Josh Schwartz’s Initial Leadership Development Plan
1. Describe my strengths and areas of development in regards to the five practices of exemplary leadership.
In terms of the five practices of exemplary leadership, I tend to see myself excelling in areas such as encouraging the heart and enabling others to act. Areas that I need to develop more include challenging the process and modeling the way. The areas I excel in, encouraging the heart and enabling others to act, comes from a strong belief in the power and ability of a group mentality. As a playful and lighthearted person, it is easy for me to encourage and enable others. I tend to work better in a group that maintains a positive attitude throughout the project. In previous group projects, I have worked well when dealing with differences of opinions with the group and creating an atmosphere where everyone feels as though their job is essential to the process. Although I see myself as a person who enables others to act, I do not accomplish this by increasing my own self-determination. Instead, I am more capable of enabling others through fostering a strong bond within our group. When I played football for my high school, I was designated a captain. It wasn’t because of my ability to share an inspired vision of winning the championship with my team or my ability to set an example by setting values that were in line with our goals. I was voted captain because I have the unique ability to inspire others through keeping a positive and lighthearted environment. The team didn’t look to me as an example for hard work and dedication but rather a facilitator of a positive, communal environment. As previously stated, areas that need improvement include challenging the process. I have never been one to challenge a process once I have already found my comfort zone. A specific example took place at my last job as a barista. The coffee shop wasn’t doing enough business to stay open for much longer. In a last ditch effort, our manager asked if we had any ideas to bring in more customers. At the time I didn’t have much experience within the service industry and held my ideas to myself worried that they would be shot down. Although the coffee shop didn’t last much longer, there were interesting ideas including an art show and a music show that did bring in some new business. I was unable to challenge the process by which we sold coffee because I did not have the audacity to give my ideas to my manager.
2. Plan for Challenging the Process- From 5 Practices of Leadership
Step One: Where am I now?
I currently struggle to challenge the process when I have already found my comfort zone. I believe this comes from a distinct anxiety that I get from stepping outside of the directions or processes that have already been formed. For me personally, I jump from step 2, inspiring a shared vision, to step 4, enabling others to act. Once the values and mutual vision have been created, I find it difficult to stray to far from the original ideas. In my previous groups, we have had the opportunity to go a different direction with our project because our initial idea was becoming to difficult to complete. However, because I struggle to let go of the first plan of action, I ended up taking on more work to complete the initial idea instead of going in a different direction.
Step Two: Deciding where you want to go?
In order to become a more complete and well-rounded member and potential leader of my group, I would like to work on my ability to challenge the processes. In order to do so, I must make myself aware of what stage of the project we are in and when challenging the process is beneficial rather than destructive. I also must work on my anxiety that I get from stepping outside of the directions and current path. Though it is possible for things to go astray when we change processes during the middle of a project, I have yet to believe in the possible positive outcomes of looking outside my comfort zone.
Step Three: Implementing a plan of action to get there
In order to become a stronger group member and potential leader, I will need to focus more heavily on the third stage of effective leadership practices- Challenging the process. Here are some clear and definable goals that I have set for myself to make myself more effective when it comes to challenging the process:
-During every group meeting, I will ask everyone, myself included, to engage in a conversation about how they went about completing their portions of work, and if they feel as though there are better ways for the group to complete tasks.
- I will myself, experiment with new ways of completing my tasks and meet my anxiety about new processes head on. To do so, I will work on parts of the project I do not generally feel comfortable with and continually challenge the process to make sure it is the most efficient way of doing things.
- During the course of my group project, I will move away from the role of encouraging the heart and enabling others to act, so I can focus more attention to the first three steps. To do so, I must be aware of my role within the group, and choose my words and actions wisely so I do not fall into the role of encourager and enabler.
3. Action plan regarding Emotional Intelligence
Step One: Where am I now?
Currently, in regards to my emotional intelligence, I would say that I struggle with self-awareness and self management components of Emotional Intelligence. I thrive in group settings because I feel I have a strong sense of social awareness and relationship management. However, there are certain characteristics of each of the components of emotional intelligence. For instance, I am a self confident person but I lack the ability to accurately self assess. I also consider myself to be empathetic and and adaptable, but I do not have the greatest emotional self-control.
Step Two: Deciding Where I want to go?
Areas that I believe I need to work on in order strengthen my emotional intelligence are emotional self awareness and emotional self control. I tend to feel very strongly about a project once I have put a lot of time into it. Sometimes I get frustrated or angry with the direction of the project or with group members. I need to understand what exactly is upsetting me and why, then I need to learn to control those emotions so it doesn’t get in the way of the overall mission of our project.
Step Three: Implementing a Plan of Action
In order to have more self awareness and emotional self control, I will implement these steps during the course of our group project:
-Whenever I feel a strong emotion during a group discussion or meeting, I will write it down and come back to it later. After giving myself time to think and absorb, I will ask myself what caused my strong emotion. If in anyway my emotions caused an issue for the group, I will also consider what I could have done to better control my emotions.
-I tend to be a little too confident about my work. I need to have my work reviewed by an unbiased opinion regularly.