Mindfulness & Leadership Spring 2016
Letter and Assignment for Final Class
We were very impressed today with your presentations. They demonstrated collaboration, creativity, and an attention to the primary objective while allowing space for humor and insight. With regard to leadership and mindfulness, we were pleased to observe the ways each group’s skits expressed leadership attributes and mindfulness practice, in particular as it relates to communication.
So, well done! We know you had little time to prepare and are pleased with your efforts.
We would like you to write a one-page paper reflecting on an aspect of your group presentation. These are to be done individually and can be turned in tomorrow in class, or anytime beforehand.
The focal point is a phrase that is often attributed to the military that “no plan survives the enemy.” It suggests that you can have a plan and prepare as fully as possible, and when the action gets going, things can happen that render parts or all of the plan moot—and then the test is how responsive one can be in the midst of the unforeseen, the unwanted, and the unpleasant.
You had nicely scripted out corporate leaders and employees engaged in challenging situations, in ways that demonstrated mindful leadership. We’d like you to select one segment of a script and write about the role mindfulness might play were you to find yourself in that spot—expecting others to be as mindful as you—and then someone says/does something that simply ruins the plan.
We recall vividly your role plays. So, briefly (1) narrate the event so we know what’s at play, (2) set forth the way it was originally scripted, and (3) the way it blows up, and write about (4) how being practice at mindfulness would be helpful to you in that moment.
Importantly, this does not mean that everything works out in the meeting, or that the person stops blowing up. “The enemy” sometimes remains the “enemy,” notwithstanding even their own good intentions, or that you are on the same team. We are interested in how mindful leadership informs your experience in that moment, and influences what takes place.
Also, you need not assume a role you actually played. Find a portion of the role-play that you feel is pivotal in a sense, where the “enemy” really mucks it up, and take it from there.