purpose
Your final paper is your opportunity to apply the learning gained through this course in a real way. In this final paper you will expand on the personal leadership challenge you wrote about in Assignment 2. The key to selecting your leadership challenge is that the challenge or issue is NOT YET RESOLVED. This paper will (a) be an opportunity for you to think about something in your career or life that is a challenge, (b) demonstrate your understanding and practical application of what you have learned in this introductory course, and (c) move you to approach the situation differently with new learning from this course.
What is a Personal Leadership Challenge?
Recall the following information from Assignment 2:
What is a personal leadership challenge (PLC)? For this course, the PLC is defined as a complex, current, unresolved problem, or challenge, or dilemma facing you in your workplace, interpersonal relationships, family, or community. It is a situation where you, as an individual, are being called to make some critical leadership choices.
The following statements are intended to guide your thinking about your personal leadership challenge. You are asked to select just one area, e.g. work, or family, or interpersonal relationships, or community and use any one of the statements in that area, as listed below, if it is appropriate for you. You are NOT limited to any of the suggested statements. Yes, you can introduce something more appropriate for you.
Work:
I seem to be challenged with working as an effective member on this team.
I don’t seem to be respected for what I am doing in my workplace.
I feel “left out” in the decision-making processes.
My boss is very authoritarian and paternalistic in his/her approach to employees.
There is a lack of trust between managers and employees in my workplace.
I am working in an environment that is ripe with gossip.
Family:
I don’t feel understood at home.
My parents don’t support me in my life choices.
I do not support my children’s life choices.
I seem to have trouble listening to my family members.
My parents are authoritarian in their approach to me.
I am having real trouble communicating with my brother and/or sister at home.
Interpersonal Relationships:
I don’t feel understood by my friends.
It seems that I want to please them more than to voice what I think is appropriate.
I don’t feel respected by those who mean a lot to me.
All they do is bad mouth others. I don’t know what to do about that.
I don’t have the courage to tell my friend what he/she needs to hear.
Community:
I am finding it to be difficult to be loyal to my community because of its old ways of thinking.
In my community, we seem to be focusing more on the past than on the future.
In my community, we seem to be mired in focusing on problems rather than on possibilities.
My community consists of individuals who think differently. That appears to be causing friction.
In my community, everyone appears to want to lead. Too many “cooks” here. Not enough followers.
how to proceed
Using Assignment 2 as your base, expand your thoughts on the following four dimensions: experience, reflection, literature, action.
Experience:
Formulate/construct your personal leadership challenge (what is it?)
Actions/Behaviours: What are you currently doing or have done, in response or in reaction to your identified challenge.
Reflection:
Consequences: What are or have been the consequences of your actions in response to your identified challenge?
Thinking: What way(s) of thinking prompted your actions? This is an important component of reflection.
Relationships: Who has or have been affected by your way of thinking and actions?
Literature:
Drawing information/learning/knowledge from a minimum of one topic within 4 clusters and what you discovered through the unit on Values Based Leadership.
i. How might you re-formulate your PLC?
ii. How is this different from when you formulated your PLC at the beginning of this course?
iii. What ‘new’ way of thinking might help you readdress your PLC?
Action:
What might you do differently (new actions)?
When might you begin to engage in new actions?
What might some new consequences look like if you followed through on your new action.
details
Maximum 10 double-spaced pages
Make sure your cover page includes the following:
Name of Course
Title of Assignment
Student Name and #
Submitted to: Name of Instructor
Date Submitted
APA 7 format
Alternatively, you may approach this assignment through a creative and arts-based method. This means that your answers do not have to be in an essay format; they can be expressed and represented in any format and through any medium (e.g., your own self-authored poem, free verse, visual art, collage, recorded dance, spoken word, play, …..etc; it is up to you how to express your new knowledge/understanding and how to represent it as well).
