An Emerging Definition of Leadership tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012-01-18:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521 2012-04-19T00:45:26Z An exploration to define what leadership means to me and the impact that meaning has on my interactions with others, for the course "Personal Leadership in the University" (OLPD 1301W/PA 1961W) Movable Type Enterprise 4.31-en Defining Leadership - Iteration #10 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.351252 2012-04-15T01:30:00Z 2012-04-19T00:45:26Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals with others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals with others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different business, process, and environmental situations
- Assess situations from multiple and diverse perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Understand work environments and how to mitigate bias, conflict, and risk
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals with others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different business, process, and environmental situations
- Assess situations from multiple and diverse perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Ensure that individuals, groups, and/or the organization is change-ready by laying a framework for enabling change
- Understand work environments and how to mitigate bias, conflict, and risk
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

Comparison Analysis
The Intentional Change Theory introduced by Boyatzis indicates that intentional change is discontinuous and occurs through a series of conditions and stages, and can only begin when there is a desire to change. Differentiating an ideal self and real self is key, enabling an individual to experiment and practice, and I believe that the key function a leader performs is ensuring that oneself, the group, and potentially the entire organization is ready for change, reflected in my modification to my definition.

Works Cited
- Boyatzis, R. E. (2006). "An Overview of Intentional Change from a Leadership Perspective." Journal of Management Development, 25(7), 607-623. doi:10.1108/02621710610678445

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #9 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.349061 2012-04-07T17:30:00Z 2012-04-19T00:05:50Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals with others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals with others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different business, process, and environmental situations
- Assess situations from multiple and diverse perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Understand work environments and how to mitigate bias, conflict, and risk
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

This week's definition
No change.

Comparison Analysis
The reason I didn't identify any reason to change my definition of leadership because while I agree that Komives raises good points in understanding how different groups value purpose, structure, and time, I believe that those are inherent in my current definition through team empowerment and assessing different situations and work environments. These all influence how a group functions together, and a leader is able to identify methods to bring them all together.

Additionally, Yoon & Johnson raise the point of the Complex Adaptive System, which focuses on a team's different perspectives that become adaptive and self-organizing. Through linear or adaptive progression, the seven phases of virtual group development discussed by Yoon & Johnson, and I still hold that this is important to a leader in terms of situational assessment that empowers the team, provides the necessary resources to the team, and allows the leader to cultivate a culture among the team.

Works Cited
- Komives, S. R., Lucas, N., & McMahon, T. R. (1998). "Interacting in Teams and Groups." Exploring Leadership: For college students who want to make a difference (pp. 165 - 194). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Yoon, S., & Johnson, S. (2008). Phases and patterns of group development in virtual learning teams. Educational Technology Research & Development, 56(5), 595-618. doi:10.1007/s11423-007-9078-x

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #8 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.349059 2012-04-01T01:00:00Z 2012-04-02T18:49:47Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals to others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations
- Assess situations from multiple perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different business, process, and environmental situations
- Assess situations from multiple and diverse perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Understand work environments and how to mitigate bias, conflict, and risk
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

Comparison Analysis
The core understandings that I got from the readings this past week were primarily derived from understanding and being aware of one's own perspectives as well as others'. This case is made in both Gladwell's commentary on "the Warren Harding Error" as well as Tatum's "Defining Racism". I'm not entirely sure how I felt about the idea that racism is structural, but I feel that leaders need to be aware of diversity in culture, background, and thought, and be able to utilize that knowledge to consciously maintain an open perspective, which I broke down between the two italicized bullet points. As for Kezar's pluralistic leadership, my main takeaway was concerning again remaining aware of the diverse and multiple perspectives for a team, organization and/or process.

