My Personal Leadership Development Plan!

In starting a blog, I pondered over what would be an excellent way to introduce this segment and I came across a leadership development plan that I had researched and written for myself several years ago. It was very interesting to reflect on just how far I have come since then in accomplishing the many things that I had outlined in this plan. It was wonderful to reflect on just how discipline, dedication, and a solid foundation can propel you into making your dreams, your reality. Enjoy this first Blog.

Leadership Development Plan

Introduction

What makes a leader? Ask, a dozen people this question and you will get a dozen answers, for there is no one thing that makes a leader. The one thing that can be counted on in the making of a leader is that to be a leader there must be followers. In reflecting over my life thus far and organizing my personal development plan for what I hope to achieve personally and professionally, it became clear that I have always been a man striving for service of the people, so that this definition offered; Leadership is an influence relationship among leaders and followers who intend real changes and outcomes that reflect their shared purposes (Daft, 2014), described my life intentions even when I did not have words to formulate of what I truly desired, to help people come together to find and act on a change that would better themselves in life as an individual and as a community. Great leaders are created by their people, and they become inspirations to their people (T’Shaka, pg.10. 1990). This has always been my mission to formulate a plan that would bring my vision to fruition. Thus, in attempting to answer the question, what makes a Leader? There are certain attributes that I as a good positive leader must have developed and functioning. Although there are many dynamics that go into the making of a leader, for my personal leadership development with a fusion of spirituality, my focus was geared toward the leaders, emotional intelligence (EI), mission/vision, his empowerment skills, and being more of a transformational leader which would make me more viable to be a leader of change for disenfranchised environments, their culture.

Qualities of a Leader

While there are many attributes that can define a leader, there are certain qualities of a leader that most will agree on, qualities such as displaying high values, trustworthy, passionate, moral, ethical, and spiritually grounded just to name a few. It has been stated that a leader if wearing their heart and emotions on their sleeves, they should do it openly (Hoffman, 2006). I agree that it should be done openly, but I do not call it wearing my heart or emotions on my sleeves, but, wearing my spirit, my instinct on my sleeve openly. It has been shown throughout history that leading with emotions can tend to make one act or react uncontrollable, inconsistent, and irrational, traits that a leader should not ever display especially in public to his/her followers. But, it is through learning how to listen to my spirit and following my instinct as a good leader will always allow me to stay grounded and communicating to the people, those who have chosen to follow me in a manner that even if not knowing, I as a leader can express that knowledge of not having a particular answer because I have built a bond of trust and empowerment that the followers can create an answer and we still move forward in progression, I consider this a developed form of emotional intelligence (EI), that will be discussed later. In this would be understanding that leadership is learned and experienced, it is both an art and science. It is an art because many leadership skills and qualities cannot be learned from a textbook. Leadership takes practice and hands-on experience, as well as intense personal exploration and development. Leadership is also a science because a growing body of knowledge and objective facts describes the leadership process and how to use leadership skills to attain organizational goals (Daft, 2014).

A leader with the quality of passion will have a drive within them to want to contribute and forge something meaningful and valuable, constantly showing integrity with their behavior (Rice, 2006). Integrity must be a constant quality of a leader that I would always have to courage to lead with. For it is through the difficult times when integrity would be tested and by living integrity, always having high values and being honest day in and day out, the practice will be in place to count on what not only I have espoused but was living and acting, so in challenging times what I believe would not be fleeting and my followers would also know to stay the course as well. One must think the truth, speak the truth, and act the truth. Justice arises from truthful thoughts and truthful actions (T’Shaka, pg. 29. 1990). When speaking about ethics and values as needed qualities for a leader to have and display, which should be stated here that these are qualities that every person should strive to live with, which goes hand in hand that a leader is made and developed through life and through people. In sum, values are the core of what a person believes and ethics is the outward manifestation of one’s belief (Hoffman, 2006). Although thought to be one in the same, values and ethics are different in that they can be nurtured differently over one’s life time.

One very important quality that a good leader must have that has been eluded to in the other qualities mentioned, is that, s/he the leader must be able to have a strong self-discipline about themselves, or one may call it self-awareness, being conscious of the internal aspects of one's nature, such as personality traits, emotions, values, attitudes, and perceptions, and appreciating how your patterns affect other people (Daft, 2014). A leader is not perfect, but a good leader will embody these qualities and more and will not be afraid if not having an answer to empower their follows to help with creating solutions or putting someone in a position with the answer to excel.

