We are a community of purpose, focused on the delivery of meaningful outcomes.
To bring this to life, we…
• Take time to reflect on our purpose and reflect on whether, and how, our activities contribute to it.
• Ensure that our work and projects are aligned to ELN’s mission and strategy.
• Set objectives for our work that are ambitious, achievable and consistently monitored.
• Embrace feedback, regularly asking stakeholders for it and taking time to evaluate projects.
• Strive to ensure that our policy and decisions are underpinned by world-class research.
• Consult well, taking direction positively and respecting job boundaries.
• Collaborate enthusiastically in the team, the Network and more widely in pursuit of our goals.
We avoid…
• Getting distracted by projects that may be interesting but don’t necessarily further our team goals.
• Taking on too many things.
• Making promises or committing to deadlines that we can’t keep.
We model the honesty, integrity, transparency and impartiality essential to our credibility.
To bring this to life, we…
• Serve, and consistently act in the interests of, the organisation and our Network.
• Strive to be open and transparent in the information that we share and communicate to each other, the Network, and publicly.
• Work to ensure we are not dependent on any single constituency and can operate impartially from any government or other stakeholder.
• Maintain high standards of research, communication and advocacy ethics.
• Admit our mistakes.
We avoid…
• Confusing fact and opinion.
• Consuming one-sided opinion.
• Hiding issues or concerns: we are open about challenges and issues we face.
• A culture of blame: we strive to treat mistakes as learning opportunities.
We are creative, innovative and optimistic about the future.
To bring this to life, we…
• Seek leadership for ourselves, the team and our Network.
• Celebrate victories, regardless how big or small, and respond positively to setbacks.
• Actively encourage bold and imaginative ideas, questions and unusual views – including from places we wouldn’t normally seek them.
• Help to make the organisation sustainable for the future by bringing ideas and suggestions for fundraising.
• Balance hope and realism and focus on practical ways forward, informed by the interests of multiple stakeholders.
• Take measured and balanced risks.
We avoid…
• Tunnel vision or having a closed mindset.
• Becoming negative or pessimistic if we don’t win every battle.
• Jumping to the next project without creating time and space to learn and evaluate.
We seek out opportunities to collaborate and build coalitions as we grow and nurture our community.
To bring this to life, we…
• Are strategic about our partnerships, identifying organisations or people that add value to our work and where we can build win-win relationships.
• Promote and seek open dialogue, common ground and mutual security.
• Trust colleagues’ positive intent and believe that we are striving towards the same collective goals, recognising that, together, we can all be more than the sum of our parts.
• Share knowledge and power, and give due credit for colleagues’ work and contributions, recognising that although we want the ELN to flourish what is even more important is the achievement of the ELN’s goals.
• Strive to resolve disagreement and conflict informally and directly wherever possible and appropriate.
• Champion the ELN, and our work, when networking and collaborating with partners.
We avoid…
• Acting in isolation and not coordinating within the team., the Network or more widely.
• Seeing colleagues as competitors rather than collaborators.
• Duplication of effort and work.
• Relying on just one type of communication, choosing instead whatever is most effective.
• Reinventing the wheel when others may already have more developed thinking / resources.
We respect each other and our individual and Network diversity. We all contribute to creating a culture that is inclusive, compassionate and kind.
To bring this to life, we…
• Go out of our way to understand and learn about diversity, equity, inclusion and intersectionality.
• Draw on our diversity and mutual respect to achieve stronger outcomes.
• Are culturally sensitive and open-minded to other approaches based on differing cultural contexts.
• Seek out opportunities to diversify our teams and activities including attracting and supporting diverse talent and perspectives within our staff team and Network.
• Encourage and support everyone to contribute in our spaces, activities and meetings, especially those who may be under-represented and lack agency / power.
• Offer a safe space for dialogue, actively listening, taking time to hear about the experiences and views of others and communicating clearly.
• Acknowledge that we are all constantly learning and embrace feedback if there are occasions when we don’t get it right.
We avoid…
• Responding defensively if someone gives us feedback and/or shares their own experiences.
• Thinking that our own perspective is the only valid viewpoint.
• Making assumptions about each other or our work.
• Using micro-aggressions, but also acknowledge and apologise if our actions unintentionally have a negative impact on others.
We nurture opportunities for learning, development and growth, encouraging, supporting and constructively challenging each other.
To bring this to life, we…
• Strive to create a trust-based environment of psychological safety, where others can thrive.
• Understand and consider each other’s strengths, taking opportunities to draw on our talents and skills.
• Look out for colleagues’ health (mental and physical), checking in if we’re worried and helping each other to do things that protect wellbeing.
• Protect our own and others’ work/life balance, staying aware of our own limits, boundaries and mental health triggers, including challenging workload if it becomes unmanageable.
• Promote and share learning and development opportunities that may be useful for colleagues.
• Reflect on our own learning and strive to apply to our day to day work.
• Ensure clarity around roles, responsibilities and professional boundaries in the workplace.
We avoid…
• Monopolising great development opportunities.
• Ignoring individual talents.
• Being unreasonably directive or intrusive.
• Creating workload issues by delegating work without support or guidance.