When way closes way will open The purpose of this paper is to explore my life experiences in light of the “way closing way will open” concept discussed in author Parker Palmer’s book Let Your Life Speak. (Palmer, P. J. 1999). Through thoughtful reflection I will share occasions in my personal journey when way closing was evident and gave occasion to unintentional way open opportunities which collectively shaped who I am today. The concept of way closing is intriguing, as it brings in perspective situations in my life when at that moment, was filled with anxiety, grief and uncertainty but now in retrospect aided personal development and growth. The process of reflecting contains snippets of hurtful experiences and woeful decision-making. …show more content…
I was making what I thought was a fair wage and felt valued within the organization. The manager eventually resigned because of a difference of opinion with the vice president of the company and he asked me to fill the role as Plant manager. I thought for sure that another well respected supervisor who had a business degree and was my senior by twenty years would be ideal candidate for this position, but this VP insisted and I was promoted. He said something that resonated with me until today, He said that I was special, that he never met anyone who could manage as many different roles as I did or who could see the end result of a project when it’s in the concept stage. I earned the respect of the engineering staff and all the departments so this was an easy decision for him. This was one of the first times I ever felt validated. I developed a strong work ethic because I did not want the words of my father to come …show more content…
The organizational leadership curriculum enlightened me to behaviors which I practiced but now I could identify them. Leadership traits founded on Integrity which was so important to me throughout my journey, wanting to operate above reproach, exemplifying fairness and emotional intelligence towards my coworkers. The last few months of my journey has been very rewarding for me. I became a senior in college and was promoted to the operations manager of Nestle Distribution Company for the south eastern United States. This achievement is the epitome of way open for
Life is like a game of blackjack where we unknowingly are dealt good or bad cards. This unpredictability makes it difficult to gamble decisions. Unfortunately many factors can lead to the bad card where in both the game and life, people are trying to prevent us from achieving the goal. There are two choices to change the outcome however, we may either give up (fold) or we may take a chance (call). The beauty of taking the risk is that if lucky, life gives you that much-needed card. When dealt that winning card, a person is immediately uplifted. That one good hand drives a person to outweigh the pros from the cons and continue to strive for the winning pot or in this case, the goal in life. Enrique in Sonia Nazario’s “Enrique’s Journey,” is dealt both the good and bad cards in life, as he undergoes a battle of being pushed internally to continue while also being pulled externally to quit, thus leading him to unearth himself as a worthy human being while on the journey to the U.S; sadly however, his arrival in the U.S refutes what he clearly envisioned for himself.
In Amy Hempels’ Short Story “Going,” our journey with the narrator travels through loss, coping, memory, experience, and the duality of life. Throughout the story is the narrator’s struggle to cope with the passing of his mother, and how he transitions from a mixture of depression, denial, and anger, into a kind of acceptance and revelation. The narrator has lost his mother in a fire three states away, and proceeds on a reckless journey through the desert, when he crashes his car and finds himself hospitalized. Only his thoughts and the occasional nurse to keep him company. The narrator soon gains a level of discovery and realizations that lead to a higher understanding of the duality of life and death, and all of the experiences that come with being alive.
While buried, so deep beneath the cavity of adversity, finding hope is nearly impossible. But, it is the ability of decisions that aids as the last gleam of hope retrievable. After facing many struggles, it becomes almost involuntary for someone to put up a guard. With using that strategy, and the transgression of time without progress, there’s a certain ignition of comprehension. Change needs to occur, and a complete remedy of that
I promised myself that I would read Let Your Life Speak with an open mind and unguarded emotion. What I revealed as I begun reading was pure delight. I detected a connection with the author, as I too wrestled with hunting for a vocation true to my heart. Palmer articulated beliefs that delivered clarity as to why I experienced negative feelings from my pursuit of vocation. I too felt lost and contended with anxiety and mild depression in my early thirties. An inordinate amount of my pain ensued from my search for purpose, self, and passion.
In Amy Hempel’s Short Story “Going,” we take part in a journey with the narrator through loss, coping, memory, experience, and the duality of life. Throughout the story we see the narrator’s struggle through coping with the loss of his mother, and how he moves from a mixture of depression, denial, and anger, to a form of acceptance and revelation. The narrator has lost his mother to a fire three states away, and goes on a reckless journey through the desert, when he crashes his car and ends up hospitalized. Only his thoughts and the occasional nurse to keep him company. He then reaches a point of discovery and realizations that lead to a higher understanding of mortality, and all of the experiences that come with being alive.