Works Cited
- Gladwell, M. (2005). "The Warren Harding Error: Why we fall for tall, dark, and handsome men." Blink: The power of thinking without thinking (pp. 72 - 98). New York: Pushkin Enterprises.
- Tatum, B. D. (1997). "Defining Racism: Can we talk?" Why are all the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? (pp. 3 - 17). New York: Basic Books.
- Kezar, A. (2000). "Pluralistic Leadership: Incorporating Diverse Voices." The Journal of Higher Education, 71(6), Nov. - Dec., 2000, pp. 722-743.Due Sunday - Watch instructor video(s)

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #7 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.345848 2012-03-10T20:05:30Z 2012-03-10T22:49:09Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals to others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations
- Assess situations from multiple perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Reflect upon ones' skills and further develop the above capabilities

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations
- Assess situations from multiple perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Remain self-aware by reflecting upon ones' skills and gathering feedback from others to further develop the above capabilities

Comparison Analysis
The key part of Heifetz & Linsky's argument focuses on objectively assessing situations, which my "Assess situations from multiple perspectives..." bullet address.
I chose to make a minor edit in my final bullet to emphasize the self-awareness that was so prominent in the Kegan & Lahey reading. Finding an individual's "one big thing" is enabled through reflection, self-awareness, and seeking feedback from multiple people to provide various perspectives.

Works Cited
- Heifetz, R. A., & Linsky, M. (2002). "Get on the balcony." Leadership on the Line: Staying alive through the dangers of leading (pp. 51 - 74). Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
- Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2009). "Identifying Each Person's One Big Thing" (pp. 63 - 67). Boston: Harvard Business Press.

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #6 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.342521 2012-03-04T04:45:55Z 2012-03-04T06:30:12Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals to others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations
- Assess situations from multiple perspectives to ensure positive net impact
- Reflect upon ones' skills and further develop the above capabilities

Comparison Analysis
The three perspectives of individual, group, and community discussed in Astin & Astin's "A social change model of leadership development: Guidebook" highlight how understanding these perspectives and the benefits that they carry are able to generate the best decisions possible, resulting in a net positive value from contributions and decisions made by the leader, given the synergies provided by each individual contributor. This led to my newly added emphasis on assessing situations from multiple perspectives.

The servant leadership described in Barbuto & Wheeler's article, "Becoming a Servant Leader" emphasized that servant leaders focus on providing for others and have awareness of situations, peers in the community, and value added by decision. Furthermore, servant leaders must be able to reflect on what skills they have, and which ones they must improve upon, which led to my adding the last bullet to my definition.

Works Cited
- Astin, H. S., & Astin, A. W. (1996). A social change model of leadership development: Guidebook (version III) (pp. 4 - 27). Los Angeles: University of California Los Angeles Higher Education Research Institute.
- Barbuto, J. E., & Wheeler, D. W. (2007). "Becoming a Servant Leader: Do you have what it takes?" Retrieved from www.ianrpubs.unl.edu/epublic/live/g1481/build/g1481.pdf

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #5 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.340278 2012-02-26T00:05:15Z 2012-02-26T01:13:20Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals to others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

This week's definition
Unchanged.

Comparison Analysis
My definition remains unchanged, as my perception and understanding of the reading this week has not really expanded on my definition. The key in Heifetz, Grashow & Linsky's article emphasized emergency and adaptive leadership during times of change or sub-optimal conditions. While it adds perspective, primarily to the "Adapt to and handle different situations" component of my definition of leadership, it does not fundamentally change the way I view leadership. If I were to elaborate any further on my definition, I feel that it would no longer be brief and concise in its components.

Works Cited
Heifetz, R., Grashow, A., & Linsky, M. (2009). "Leadership in a (permanent) crisis." Harvard Business Review, 87(7), 62-69.

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #4 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.339162 2012-02-19T04:02:12Z 2012-02-19T06:35:10Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision - Communicate vision and goals to others - Empower team members through relationship and individual development - Provide the resources necessary... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

This week's definition
Unchanged.

Comparison Analysis
The primary reason for not changing my definition this week is because I believe that having ethics and morality does not explicitly influence what leadership is. This can go back to last week's reading by Terry, "Deciding what you believe", in which one of arguments is "Leadership is both ethical and unethical," using Hitler as a key example. I personally agree with this argument, as my belief is that leaders are able to create a clear vision and motivate followers to work towards that goal, whether that goal is ethically sound or not.

While I agree with Kidder that right vs. right decisions occur and are difficult, and I recognized that Paul & Elder's points on how we must push ourselves to think critically and ethically to combat the inherent selfishness of humans, ultimately, understanding ways that ethical decisions can be clouded and how they can be better made did not incite me to change the way I perceive leadership as I have defined it thus far.