The Emotional Intelligence (EI) Level

It was mentioned earlier that a leader must have a strong self-discipline about their selves, to elaborate, Self-discipline is a form of freedom from laziness, lethargy, freedom from expectations and demands of others, freedom from weakness, fear, and doubt. Self-discipline allows a leader to feel their individuality, inner strength, and talent. S/he is master of, rather than a slave to, his thoughts and emotions (Daft, 2014). Aligning this with one’s emotional intelligence, referring to a person's abilities to perceive, identify, understand, and successfully manage emotions in self and others, being emotionally intelligent means being able to effectively manage ourselves and our relationships (Daft, 2014). I personally re-built my life around the self-discipline theory so can attest to its ability to change one’s mindset or culture for the positive. It was not an overnight change, but I kept the reason or mission constantly on my mind with daily rituals and small steps, allowing me to witness the accomplishments. This allowed me to gain much needed knowledge of myself, a continuous self-reflection as I now know it was emotional intelligence (EI) that I was developing.

With my own development of emotional intelligence, I can use it in building my organization because in today’s fast changing world the use emotional intelligence has become relevant in the development of organizations and people by providing different way of understanding and assessing the behaviors, management styles, attitudes, interpersonal skills, and potential of others (Emotional Intelligence). Love and spirituality means a lot to me, it is what I developed rebuilding my life around as I set out to change how I viewed myself. I must add that when I speak of spirituality, that I am not talking about a form of religion, but an inner peace of humility and confidence, of knowing and not afraid of change when needed. And emotional intelligence has been strongly linked and applied to love and spirituality (Emotional Intelligence). Being developed through self-discipline, time, and pressure (Di Frances, 2005), the use of emotional intelligence (EI) has offered me an added discipline to display my standards and be able to teach or assist others, allowing them another avenue to succeed.

Empowerment

While the, rah rah type of motivating has been known to get people highly enthusiastic for the moment, I have never been one to follow that type revved up enthusiasm. I have seen firsthand how after hyped up speeches, days , weeks, even hours later the fire had burned out and the majority had not in the end accomplished anything. I personally am a self-made man have been saying this about myself for years. I learned to self-motivate myself. I learned and developed how to empower myself to achieve, even when the odds were not in my favor, when no one believed in me, and when it seemed that I kept making mistake after mistake, I developed a since of determination an empowerment through the mistakes, experiences of what would work and I kept moving forward. I developed a since of intrinsic rewarding. Intrinsic rewards come from the internal satisfaction and enjoyment a person receives in the process of performing a particular action (Daft, 2014). No revved up speaker, no one feeding me rhetoric with no ammunition to succeed, I learned to gather my own ammunition. This is why I feel that as a leader I can empower people to learn how to come together and succeed, more importantly they will learn self-motivation.

Empowerment can be compared to a steady burning fire with plenty of fuel so as to continue burning, even when the flames die out, the embers of wood will continue to glow sparking the fire again, allowing it to start back burning strong and long (Pellegrino, 2009). Through my ability to empower I would instill in the people the Maslow’s hierarchy of Needs and show them how to with assist achieve each level beginning with the physiological and safety needs, to feeling of belonging, which would build their esteem, finally tapping into and obtaining self-actualization of themselves. By employing the Maslow’s hierarchy of Needs the people (followers) would be able to demonstrate two different dimensions of what I would call succeeding; One, the extent to which employees are involved in defining desired outcomes; and two, the extent to which they participate in determining how to achieve those outcomes (Daft, 2014). My leadership skills would show both dimensions working.

To Be a Transformational Leader

Even though I consider myself more of a leader that imbues empowerment over high pitch motivational speeches, I do feel that I have a strong kinship to being a Transformational leader in the since that a Transformational leader is getting followers to transcend their own self-interests for the sake of the larger polity (Grant, 2012). By empowering people with the knowledge of self-actualization, they would have a deeper understanding of community because of the love of self, being the follower would see just as the leader does, not an individual piece, but the whole totality of what is trying to be accomplished. Transformational leaders have the ability to lead changes in an organization’s vision, strategy, and culture as well as promote innovation in products and technologies (Daft, 2014). Through my passion as a Transformational leader, I do articulate inspirational behavior through my mission and vision. I saw not only how we are individuals, but that we also have a collective identity by coming together to achieve the same goal. Because of my self-knowledge, I saw continuous confidence and optimism and I always bring the discussion back to the core values of what we are reaching for (Grant, 2012).

Through studies over the past 20 years it has shown that Transformational leadership has had, an effect on followers by how they have come to think about themselves and the group that they are with, with regards to self-efficacy and group potency. They have also shown to have a trust and connect in a personal identifying way (Piccolo & Colquitt, 2006). By staying grounded and connected to the people (followers) has given me the ability to use emotional intelligence and empower everyone around me to work for the collective when needed, while continuing to grow within self, to build a link between individuality and community.

