NORTHERN ARIZONA UNIVERSITY
that a quantum leader does ,” he explains . “ A very concrete example is driving leadership responsibilities to the front lines of the organisation . I ' ve tried very , very hard to drive leadership as far down into the organisation as I can , past management , right to the front lines so that people feel empowered to lead from the front .”
Putting this into practice , NAU has created fusion teams that draw experts from disciplines across the organisation to achieve a particular project outcome , both in terms of the human implication as well as the technological . It is a structural rethink that epitomises much of how Burrell applies quantum leadership ’ s core concepts with the broader purview as the university ’ s Vice President for IT and Chief Information Officer .
“ We ' re simply trying to connect what we know about technology in the world and empirical sense to what we know about people in the emotional sense , synthesising that with this kind of inner knowledge and spiritual sense ,” he says . “ That extends to creating shared governance to drive technology agendas , priorities and actions by drawing from a large range of people , and their voices ; to enable different perspectives and inputs that ultimately help guide the decisions that we ' re bringing forth .”
Holistic approach to digital transformation In terms of digital transformation , the backbone of any modern CIO ’ s responsibilities , it is a logical next step rather than a quantum leap .
“ There ' s a certain resistance to technological change , and particularly nowadays I think we ' ve come throug a very intense period in response to the global pandemic ,” Burrell says . “ But digital transformation is very quantum in its
256 March 2022