Having
taken two courses and just starting my third in the Embry Riddle Leadership Master’s
program I feel that I have begun to develop a small amount of self-awareness. In previous courses we have already focused
on the five core aspects in some degree or another.
The
first of the core values is our own core self-evaluation. Before we can truly begin to develop and
build on our own management and leadership skills it is important for us to
understand ourselves and our own attributes.
This is no easy task and I fear will take my entire life before I can
come to a true understanding of my full range of strengths and weaknesses. In the text Developing Management Skills it’s stated that there are “an
innumerable quantity of personal dimensions available to explore if one is to
develop in-depth self-awareness.” (Whetten & Cameron, 2011, p. 61) It is because of this that we need to
continually focus and refocus on the attributes that pertain most to the things
that are taking precedence in my life and career at a given time. My time so far in the MSLD program has given
me new knowledge and insight into these ideas and helped me to understand not
only more about myself but helped me to know where and how to evaluate
myself. It’s through this better
understanding that I can develop the other four core aspects of self-awareness.
The
second core aspect of self-awareness is “values”. Throughout our lives we will be asked to
participate and make decisions that may or may not fall out of the typical “black
and white” frame of reference. Many
decisions may fall in that gray area that can cause us to question what our
values truly are. If we have not decided
on these values it will be difficult to decide in the moment what is right and
what is wrong. If at a young age I
decide for myself that I will never do drugs and then in high school I am
offered marijuana by a friend my decision to turn down the offer will be much
easier than if I had to decide in the moment.
The text describes values as “the foundation upon which attitudes and personal
preferences are formed. They are the basis for crucial decisions, life
directions, and personal tastes. They help define our morality and our
conceptions of what is good. Much of
what we are is a product of the basic values we have developed throughout our
lives.” (Whetten & Cameron, 2011, p. 65)
Throughout
my own life I have always strived to establish a core set of values. Much of these I have developed through my
faith and through my relationship with my parents and the things they have
taught me. There are times that these
values can be difficult to translate to my own professional career. When there are things I have yet to
experience I need to have a good understanding of my personal values and how to
apply them in the variety of situations I am bound to experience at work. Through the discussions, readings, interviews
and exercises in the MSLD program I have been able to more thoroughly visualize
how I might have to apply my values to work and how I can translate my own life
experiences to other things I will experience in the future.
The
third core aspect of self-awareness is learning styles. For a good chunk of my life I felt that I had
a more difficult time picking things up compared to others around me. I would watch friends barely study for tests
and then ace them with little effort. I
would study repeatedly and pull a “B” if I was lucky. I realized later in life that I did not have
a good grasp on my own learning style.
Once I began to realize that I learned by doing and that as I could
understand and visualize the things I was learning I began to do much better on
my school work with less effort. I
became more efficient at studying and picked things up quicker. Understanding our own learning styles can be
difficult. In my first class with Embry
Riddle, MSLD 500 I learned a great deal about creativity and applying my own
thoughts and ideas to the work. Many of
the assignments were ambiguous, leaving me up to deciding what the assignment
would look like when I was done. This
was very helpful in aiding me to discover more about my own learning style and
allowing me to apply a level of creativity to my work. In the text Whetten suggests that cognitive
learning is based on two key dimensions.
These are “the manner in which you gather information and the way in
which you evaluate and act on information” (Whetten & Cameron, 2011, p.
74) . It has taken me a long time to come to a
better understanding of how I gather and evaluate information. I hope to be able to build on what I had
learned and strengthen the areas I find to be especially week so that I can
broaden my learning capabilities for a variety of situations.
One
area that I have always been fairly good at is my own ability to adapt to
change. I have grown up moving every few
years, constantly being put in new and uncomfortable situations. As an officer in the Air Force I am
consistently asked to do things that fall outside of my experience and comfort
zone. If I were to let my inexperience
get the better of me I would fail before I even had the chance to succeed. I am not always expected to know the answers
to everything, however, I am expected to learn quickly and grow and take the lead
when called upon to do so. The world
often feels like it is moving at a breakneck speed and in order to keep up it
is important to develop the ability to cope and handle change. In the text Whetten states, “The challenge of
students and managers at the beginning of the twenty-first century is to prepare
for a world that cannot be predicted by the experiences of the past” (Whetten & Cameron, 2011, p. 76) . We live in a world that is consistently
developing new technologies and ways of communicating. It will be difficult to rely on the way
things were done. We need to be able to
develop new and innovative methods of accomplishing our goals.
The
final area of self-awareness I need to come to a better understanding of is my
own emotional intelligence. When leading
others I need to be able to judge and assess their behaviors and emotional
state of being. I need to be able to
show and feel empathy for the things that are happening in their lives. In the Air Force I often find myself leading
young airman barely the age of the eighteen and far away from their parents for
the first time in their lives. This can
be an incredibly difficult experience for them.
It is important that I am able to apply my own personal experiences to
the world around me and use that knowledge to help others. Whetten discusses this ability to connect
with others in the text. He states, “Emotionally
intelligent people are also able to accurately diagnose and empathize with the
feelings of others. They are sensitive to what others are experiencing, and
they can share in those feelings” (Whetten & Cameron, 2011, p.
64) . Throughout the MSLD program I have been able
to apply the things I’ve studied to my work and have discovered that when I
listen to others and their situations I am less likely to judge harshly and
more likely to help them find a solution or sometimes just listen to what is
going on. I have found myself in a
position to help others on several occasions and have been grateful for the
leadership skills I have learned in this program and my ability to empathize
and understand what others are going through.
I
have only taken two classes so far in the Embry Riddle Leadership program,
however, I feel that I have already been able to add quite a few tools to my
leadership tool box. I understand that I
have a long way to go and am grateful for the leaders I have that are pushing
me to start this program early. The
earlier I am able to study and learn leadership skills in this program the
longer I will be able to apply this knowledge to my own life and career.
References
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