May 05, 2008
Day 5: Program Closure
The view from Michigania...
Today was our last day at Leadership Connections. We began by completing five sentences. Here they are (after the colon is what we filled in):
1. We want to say thanks to: staff members and fellow groups for: sharing with us and inspiring us.
2. We really hope that: we can expand on what we've learned this week and bring it back to our society.
3. We are grateful for: the people who created EGL and made it the organization it is today.
4. We learned that: there is always progress to be made.
5. In the coming year, we are committed to: achieving our manageable goals and striving towards our stretch goals.
In number 5, you will see mention of our manageable goals and stretch goals. We didn’t post the picture of our goal sheet earlier, so here are the top manageable goals that we agreed on:
1. To create incentives towards/for meetings/events to engage more members
2. Session with new members and Tauber II’s
3. Create committees under executive board to get more involvement
Here are the top stretch goals that we agreed on:
1. For EGL to be more known to campus, faculty, and staff (100%)
2. Engage more members
3. More prestige
4. Receive more corporate donations/sponsorships (adequate funding)
5. 100% college, university, and community support
We sincerely hope to work towards these goals in the coming months and years. As we rode the bus home, during the four-hour drive we shared the lessons we learned during the week and during the break-out sessions from the day before. Overall, EGL’s first trip to Leadership Connections was a great success. We are all very excited about the future of EGL, and we would like to thank everyone who made this possible: The Office of Student Activities and Leadership; the facilitators: Jimmy, Angela, Jaden, Geni, Gabe, Mark and Dave; Stacie, our program advisor, who encouraged the idea of making a blog for our trip; the EGL student who read our blog and responded with comments; the fellow students at Leadership Connections who constantly provided support and new ideas; the three general student members (Claudio, Meghan, and Nate) who graciously donated a week of their summer to EGL, and provided new insight, energy, and boundless enthusiasm for the program; and our President, Lindsay, for her support and coaching during the sessions. Without her idea of attending LC, we would not have had the opportunity to attend and gain so much from this week.
We hope to return to Leadership Connections in the future, to continue to shape the EGL program and further the program’s mission! Thank you!
Posted by brumao at 11:14 AM | Comments (0)
May 01, 2008
Day 4: Organizational competencies, collaboration, and shared purpose
Key Takeaways:
• The leadership cycle can help us predict and prepare for future events
• Transformational leadership + Transactional leadership = Full results
• EGL is one good looking society and loves to dance!
Leadership Cycle
Claudio felt refreshed this morning from eight hours of sleep. We began the day learning about the cycle of a leader. Identify (the groups with whom you could collaborate), retreat (if first impression does not work out), internal identification (identify within yourself the values of the organization), external identification (market your belonging to the organization, display your passion), leadership (take on a leadership role within the organization), withdrawal (leave the group). We learned it’s important to safeguard against the retreat and withdrawal. This cycle can also help you prepare and brace yourself for the leadership cycle.
Another aspect of the leadership cycle is the concept of burn-out versus stress. Stress is temporary, it can be productive and lead to over-engagement, and it allows you to remain effective until the point of burn-out. Stress is also compartmentalized—it does not affect other parts of your mind or spirit. Burn-out is more serious, it results in disengagement, and it’s ineffective.
Integrating Transformational Leadership
What is transformational leadership? It is a style of leadership that takes a leader from transactional leadership to performance beyond expectation. Transformational leadership motivates leaders to do more than what is expected. The basic influence behind these styles are the four I’s: idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individual consideration. Also, we did an activity called “start, stop, continue”, where we listed activities that we think EGL should start doing, stop doing, and continue doing, based on the four I’s.
Transactional leadership is a style of leadership of give and take. It’s based on the status quo, and does not necessarily display the goals and higher purpose of the organization. The most effective combination of leadership is the combination of transformational and transactional leadership. To fully achieve your potential would mean having that healthy combination. There are three core team processes for transformational leadership: 1) cohesion, 2) communication, and 3) conflict management. The different types of conflict include healthy and unhealthy conflict. The healthy conflict is cognitive, and creates a dialogue. An effective conflict is emotionally driven and there is a focus on interpersonal incompatibilities, and arises when cognitive conflict becomes corrupt.
Lunch was grilled cheese and tomato bisque. It was delicious. The lemon bars were fantastic, maybe a little on the sticky side, according to Claudio!
