By Nolan Madden The county is primed to train its future leaders as it begins enrollment for the upcoming 2016 Leadership Academy Program, which opens Jan. 20. Now in its third year, the academy was the result of the county’s 2013 strategic five-year planning goal to improve team development across all county divisions. The application process is open to all interested county employees, so classes contain a diverse mix of department supervisors and workers, as well as elected officials. Due to high interest, students will be chosen by random drawing to fill the class’s 40 slots, with 20 each picked from south county and north county locations. This year’s nine-course, 11-month academy session will run through Nov. 2 and is set to cross-train students in its gamut of leadership topics, including Leadership and Team Building, Innovative Thinking, Transition to Role of Supervisor, Finance/Budget, Conflict Resolution, Performance Management/HR Practices, Change Management, Managing in a Political Environment, and Ethics and IT. According to program guidelines, persons who were not selected in a prior year are guaranteed a class spot for the current year, noted County Human Resources Specialist Laura Carrell. Some of last year’s participants shared their enthusiasm about the training course. “I liked mingling with everyone across the county, especially in the combined classes, where you get to know everyone and put faces with names of people from other departments, to know who works where and what they do for the county,” said County Senior Account Specialist Rebecca Robertson. “The classes are interactive, so you get to talk with other people and discuss what you would do in certain situations, so it’s a very active experience. “The year-end project presentations are the most fun, to me, because you get to see everyone’s creative side; some people did skits, and others did poems or PowerPoint presentations,” Robertson related. “The leadership academy was very good. I found it to be not as time consuming as I had anticipated, so I was happily surprised about that,” said Navajo County Emergency Management Coordinator Catrina Jenkins. “I didn’t think it was too extensive. The courses were informative, and I retained a lot. It broadens our perspective, whereas we may typically have the tendency to go to our offices and work with a bit of tunnel vision,” she said.