Self-awareness, internalized moral perspective, and relational transparency. Confidence, hope, optimism and resilience. If that’s all it takes to be an authentic leader, I’m almost there. Balanced processing and self-discipline could use a little tweaking (Northouse, 2013).
At my age (56), most of these traits are to be expected. I have been married for 33 years, and I have raised six children. I live successfully with bipolar disease (blessing/curse). I worked as a supervisor in a nonprofit human service agency for more than 30 years. I returned to school in 2013, and will start my final semester in less than four weeks. I am an Organizational Leadership major, with minors in Human Development and Family Studies, Labor Studies and Employment Relations, and Sociology. Something is terribly wrong if I haven’t learned a few things in the process of gaining all of that “life experience.”
Many of the courses I have taken have had an element of developing self-awareness. Most leadership theories mention self-awareness as a necessary leadership trait. If you don’t know yourself, you can’t lead others. I have always had a strong sense of self, but studying leadership has taught me that developing self-awareness is a life-long process and that I don’t know as much as I think I do. I have had quite a few “aha” moments in the last year.
My strengths include empathy, optimism, confidence, connectedness, a strong belief system, creativity, sense of humor, and communication skills. My weaknesses are procrastination, dreadful time management, deficient mathematical and analytical skills, inconsistency, talking too much, and over-dependence on others (especially my patient and long-suffering husband, who some refer to “Saint Steve” – I can be exhausting). I would like to think that I am an ethical person, but I discovered in an ethics course that it’s often easier said than done. I consider competitiveness, perfectionism, stubborn determination, organization, and a trusting nature to be both a blessing and a curse. Selfishness and generosity are the “devil and angel on my shoulders.”
That brings us to transparency. I am an open book. I tend to have no filter; as a result, maintaining professionalism has sometimes been an issue. I lack the ability to resist a punch line when the opportunity presents. My husband says that he could travel across the country on a bus and never know the name of the person beside him, while I can’t make it through the checkout line at Walmart without making a new friend. Blessing/Curse.
Hope, optimism and resilience are innate traits. I’m stuck with them. Most of the time I am confident, but we all have moments when we doubt ourselves or feel uncomfortable in a given situation. I rely heavily upon instinct in decision making. I have been conditioned to hold my nose and jump; afterward I have no choice but to make it work. This is how I came to adopt two children with Down syndrome, and it frightens me to think that I might not have if I had given some thought to the possible ramifications of that decision. I wound up back at PSU on impulse. After six months of being unemployed, I got bored (I sure didn’t see that one coming). I woke up one morning and decided to become a student. Two days later I had secured student loans, scheduled courses, and ordered books. The four dogs? Maybe it was not such a good idea to act on impulse in that scenario. Moderation is definitely not one of my virtues (blessing/curse).
Bill George (Northouse, 2013) suggests that a genuine desire to serve others, passion, and heart are authentic leadership traits. I can check those off the list. Somewhere in my studies I read, “If you lose the role with which you have become identified, you will confront the loss of your center.” That was one of those “aha” moments. I strongly identified with my former job and am at somewhat of a loss about future career goals. But, that is where faith comes in. God made me exactly who I am, and I believe that he takes responsibility for that questionable decision. He has more common sense than I do. Somehow I always end up exactly where I am supposed to be, and I have learned not to worry or question. When I fall off the path, God kicks me right back on (sometimes it hurts). And, I am grateful for it.
Did I mention that I talk too much?
Reference
Northouse, P.G. (2013). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Alexis Mi Kim says
Hi,
I have to say… this is one of my favorite blog I’ve read this semester…so, no, you don’t talk too much! Thanks for sharing your strengths and all of your amazing accomplishments. What an awesome life journey you have experienced so far. You sound like such a wonderful human being who will do great things for this world…
Most importantly, you should feel so proud of being an amazing mom and a wife. As far as career goals is concerned, focus on your top strengths and aim high for your dream! I believe in you!
hrh5077 says
I love this post. Ever think of becoming a motivational speaker? It is very important that we have sense of self awareness and even more important that we don’t allow ourselves to be defined by the words of a textbook. Every situation in life requires a specific person to fill the gap. Each of us experiences life uniquely and that uniqueness is what allows us to fit into those roles that seem to be made just for us.
The longer I live the more “aha” moments I have and the more I become truly grateful for all of the positive and negative things that I have endured that enable me to be who I am and who I will be.
What this course seems to be all about is having the awareness that leadership will be defined by the person as much as it is defined by the situation. And that, it seems, trying to define leadership definitively, is impossible.