My Leadership Experience Paper

A leader’s style is the way in which someone provides direction, implements plans and motivates people.1 In other words, everybody has a method of leading others to accomplish a shared vision and goal. Furthermore, understanding leadership style is vitally important for both a leader and those under his or her leadership. For example, if a leader is a democratic leader, people’s opinions will be very important to that leader as well as lengthy discussion before a decision is made. Therefore, those under this leader need to know that their opinion is valued and necessary. When I first started leading at church, I was a very democratic leader until someone said, “Just tell us what you want us to do.” What they were asking for was a compelling vision and assignment. We were just getting started and they wanted to charge a hill, but did not know what hill we should charge.

“Authentic Leadership is comprised of moral behavior that is based on a system of sound values that align with others and the organization; it is continually evolving through relationships with peers and followers. To be an authentic leader, one must be true to oneself as it relates to the collective good of others and ethically accountable” (Bishop, 2013).

Throughout my life I have experienced a variety of things. Among those things I have dealt with is leadership. Leadership is having the ability to lead or guide others. Anyone can become a leader if they set their mind to doing it. A quote I always liked said “Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better” –Bill Bradley. This quote to me simply says that you have to enhance the lives of other if you want to be a great leader yourself. In my paper I would like to discuss a few leadership experiences I have been involved in while here at The University of Southern Mississippi.

I really enjoyed reading your discussion board post. You made some interesting points about leadership. I agree it takes upper management to bring order and plans. The health system I work in is partnered with clinics. The availability of services these clinics offer is great, but the financial side is lacking so much. This is due to upper management not having a complete plan. I believe other management respects the clinic management because of knowledge-based trust (Lesson 6: Leadership, 2016). The clinical side is covered, but the financial side needs improvement. The financial side lacks order and organization. I understand where management in health systems are coming from. Most of the time their background is in the clinical side. To them the

As a future Naval officer, I will be challenged with the duties and responsibilities of leadership daily. As a result, developing my leadership skills is essential to prepare for my future career in the United States Navy. Leadership can be learned two different ways: experience and formal study. Experience is arguably the best way to become a better leader; however, experience takes considerable time and effort to gain leadership positions and to learn from real-life experiences. Formal study of leadership is critical because it can help provide students with different tools to examine a situation from a variety of viewpoints. Using scientific studies and reading experiences from leaders past, one can more adequately prepare for leadership positions.

When I attended my first lecture of Principle Management and Leadership my first thoughts on the module was quite positive, I understood why and how this module relates to my current course. This Subject is quite new to me and I hope I gain a deeper understanding to it, so that it could enhance my current skills and possibly gain new ones. My main aim is to understand up to date key theories and concepts which would be relevant to the Travel sector. Points of interest from the lecture (Kanuga, 2017) HEAT stands for Hospitality, Events, Airline, Airport and Tourism. The HEAT industries quite often overlap with each other; this is because certain distinct areas of work which falls more broadly into other industries e.g. Airline companies working alongside tourism organizations to sell package holidays etc., Different industries working alongside each other so that they could provide a high-quality service to wide range of customers.

My definition of leadership is providing direction to inspire a vision then enable and motivate my Sailors to achieve that vision. Throughout my career, the most influential leaders had the ability to empower Sailors to achieve command/mission objectives in addition to accomplishing goals important to them on an individual level. Captain Kenny, my personal choice for an impactful leader, made it a point to visit his Sailors on the deckplates and celebrate everyday victories such as completing a flight schedule or fixing an abnormally difficult discrepancy. Sailors worked hard for him because he understood and recognized their contributions to the command as well as their personal successes.

It was great to hear speakers, who are well in their careers, talk about how they got to where they are and the steps and obstacles they faced to get there. Mr. Jay Jacobs, Lt. General Ronald Burgess and Dr. Carl Stockton were different nonetheless, but they all had a general concept, character. A person with good character shows attributes such as integrity, honesty, courage, loyalty, fortitude, and other important virtues that promote good behavior and habits.

Leadership is a very broad topic that encompasses many aspects. Throughout my time in the Coast Guard I have had many good and bad leaders and have learned from both of their styles. My first unit, CGC ELDERBERRY, had eight members with an Officer in Charge, then BMCS Woody Woodell, who literally led from the front. I knew it was not normal for an E8 to wash dishes at the time but I didn’t fully appreciate that fact until much later. When at PACTACLET as an E5 the Commanding Officer, then LCDR Pat DeQuattro, allowed for any member to hold any qualification regardless of rank or title. On the challenging side of Leadership, I worked for an Officer in Charge who I felt took my disagreement with him behind closed doors in the open and was too entrenched in rank to listen to the messenger rather than the message. Those snapshots in time and others experiences have led me to believe that Leadership is a way of doing things that encourages others to not only want to accomplish a mission but have the freedom to make decisions as the most efficient way to accomplish that mission.

There are many forms of leadership and it is important to recognize that there is a need for variation. In order to most effectively lead, plans must adapt as necessary. Leadership is the guidance of a group to complete a goal that positively impacts each member and facilitates success of whatever project or task needs completion. If done correctly, cohesion will form among group members and potential future assignments will be accomplished with improved results.

Throughout the time of my mental evolution, I have come to understand leadership as the influential ability an individual has among a community of people in order to implement their vision. Notably, Robert Evans stated there are three sides to every story. Theoretically, in a role of leadership those sides are: the constituents who are impacted by a leader’s decisions, the primary account of the leader, and the emotional chemical reactions between the leader and their constituents that resulted to the leader’s final decision. This quote helps to explain why in my theory of leadership I believe that in order to obtain influence, an individual should seek to understand the chemistry of emotions and the development of human life in order to achieve an open mind. For this belief, everyday I seek to redefine perceptions of people and life that was rooted in personal presuppositional theories in order to best advance forward in a sustainable inclusive direction.

Before attending introduction into leadership I assumed that I was a very good leader. I attained the leadership award at my high school, in the softball program I was known as a leader by both my coaches, teammates, and in newspaper articles. Given that I have all these awards for being a leader I assumed that there was nothing else to learn about being a leader. I know that you can always improve if you practice something, but I never realized that there are different ways you can lead and still be effective. Throughout the course, it has opened my eyes to different models, theories, and ideas that can help me improve my skills not only as a leader but as a follower as well. I learned that there are different leadership styles along with followership styles, self-awareness along with personality dimensions, and motivation models along with theories.

I’ve learned from experience in the past I know that I’m a mixture of the Laissez-faire and Participative leader when it comes to my home, community, and self. I prefer to just go with the flow and not really take assertive action to finish a task unless it necessary. On the flip side of that when I’m in the work setting I prefer to possess the leadership style of an autocratic leader, but I believe that is because I work with kids that grow up being a troubled youth. While working with the troubled youth I teach them to golf, which I very passionate about since I’ve been playing and growing as a golfer since the age of ten. So, I feel like I have to be an autocratic leader just to get through to them so that I can teach them not only to be a better golfer but a better youth to society.

1. Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes, or contributed to group efforts over time.ANSWER

My license defines my role as a teacher, but I am not a transmitter of knowledge, I am a facilitator of knowledge. Enter my classroom and you will find what to some appears to be chaos. Students are talking, debating, instructing, questioning and most importantly, learning. How you might ask, can a student learn anything in such an environment? The students in my classroom are owners of their coursework. Each day, students are in an active learning space where I encourage small groups of students to engage in topical research projects and activities to deepen their understanding. You will rarely find me in the front of the room lecturing on a topic.