After lunch we all split up into several different enriching sessions. Brian went to sessions on how to respond to trigger statements as well as a session on icebreakers, energizers, and reflections. Lindsay went to sessions on improving student organization’s meetings, as well as the session on trigger statements. Nate went to icebreakers, energizers, and reflections, as well as the session on trigger statements. Meghan went to sessions about marketing the student organization experience in the job search, as well as the session on improving the organization’s meetings. Claudio went to sessions on the importance of physical wellness in student organizations, and also how to utilize transformational leadership in teams. While we could all go on about the value and lessons learned, please seek us out or leave comments in the blog if you have questions about any of sessions!
Organizational speed dating followed; we met with Circle K, SWE (Society of Women Engineers), NSBE (National Society of Black Engineers), SADHA (Student Americans Dental Hygienist’s Association), MES (Michigan Economics Society), SGE (Society of Global Engineers), Gates Millennium Scholars, LSO (Latino Students Organization), MSA (Michigan Student Assembly), UAC (University Activities Center). We learned these organization’s structure, purpose, and incentives programs, as well as possible opportunities for future collaboration.
Someone left a note that said Lindsay is very cute. We also got sunshine awards for being a “good-looking” society (See picture below for visual evidence). Now there is a dance party, so we’re leaving you all to represent EGL well!!! Hiding in the corner awkwardly like most good engineers…
Cheers,
Lindsay, Brian, Meghan, Nate, and Claudio
Posted by brumao at 11:03 PM | Comments (2)
Day 3: Inclusion, empathy, shared purpose, committment
Key Takeaways:
• Mind-mapping is a good way to see how a team can break down an issue into smaller parts
• Defining EGL’s organizational culture through purpose, philosophy, priorities practices, projections
• EGL has many important manageable goals and stretch goals that we’d love to hear your feedback about
Ideal Campus
We began the morning discussing our ideal campus. We performed skits and such, and it was a nice way to begin the day. Some of the common themes included social justice, adequate resources, improved communication, sustainable resources, which led to a discussion on social justice. Although it was another good discussion, we did not feel it was the most beneficial segment to our goals for the week.
Lunch was salad. The cookies were AMAZING. We also played a game of ultimate Frisbee, where Nate was a beast.
Mind-Mapping
After lunch we did mind-mapping, and it was an opportunity for us to be creative in a very organized fashion. Our mind map focused on issue “EGL needs to better engage its members.” We came up with four main branches, which are: improve relationships, events, meetings, and open communication. It was a good brainstorming strategy that allows us to take a large problem and break it down to smaller, manageable pieces. We noticed that the events and meetings have very similar issues, including the scheduling conflicts and the perceived value of the topics. Improving relationships tied in with the other branches. You can check out a picture of our beautiful mind map below.
Organizational Culture
Assessing your organizational culture was the next segment. We looked at our purpose, philosophy, priorities, practices, and projections. You can check out our culture in the beautiful concentric squares below, created by Meghan. The purpose is the fundamental reason the organization exists. Philosophy is what makes the organization distinct, or the prime believe that directs how business is conducted. Purpose and philosophy are supposed to always stay the same. However, priorities, practices, and projections will change with time. Priorities are the key values and standards of an organization. Practices are where your organization lives out the priorities, both internally and externally. Projects are how your organization markets itself, how the org lets others know about it.
Trivia: What’s the biggest room in the world? Post your answer in the comments…right answer gets a prize!
Goal-setting
After dinner we had a two-hour session on goal-setting. We all found this to be very beneficial. We learned about the state of an organization and how different factors can create different results. For instance, you need vision, skills, incentives, resources, an action plan, and results to create change. Without any of these, you might get confusion, anxiety, or frustration. Then we individually brainstormed goals for EGL in the generation segment of the session. When we returned to the group, the five of us created a list of 40 distinctive goals. From this we separated the goals into manageable goals and stretch goals. The stretch goals are more long-term while the manageable goals are more readily achievable. The top three manageable goals based on our discussion were:
1) To create incentives for student engagement
2) Session with new members and Tauber II’s
3) Create committees under the executive board to get more involvement
The top six stretch goals based on our discussion were:
1) Increase awareness and support of EGL on campus
2) Engage more members (tied with #1)
3) Create more prestige of EGL
4) More corporate donations/sponsorships
5) Fully define the board positions to align with the mission
6) 100% internship placement of all members (tied with #5)
We would like to get more input from the membership about these goals. As the summer progresses and as we return to campus in the fall, we all look forward to hearing everyone’s opinions on the direction of EGL. Feel free to leave a comment on the blog!
After finishing these goals, we went to the bonfire by Walloon Lake. There were smores, singing, dancing, and overall a lot fun.
Posted by brumao at 12:56 PM | Comments (2)