11/05/2010 To understand how leaders….
In the morning I just woke up in a good mood with lovely nice sunshine. when I was suping my delicious coffee from one of my favorite mug , I thought how much I neglet blog writing and still I am trying to run away from blog. Then I decide to get rid of all of my conrens about everything and to do something with pozitive energy. Believing pozitive energy will affect my perception which makes me more poverful than ever like shield carried by a warrior .
So when checked module web side to find a topic which will be able to talk about it, I stuck in the begining of the module aim.
''Leadership and Excellence module aim is to understand how leader develop, facilitate and manage the achievement of the mission and vision via a clear stakeholder focus strategy, supported by relevant policies, objectives, targets and plans implemented through apropriate action and behaviours that conform to developed values reguired for long term success, thereby ensuring that the organization's management system is developed and implemented. ''
When I read all these big words, I thought that It is nicely writen a bounch of words and this aim does not look like real!!
I think that this is the biggest problem about this module , nothing is simply understandable and nothing is conrete. Since module starts my group have been gone through two case studies and we did not have firey arguements or challenging things or something joeyful and suprising or something torturing. If I have to be honest about learning part , I did not learn anything so far.
Last case study my group ( team 1) realized that our strategy was not the most reasonable one within all stratagies and it does not have enough opportunities to rescue or improve company ( WaveRiders ) as financially. Therefore couple of team members suggested to change our strategy , I suggested that we should stick in strategy 5 , because It will be much more creative one for us because of difficulties. Also If we find ways to survive our company with this strategy , It will impress others. Then everyone agree with me , we decided to stand behind strategy 5.
Yet the problem is we could not extend or change anything in strategy , because we have to fallow 5 doing steps in it. I did not want to develop new product for liesure times sector. I thought that we should produce a new product for military sector because less competiters and company has good connections in the government. Also developing new product takes almost 2 years and It is expecting that militory sectors will pick up wtihing two years. It might be good opportunity for our company.
During the team meeting , I asked so many times silly questions to conflict our strategy . I do remember that I think Oliver could not bear with me and he asked me that did you read strategy 5 ? and I answer to him with silly glance yes.
In the end we just wrote the most reasonable and possible points which we should write for it and that was it . If I have to be honest , I did not learn anything and It was not the most creative case study for me.
In conclusion I am not blamig anyone for anything , also I am not the person who makes a criticism about everything like machine. Yet I have joined in Leadership and Excellence module to understand how I can improve and enrich my leadership skills. I have never made doubt about my leadership skills , because It is naturaly gifted and I can not fly in the face of nature.
The summary of four days ;
What I did learn from two case studies - nothing
Do I have any questions in my mind after class, seminar and four days ? I do not have any question ( nothing )
Do I worry about it ? ???? Yes
What should I do to make this team work and module more exiting than as usual ??? I have still no idea
Am I bored ???? Yes
I would love to share one of my favorite quotes ;
'' Brother stand the pain; Escape the poison of your impulses. The sky will bow to your beauty, if you do. Learn to light the candle. Rise with the sun. Turn away from the cave of your sleeping. That way a thorn expands to a rose. A particular glows with the universal. ''
11 May 2010 13:53
| 
Comments (2)
| 
Report a problem
Loading…
Ben
Sometimes I think I’ve got a similar problem – it can feel like leadership is a quality that is born into some people and not into others. My advice would be to stop thinking of leadership as a quality and to look at it as a thought process.
If the aim of the leader is to “develop, facilitate and manage” the mission, how do they do it and what skills do they use? Well the answer is to have a “clear stakeholder focused strategy” which is made up of “policies, objectives, targets and plans”.
So if your mission is to make money by selling a product, your strategy would be to increase volume of products you sell and maximising your margin on each product (two objectives). The first skill a leader uses is therefore the ability to understand that the strategy as a whole is made up of separate parts and to be able to see their actions in the context of the big picture.
The second skill is really just an extension of this; to make sure that your targets and plans are actioned in such a way that they promote long term success – that you recognise the constituent parts of the policies and objectives that work towards your overall goal. So a leader goes beyond thinking “what will make money today” and explores how they can optimise their revenue stream in the future. So maybe as part of keeping your overheads down you decide that no members of staff will get a pay-rise. The risk is that your staff will move to another company so with the goal of long term success you have to find a way to balance staff retention with maintaining low overheads.
In the terms of my company (we sell fridge freezers ) we can see that this mind set can be applied to every area of how we work. So in order to grow we recognise that every area of the company is linked to every other area of the company and that a cut in any of our costs has a negative impact somewhere else down the line. The smart leader therefore promotes a holistic approach to management which balances immediate gains with the long term strategy.
12 May 2010, 14:12
Paul Roberts
A good reflection Demet. Clearly you practised leadership and persuaded your colleagues to stick with strategy 5. What were your key influencing skills?
Although for the original exercise the strategy had to be selected without change, this does not follow for the mini-projects. That was simply an assumption on your part.
If you are bored, what can you do to enrich the mini-project experience? If the answer is nothing you are saying that the situation cannot be changed or that you cannot influence your colleagues to change. Is there nothing that you can do to find something interesting in the opportunities presented? Are there no aspects of leadership that you wish to explore?
12 May 2010, 14:23
Add a comment
You are not allowed to comment on this entry as it has restricted commenting permissions.