This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose." (No Change)

This week I did not feel it pertinent to add to my definition of leadership. I considered adding something from Saphiere's reading, but I thought I would just be forcing it. My definition has grown so much this semester that I feel like it would really have to be something special to merit an addition. Having said this, the readings definitely supplied some interesting things to consider in terms of leadership and communication. I especially found it interesting how much cultural differences can affect the fluidity of communication in Saphiere's reading. Also, I enjoyed the section about self-concept. Saphiere talks about this when he states, "Our goal with communication style, therefore, is to maintain our self-concept while enhancing our collaboration. The goal is not necessarily to change our style, but to be able to express ourselves a variety of ways with a diversity of other musicians to be both more strongly and uniquely ourselves and more flexible and responsive to others" (Saphiere 65). I feel this is very important in being an excellent communicator. One has to cling to their own unique self-concept, but it is also very important to have some flexibility and be able to adapt to the personality and cultural differences that one may face.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose." (No Change)

This now marks the fourth week in a row that could not add to my definition. This week's reading, An overview of intentional change from a complexity perspective by Boyatzis, was quite difficult to comprehend but still somewhat interesting. I just could not find significant enough direct relevance to my current definition of leadership. This is because in the reading there is an obvious focus on people changing themselves. Not to say this wouldn't be constructive for a leader to do, it is just that it does not fall under the core ideas of a leader and leadership in my opinion. Having said this, I did enjoy the insight this article offered. Specifically when it is stated about ego-defense mechanisms, "These ego-defense mechanisms serve to protect us. They also conspire to delude us into an image of who we are that feeds on itself, becomes self-perpetuating, and eventually may become dysfunctional (Goleman, 1985). This seems very accurate to me because while these mechanisms may serve a positive purpose in protecting us psychologically, they can also easily hinder our development into our ideal self.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose." (No Change)

Again this week, for the third in a row, I did not feel the need to add to my definition. I am beginning to sound like a broken record but the reading by Komives, Lucas and McMahon was quite interesting, it just did not seem pertinent to my definition. At this point in the class it seems to me that the readings are focusing more on the underlying aspects of leadership rather than what it is in general terms. This seems necessary to continue to grow leadership knowledge, but it becomes difficult to add to my definition. One quote I liked from the reading was: "One of the foundations for understanding group dynamics is to recognize that in any interactive setting, individuals engage in communication patterns that may signal roles they are adopting in the group" (Komives, Lucas & McMahon 173). It is a rather general quote but I like it because I find this to be very true. It can be quite noticeable, when a group is forming, the roles that people will probably be playing by the way they interact with each other. The more outgoing and intellectual people usually display these leadership qualities in less formal settings as well.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose." (No Change)

For the second week in a row I did not feel the need to add anything to my definition. I felt that the readings were some what interesting and it did really make me reflect on the racism still present in our society today. Having said this, I didn't feel it relevant to my leadership definition to add anything about racism or prejudice. One quote that real struck me though was Tatum's reading when she states, "In the context of the United States, this system clearly operates to the advantage of Whites and the disadvantage of colored people" (Tatum 7). This quote is much like the reading in its entirety, succinct, frank and honest. I don't know if I completely agree with everything stated in her reading, but it certainly did make me reflect on my own life and any advantages I may have being White.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose." (No Change)

For only the second time during this semester, I feel that I would be forcing it to add anything to my current leadership definition. Although I did enjoy the reading by Heifetz, though not so much the other one for the same reasons as Colin, I didn't feel compelled to squeeze something into my definition. I believe that Heifetz's reading is actually quite informative and I would like to try to apply the metaphorical idea of "getting off the dance and going to the balcony" in my own life (Heifetz 51). Basically, this idea is to reflect upon yourself as a leader and to try to look at yourself through your own personal views as well as everyone else's. While this is an extremely important and humbling thing for any leader to do, I don't feel that it necessarily synthesizes well with my evolving leadership definition.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results and a common purpose."

After having a week where I didn't feel it necessary to add to my definition, I am again feeling the need to add. This week I added the portion at the end about the need for a common purpose. This applies not only to the leader, but more importantly, to the followers as well because a common purpose must be the driving force for everyone involved, otherwise it is not common. It is stated quite clearly in Astin and Astin's reading the reason a common purpose is so important. This is because, "unless the group members can agree upon what the basic purpose and function of the group should be, it will be very difficult to develop any real collaboration" (Astin, H. S., & Astin, A. W. 5). This is quite straightforward in that it is saying, if the group does not hold the same goals, visions and beliefs to be true, then it is not possible for them to fully unite and move forward in a positive and productive direction.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results." (NO CHANGE)

This marks the first week of doing this activity that I did not feel compelled to add to my definition. This decision didn't come without some thought, but after looking over the reading further and watching the instructor video, i agree with what Jude stated. This reading is more about where leadership is going than where it comes from or what it is presently. An example of this is when Heifetz says in the idea brief at the end " Are you waiting for things to return to normal in your organization? Sorry. Leadership will require new skills tailored to an environment of urgency, high stakes, and uncertainty -- even after the current economic crisis is over" (Heifetz 2009). This reading emphasizes more of a guideline for leadership into the future than an idea of what it is presently. That doesn't mean it couldn't affect my definition in general, but now that my definition is gaining some mass it is becoming harder to find things absolutely necessary to add.

This Week's Definition: "Leadership occurs when someone takes upon the role of the head of a group of people and uses superior and unique social skills to help guide that group by making difficult, yet ethical decisions. Additionally, while following the leader's unique and clear personal vision and creating a response from others that promotes positive results."

Yet again I was compelled this week to add to my definitions of what leadership is. Out of the two, the reading that most influenced me was the one by Kidder. I had never thought of decisions in such a way and it seemed extremely accurate the way he portrayed ethical decisions. When he states that decisions, if ethical, are not ever right and wrong, but rather they are right and a different kind of right (Kidder 14). One choice may be right but have a certain downside in one area, and vice versa for the other choice. This is why I felt I had to add that a leader must guide by making difficult, yet ethical decisions, because often ethical decisions are very difficult and can have two right answers.