"What is a comment, thought, or action from one of your classmates this semester that has re-framed your perspective on leadership in some way?”

"What is a comment, thought, or action from one of your classmates this semester that has re-framed your perspective on leadership in some way?”

The pipe class exercise really re- framed my perspective on leadership, questioning the role leadership. The goal was for everyone to work together if you were on team A or B for the class exercise, which was successful the first time and everyone was excited to get the golf ball in the cup. Before team A was successful in the exercise, one of the B team members had to come up with a great plan and communicate the plan thoroughly to both teams, than make an attempt to get the golf ball in the cup. Before I get into more detail I would like to share my perspective of being on the B team and what made me question the roles of a leader. Other B team members had ideas how to successfully get the golf ball in the cup before I could speak up.

I feel that it was best and respectful to make suggestions on how to perfect their idea or if the ball was picking up to much momentum in a certain area. I addressed B team members one on one so they could hear me clearly since have a soft spoken voice and wouldn’t be able to yell across the room. One of the B team members came up with a great plan that seemed to be working and both teams worked together to make his idea successful. After the first successful run, everyone was motivated to come up with new ideas to complete the next goal. I threw some ideas out there to both team A and B but I don’t think I was heard. so I went back into pyshically helping position the height of the pipes or letting team A know where we needed 1 or 2 pipes to continue the motion of the golf ball to the cup. When both teams started to yell about strategies, talking over one another, cutting each other off, and not listening to one another I started to question the role of a leader.

I thought a leader had to be loud and have an out spoken voice in order to be heard but that wasn’t the case in this situation. I feel in most situations such as this one, it depends on the audience, peers, or associates they have to listen, hear, and be respectful of others. I realize that my weakness is my voice; I have to speak up first before someone else comes up with the same idea that I have or comment but we all must listen attentively with respect.

In our textbook Exploring Leadership it talks about “I”-“You”-“We” and I bring this up because the company I work for just started to us this leadership strategy but now I have a greater understanding of it. For us as students, to be an effective leader we must understand when to use these to have a greater understanding of self and others. In this method “I” focuses on the individual, “you” emphasizes on listening/engaging and “we” puts attention on equals/ community. In chapter 5 it defines pluralism groups which mean a “plethora of differences that need to be understood to accomplish shared goals”. I think if everyone of us would applied this to the exercise and pluralistic leadership we would of made our second goal successfully. But I will always try to remember this quote to be an effective leader, “communication requires one to listen with empathy listening with your ears, eyes, and heart”.