Thursday, February 19, 2009
Week 6
We finally have group leaders this week! I'm not sure, for me, if that is a good thing or a bad thing. On Monday, I received an e-mail from my leader telling us we were in his group and to bring 20 solo cups and duct tape to class for a group activity. He also said to try to sit in one area of the room so we could all sit together. First impression- not too bad. He seems organized and communicating well. So, in class I sat in the designated area as requested with my solo cups and tape ready to go. So, we are told about the activity and Feinberg says- "ready go". Our group leader immediatedy leaves the group! What? Where did he go, half the group is in the designated seating area wondering where our leader has run off to! So, make our way to the fron of the room, along with 5 other groups, and try to figure out what is going on. Bad leader! When we finally get to him, he says just start taping cups together and we will make a tower. Well.... ok leader thanks for asking your group how we should go about this or if we had any ideas as to what should be done! Bad leader! So, we do as we are told and just tape cups together growing our tower as tall as the room with allow. We were not prepared to represent our group on our tower... and had no idea why we decided to use solo cups and duct tape! Bad leader! Hopefully our leader will for future activities get some input from his group members!! This class is definately teaching me how to be a BAD LEADER!!!!
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This Blog represents your initial impressions and thoughts about your group leader in a way that reflects many of the negative things he had done in your first encounter with him. I am impressed by how you were able to recall the details and chain of events that took place and then portray them in a way that the reader can relate to. I think that you could have improved this post by offering advice to your leader that didnt come across in such an offensive manner. I think if you would have included more insight on what you would have done in his position it would have made your blog even stronger.
ReplyDeleteI am a little worried that you may have been too quick to judge about your leader being a bad leader, just because of this one event. To me, it appears that your group leader had sent an e-mail requesting for you to come prepared to class based on an idea that he had for the tower building excercise. One thing that your leader could have done that would have portrayed better leadership was to describe, in that email, what the excercise was going to be in class and then ask for ideas and suggestions from your whole group. Since he made the decision himself, he made the mistake of not gaining the buy-in of your entire group. Good leaders MUST earn the trust of their followers in order to be successful.
I am not going to put the full blame on your group leader, however. If I was in your group and received that e-mail, I would have e-mailed the group leader back. I would have asked him to give some details as to why we needed to bring these supplies. One thing that everyone can learn from this situation is that you can't just assume that the leader is right. We also have to lead ourselves. By not asking the right questions, you and your fellow group memembers passed up an opportunity to help the group out. By challenging the leader's decision making process, you may have made him stop and think..."Maybe I should be asking my group members for help!". If that were the case, maybe your post on tower building day would have been completely different. This is a good example of how the decisions we make can affect the outcome of a situation.
The group leaders in this class are human as well. They don't know all the answers. As a member of the group you have the ability to make an impact on your group leader, just as they can make an impact on you. It is through that interaction and challenging eachother to be great, that we will all become better leaders.