cordeiro in the kick off of THNK Lisbon. - Municipality of Lisbon | Challenge topic partner
- Tourism Board of Portugal | Challenge topic partnership
- EPAL | Location partner
- Oceanário de Lisboa | Location partner
- Parques de Sintra-Monte da Lua | Location partner
- Quinta das Sequóias | Location partner
- Sociedade Filarmónica Democrática Timbre Seixalense | Location partner
- Bio-Miosotis | Supplier of organic foods
- Crumb Miolo | Supplier of low gluten (wheat free) bread
- Quiosque da Natureza | Supplier of organic foods
- Susana Carvalho | Supplier of Paleo Bread
- Val das Dúvidas | Supplier of Ancestral Agricultural Practices foods
PARTICIPANT TAKEAWAYS
Speaking with participants, whether immediately or a year or two or more after they have completed the program, we are grateful to hear the following appreciation:
- it is a privilege to reset their purpose, reframe their life and redesign their vision in the context of our creative leadership programs
- we provide participants with a set of actionable frames, tools, and common language to set-up a structured process for innovation and impact
- we hold an inspiring collaborative space for creative leaders to realign with their purpose via curiosity, to connect with the system via compassion, to engage with action via courage
- we hold a safe space for the new to emerge
- we enable them to learn from social entrepreneurs about meaning and relevance, from corporate intrapreneurs to explore the power of reach, from commercial entrepreneurs about how to be nimble and agile in seizing development opportunities, from government officials to bridge between innovation and regulation and from environmental entrepreneurs how to humbly learn from Nature
testimonials
“Training is a part of Oceanário’s DNA and we invest a lot in it – from our experience there are courses that give you technical skills, there are courses that try to deliver leadership skills – most of them do not have a long lasting impact. THNK achieves something we have never seen before – it changes people for good.“
— Joana Pereira
“Everything about the program – facilitators, places, exercises and, of course, the fabulous organic food we were offered every day – was amazingly prepared, creating a very comfortable environment for learning, for insights about self and, of course, for moments of laughter and celebration. A special thanks to the local team responsible for creating this amazing experience.“
— Catarina Cruz (Colabor)
“Being part of THNK Lisbon class 6 was one of the most amazing Learning experiences I’ve had in my life. It connected me with unknown potentials and allowed me to create with others in a challenging way. Many mindsets were rethought, and new life projects emerged.“
— Catalina Zuleta Triana (Gimnasio Fontana)
“I have been through tools and leadership programmes many times in my working life. For me, THNK is the out-of-the-box, holistic, earth-shaking experience. Every educational system should have THNK methods.I am very grateful for the challenging and conscious new path THNK has opened for me.“
— Assunção Albuquerque (Entrepreneur)
“At the very core of my life and professional purpose is to create environments to raise awareness. Through the THNK program I found not only tools, methodologies, and insights to enhance those ultimate goals, I also discovered a local and international community of change makers. I’m extremely grateful for THNK Lisbon’s tailor-made approach to our Portuguese context and also how it is reverberating daily on my class mates and beyond.“
— Arthur Mendes (Boom Festival)
“THNK Lisbon creative leadership program was a deeply transformative experience, both personally and professionally. I had always heard about what it takes to be a leader, but until you go through the program you won’t really know and feel what it means, it will stick and get below your skin. The community is the soul of the journey and the transformation is real because it is shared.“
— Francesco Rocca (Impact Hub)
“Participating in the Lisbon program exceeded all my personal expectations. The learning experience based on unconventional methods helped me to achieve results for my professional and personal development.“
— Victor Vieira (Lisboa E-nova, Urban Resilience, Circularity)
“THNK School of Creative Leadership in Lisbon was an extraordinary experience on many levels. A joyful immersion into experiential learning. A diverse group of strangers soon became family. Doors with new perspectives and tools opened, with the caring guidance of facilitators. We immersed ourselves into pristine nature. Ideas emerged and evolved. We studied human and natural systems, and learned about the magic of syntropy. And the delicious vital food alone was worth signing up for.“
— Alan Laubsch (Ocean Advocate, Finance, Risk, And Blockchain Technology)
“It was a beautiful and meaningful experience for me. Beautiful. I met good people who want to change their world and the way they see the World. A fantastic team, with joy, dedication and professionalism. I was spoiled. The food was excellent. The spaces, striking. I had the possibility to learn about myself, to grow. Significant. Good, practical content designed to trigger action. Good toolbox. Non-formal learning based on personal experience and supported by the group. Learning by doing, using mind and heart.“
— Marco De Abreu:(Fundação Terra Agora)