Works Cited
- Paul, R., & Elder, L. (2006). "The Function of Ethics -- and Its Main Impediment."
Understanding the Foundations of Ethical Reasoning (pp. 4 - 36). Dillon Beach,
CA: Foundation for Critical Thinking.
- Kidder, R. M. (2003). "Overview: The ethics of right vs. right." How Good People
Make Tough Choices (pp. 13 - 29). New York: Simon & Schuster.

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #3 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.338046 2012-02-12T00:13:26Z 2012-02-26T01:04:30Z Last week's definition Leadership is the ability to: - Work with others to create clear goals - Identify ways to develop individuals' skills - Provide the resources necessary to ensure success - Adapt to and handle different situations This week's... tsoxx007 Last week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Work with others to create clear goals
- Identify ways to develop individuals' skills
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Identify a clear vision and goals to achieve that vision
- Communicate vision and goals to others
- Empower team members through relationship and individual development
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

Comparison Analysis
After this past week's reading, I think I was much more influenced by Terry's article on "Deciding what you believe" as it challenged my ideas on leadership and forced me to "choose" sides on the debates between the different aspects of leadership. My answers tended towards how a leader is empowered by others, how leadership can exist everywhere, and how intent and engagement are the most important. This led me to specify my view of how a leader can help others develop.

However, the change in definition seems appears more to reflect Lee & King's article, as I change wording from "goals" to "vision and goals" since the vision is the overarching idea that an individual has, which serves as the foundation for a leadership vision, as discussion in Lee & King's article.

Works Cited
- Lee, R. J., & King, S. N. (2001). "Ground your leadership vision in a personal vision." Discovering the Leader in You: A guide to realizing your personal leadership potential (pp. 31 - 54). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Inc.
- Terry, R. (2001). "Deciding what you believe." Seven zones for leadership: Acting authentically in stability and chaos (pp. 20 - 40). Mountain View, CA: Davies-Black Publishing, Inc.

]]> Defining Leadership - Iteration #2 tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.336803 2012-02-04T22:31:08Z 2012-02-04T23:11:08Z Last week's definition: To me, leadership is the ability to: - Work with others to create clear goals - Provide the resources necessary to ensure success - Remove any obstacles that may be encountered This week's definition Leadership is the... tsoxx007 Last week's definition:
To me, leadership is the ability to:
- Work with others to create clear goals
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Remove any obstacles that may be encountered

This week's definition
Leadership is the ability to:
- Work with others to create clear goals
- Identify ways to develop individuals' skills
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Adapt to and handle different situations

Comparison Analysis
The new definition has been more formatted more concisely. Firstly, I removed the last bullet point from last week's definition, because I felt that it was derived more from my experiences in IT project management, which isn't necessarily leadership. I added the "Identify..." bullet because of my belief that leaders inherently help improve individuals, something that I was reminded about in Rath's article, "Understanding why people follow," as leaders must demonstrate or ensure that the factors Trust, Hope, Stability, and Compassion exist to facilitate the growth of the organization.

The different styles of leadership discussed in Goleman's article, "Leadership that Gets Results" led to my inclusion of the final "Adapt..." bullet point, since I believe and agree that, "the more styles a leader exhibits, the better." Leaders must be able to utilize different styles to cater to and address different situations or environments where followers or other people need to be different interactions with the leader in order to feel more of the 4 factors of followers.

Works Cited
- Goleman, Daniel (2000). "Leadership that Gets Results." Harvard Business Review, 78(2), 78-90.

- Rath, T. & Conchie, B. (2009). "Understanding why people follow." Strengths based leadership: Great leaders, teams, and why people follow. (pp. 79 - 85). New York: Gallup Press.

]]> Kicking things off: What is Leadership? tag:blog.lib.umn.edu,2012:/tsoxx007/anemergingdefinitionofleadership//15521.331818 2012-01-18T22:58:52Z 2012-01-19T00:08:25Z To me, leadership is the ability to: - Work with others to create clear goals - Provide the resources necessary to ensure success - Remove any obstacles that may be encountered This multi-part definition has been derived primarily from my... tsoxx007 To me, leadership is the ability to:
- Work with others to create clear goals
- Provide the resources necessary to ensure success
- Remove any obstacles that may be encountered

This multi-part definition has been derived primarily from my experiences and interactions with course projects and interning in a business environment, with a particular focus on the IT and project management lenses.

I look forward to learning more about different leadership styles, increasing awareness of my own style, and being aware of what challenges I may experience ahead.

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