Mission and Vision Statement

My mission in life has always been to empower, to motivate people to change something about themselves for the betterment of their own wellbeing which would in the long run be, a betterment for society as well. Mission is the core purpose and reason for existence, it is the glue that holds an organization together throughout the changes that it will go through (Daft, 2014). Whereas vision has broad appeal, deals with change, reflects high ideals, and defines the destination and the journey. A good vision for the future will have specific outcomes that will want to be achieved (Daft, 2014). And a great leader will not only voice the people’s vision, but forge a oneness with the people which will enable them to improve on the people’s vision (T’Shaka, pg. 10. 1990). I have always had a vision to empower at risk young adults through a workshop that I created titled; “Know Thy Self.” It is from an ancient African Proverb that describes the path from ascending from being foolish to knowing one’s self. Also, along with the creation of the “Know Thy Self” workshop, I created a performance lecture titled; “13 Taboos of My Relationships” for couples to better know of themselves which in turn would allow them to truly learn and know of their mate, partner, and spouse. Both have gone through several changes over the years, while still staying steadfast to the core mission.

My coming back to school after leaving over 25 years ago to get my education in Behavioral Science, which one of my goals in coming back is to graduate either Magna Cum Laude or at least Summa Cum Laude, with a little more than a year left I have been in the honor society. Staying with the core of my mission, graduating and going on to obtain my Masters, once thinking that I would further those studies in Religion, that has since changed to Transformational Social Psychology, sticking with the core mission of bettering people and the community as a whole.

Leading Change

Just as there is an eight-stage plan for organizational change, I have an eight-stage change plan in my empowerment workshop “Know Thy Self.” Stage one; Who Am I, stage two; what do I want most out of life, stage three; why do I want what I want, stage four; what prevents me from achieving what I desire, stage five; what do I do to get what I want, stage six; what would be my ideal future, stage seven; what is the purpose, reason, and goal of communication, and stage eight; who am I. And the reason for coming back to school to achieve my education is to allow me to not only perfect my theory of how to empower, but to have the proper technical terminology which would allow me the opportunities to take it into more elite institutions without the wall of I not having the proper credentials being used to stop me.

Creativity is the generation of ideas that are both novel and useful for improving efficiency or effectiveness of an organization. Creative people come up with ideas that may meet perceived needs, solve problems, or respond to opportunities and are therefore adopted by the organization (Daft, 2014). I not only have a creative journey, I do have a very concrete destination that is not only obtainable, but will benefit not only people, but organizations as well. For it is after all, people that make up organizations, give them life, allows them to sustain and grow for years or leaving the people to be stagnate and unenthusiastic, non-committed which would leave the organization to crumble. Also, as mentioned I have a relationship performance lecture with the same mission to empower to motivate people not only want better, but to do better.

In conclusion, to become a leader of quality for change as a developed transformational leader, it takes an understanding of my emotional intelligence, have a clear mission and vision of what I truly want to achieve, and be empowered to empower others to use their self-motivation to gain what it is they need and seek in life, staying steadfast to the mission with high values and ethics, while embracing the change that can and will occur with the vision as time come and go. These are the concepts of being a great leader that I have taken on and throughout my adult life been on a path to develop, not allowing any mistakes to be seen, as a failure, but simply as a lesson in growth and understanding that will only help and assist me in helping others.

Reference

Daft, R.L. (2014). The leadership experience (6th ed.). Mason, OH: Cengage Learning. ISBN: 9781435462854

Di Frances, J. (April 26, 2005). The Six Essential Leadership Attributes. Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Six-Essential-Leadership-Attributes&id=29808.

Emotional Intelligence (EI). Retrieved from http://www.businessballs.com/eq.htm.

Grant, A. M. (2012). Leading with Meaning: Beneficiary Contact, Prosocial Impact, and the Performance Effects of Transformational Leadership. Academy Of Management Journal, 55(2), 458-476.

Hoffman, P. (October 21, 2006). Define Your Position: Values, Ethics, & Leadership. Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?Define-Your-Position:-Values,-Ethics-and-Leadership&id=334934.

Pellegrino, B. (October 2, 2009). The Difference between Motivation and Empowerment. Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?The-Difference-Between-Motivation-and-Empowerment&id=3024576.

Piccolo, R. F., & Colquitt, J. A. (2006). Transformational Leadership and Job Behaviors: The Mediating Role of Core Job Characteristics. Academy Of Management Journal, 49(2), 327-340. doi:10.5465/AMJ.2006.20786079

Rice, K. (December 1, 2006). Four Dimensions of Leadership. Retrieved from http://ezinearticles.com/?Four-Dimensions-of-Leadership&id=374399.

T’Shaka, O. (1990). The Art of Leadership Volume 1. Richmond, CA: Pan Afrikan Publication. ISBN:1-878557-00-9