Leadership at times can be a complex topic to delve into and may appear to be a simple and graspable concept for a certain few. Leadership skills are not simply acquired through position, seniority, pay scale, or the amount of titles an individual holds but is a characteristic acquired or is an innate trait for the fortunate few who possess it. Leadership can be misconstrued with management; a manager “manages” the daily operations of a company’s work while a leader envisions, influences, and empowers the individuals around them.
The Leadership Challenge by Kouzes and Posner (2007) is the result of twenty years of research on the factors that influence and create great leadership. Through studies and stories from leaders with various backgrounds throughout the world, the practices and characteristics that create great leadership are delineated. Leadership is viewed not as a group of inherent characteristics, but as learned behavior that anyone can achieve. The goal of Kouzes and Posner’s book is to inspire and educate leaders through transformational leadership. As such, leadership is about mobilizing others to become and do extraordinary things.
Systematic research on leadership began in the early 1930s (House & Aditya, 1997). Researchers were interested in identifying leadership traits that might differentiate leaders from non-leaders. Despite of devoting so much effort to this area, only a few leader traits were found to be positively related to leadership effectiveness such as intelligence and Self-confidence.(Mann, 1959).After this leadership researchers turned their attention to leaders’ behavior. Two types of leadership behavior were identified in different studies (1) Initiating structure that includes task related behaviors such as organizing work, defining role responsibilities, and setting up work activities. (2) Consideration includes relationship oriented behaviors such as building trust, respect, and liking between leaders and followers. The University of Michigan group also identified two types of leadership behaviours. (1)Production orientation means that how much leader is concerned with achieving organizational goals and tasks and (2) employee orientation means that how much followers’ needs are important to leader (House & Aditya, 1997). (Song Heyi and Mao Na Guo Dan, 2007) inspect the relationship between the traits and the performance of the leader in different organizational cultures and found that in today’s dynamic world the negative traits are directly related to the performance, leaders play significant role in every organization. As the competition between the service oriented organizations is very high and continuous change is needed here and growth of these organizations where the only possibility to survive successfully is due to the effective and productive leadership. Leadership is process of social interaction where leaders try...
Destiny, brought the book True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership into my life and I want to bring it into the lives of others. More specifically those who may believe they weren’t born with the characteristics or traits to become a leader or those who have not found their passion or purpose in life; their “True North.” The book, written by Bill George and co-author Peter Sims, compiles a series of interviews with 125 managers from Howard Schultz of Starbuck’s to Dan Vasella of Novartis. The interviewees guide readers through their journey to become the leaders they are today; discussing their failures, successes, obstacles, personal tragedies and triumphs. The stories of each manager prove the True North’s thesis, which is no one person is born a leader and there isn’t one path to becoming a leader. The book is separated into three sections: 1) Leadership is a Journey 2) Discover Your Authentic Leadership 3) Empowering People to Lead. Before giving overviews of each section, it is important to define an authentic leader.
There are several ways to define leadership, but what sets effective leaders apart from commonplace managers are their extraordinary actions and the successes that result. In The Leadership Challenge, James Kouzes and Barry Posner claim leaders that employ The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership are much more effective than those who do not (2012, p. 25). This paper will be reviewing my assessment findings, exploring my strengths and weaknesses, examining my personal-best leadership story, and detailing a specific area of development.
According to the “trait theories of leadership” in the textbook, six traits have been identified as being consistently associated with leadership: 1) ambition and energy; 2) the desire to lead; 3) honesty and integrity; 4) self-confidence; ...
The only way to develop the kind of leaders a changing organization needs is to make leadership a critical criterion for promotion, and then manage people’s careers to develop it.
Kantrowitz, Barbara. A. A. Tyre, Peg. “The fine art of letting go.” The Reader, 2nd edition. Pearson Education, Inc. 2012: 126-130. Print.
Although there are many outstanding, albeit necessary qualities of a good leader, it is the leader’s beliefs in which greatness is given its first breath, fostered by action, and spread throughout the institution. A great leader believes in encouraging, not destroying; in setting the precedence instead of yielding to prominence ; in collaboration, not division; in giving, not taking; and in having high standards and volunteering to be the first of many to be held to them. A great leader does not take advantage of the people being lead, but instead, creates an advantage for the people by giving them the opportunities to lead. Only when people take ownership of an institution will passion be cultivated, action be taken, and greatness be achieved.
This paper describes about my leadership strengths and areas for growth/future study. It also included how these qualities are used in my daily work routine, self-assessment results and a brief explanation on Individual style in leadership.