Self Reflection: Reflected Best Self

For me, the Reflected Best Self exercise was by far the hardest and also the most informative self reflection assignment to date. It was difficult because we were asked to identify 20 people to email and ask them to respond directly to us answering the following:

One of your greatest strengths is… For example, I think of the time that…

What I value most in my relationships is… For example, I think of the time that…

One thing that I think is unique about you (in a good way) is… For example, I think of that…

So basically I had to email friends, family, co-workers and ask them to say nice things about me. I was nervous that no one would respond. But, of course, I have amazing friends and coworkers, and I had 13 respondents of the 20 invited.

Ultimately, I could not be more glad that I was forced to do this. It turns out that it was a really fun exercise. I loved reliving the moments that my friends thought I was at my best! I, of course, cried tears of joy while reading each and every email as it came in.  In reading the responses, I got to take a trip down memory lane with some of my favorite people as a guide. One friend reminded me of an amazing hike in Joshua Tree where we got a little lost and saw a great horned owl, and one friend reminded me of a time when we were a bit lost in Cusco, Peru (hmmmm…I’m sensing a theme here…) Several friends talked about less fond memories, particularly about my Mother’s and my Mother in Law’s illness and death. While those memories are always hard to revisit, it was living through those tortuous challenges that I, and apparently others recognized my ability to be strong in the face of adversity. Two examples that were stated repetitively in all three categories, included my completion of a the John Muir Trail last summer and my service as a dog foster.

I attempted to group all the comments into a few core common themes:

  • Caring & Supportive of others
  • Strength/Determination/Self discipline
  • Positive attitude
  • Open minded
  • Adventurous/Try new things/Tackle new challenges
  • Unique personality

The PSEL program instructions suggest that we write a story with the information the respondents provided. I was uncomfortable with that, so I got permission to do a word cloud with the information instead. I found a free word cloud program, and then entered the phrases from each response and this tree shaped word cloud is the result.

While there’s nothing earth shattering in any of this information, it’s great to have a better understanding of others’ perceptions. I’ll elaborate more on this entire Self Reflection process in my next blog post.

 

Self Reflection: Multi-Rater Leadership Profile

The Multi-Rater Leadership Profile is a feedback “survey”that is sent to a list of folks that are familiar with each PSEL participant and their leadership abilities/performances. It is controlled mostly independent of the PSEL participants; we only entered the system to input names an email addresses of the people we wanted to fill out the survey. We also had to indicate if the person receiving the survey was our peer or supervisor. All responses are anonymous. PSEL participants then had to complete the survey too, thereby allowing the data to include a self vs others comparison.

Once all survey participants completed the questions, a report was provided to each PSEL participant. We met in small groups to review the data and generally discuss the results. I invited 10 people to participate in the survey; all those invited completed it. I had 2 supervisors complete the survey and 8 “peers”.

The report contains some very specific information, but there were some overall messages that were loud and clear:

  • The “you’re your own worst critic” colloquialism rang true. My peers and supervisors never rated me lower than a 4.0 on any competency (with the lowest being 4.25), yet I ranked myself 3.0 for several items.
  • My supervisors think highly of my abilities (this makes my impostor-syndrome self very nervous)
  • The negative gaps (times when I rated myself higher than others) were all less than 1 (which is considered negligible), which is reassuring to me. It’s good to know my perception of my abilities isn’t that far off of others’ perception.

The last two pages of the report ask respondents to “Describe three or more of this person’s greatest strengths” and “Describe three or more specific things that this person can do to improve overall effectiveness.” I was surprised to see a common theme of self-discipline and determination emerge in the strengths comments. Some of the other positive comments included the following:

  • Adventurous
  • Compassion/empathy
  • Good communicator

The tips for things I can improve included:

  • Patience
  • Giving others the benefit of the doubt
  • Be more assertive in meetings

There were a few contradictions between the data provided earlier in the report vs the some of open ended comments submitted. Primarily, the data stated that I rated well in “Maintains composure in stressful situations” however, one of the first comments under things I can improve was “Careful consideration of reactions in tense or unappealing situations”. That being said, some of my greatest strengths comments stated “Tends to deescalate problems and issues in a way that is appropriate and helpful” and “Haley is… even tempered”. I think hubs would disagree with the even tempered comment, but he has to live with me.

When we discussed the report results in our small groups with Christina (the PSEL lead), she explained that there is context involved with all comments, and potential hidden agendas, so to consider that when reading and digesting the feedback. While I don’t agree that I maintain composure in stressful situations (in fact, I’m notoriously useless in stressful situations), I do realize that I “wear my heart on my sleeve” as my Mom would have stated. I carry my emotions close to the skin, and my face often betrays my thoughts and feelings. I do realize that this is something I need to work on, however, I also think that there’s a certain level of genuineness and therefore relateability that comes along with my mostly unguarded nature.

I once had a manager tell me that I was “too much like myself” at work. When I looked at her questioningly, she explained that she had a “work personality and a home personality” and they didn’t mix. I don’t understand this mentality, especially when we spend more hours a day with our co-workers than our spouses and kids. Perhaps I need to reign in myself a bit, however, I can’t imagine not being genuine 40+ hours a week.

In summary, the most valuable part of the exercise for me was reading the open ended comments. Between this exercise and my self reflection responses from earlier, I’m really starting to get a clearer picture of what I bring to the table and how my abilities and experiences may be best put to use. I’m also getting some valuable feedback regarding behaviors/practices that may hinder my effectiveness as a leader.





Self Reflection: Binder Exercises

As with most professional development programs, the PSEL assignments force participants to do a large amount of self reflection. There are a total of 25 pages of self reflection activities in the binder provided. In addition, participants are asked to reach out to current and past supervisors and co-workers for the Multi-Rater Leadership Profile and then also friends and family too for the Reflected Best Self exercise.

I’m not sure if it’s a personality quirk, or a genuine interest in bettering myself, but I don’t mind self-reflection activities. The binder exercises included a laundry list of questions designed to prompt participants to evaluate where they’ve been and focus on what’s gone right along the way.

Some highlights include:

Defining Success

In the Personal Inventory section, it asks, “Success looks like this to me:”. This prompt caused a good deal of consideration. My idea of success has changed many times throughout my life, so when responding I struggled with the idea of defining success today vs what success in a few years may look like. If I were asked this question a decade ago, my response would have indicated that I wanted to work in an important, fast moving position in a prominent organization. That idea was based on my desire to have nice things, feel important and work in a stimulating environment. I thought that I would be the type of person who was identified by their job; someone whose self worth was connected to their professional career. However, my idea of success has changed with geography, age, experience, and perspective.

Ultimately I decided that success for me now, and moving forward, no matter what other parameters are included, will also need to include freedom, challenges, and contentment. Freedom because I’m miserable when I need to punch a time clock. The flex schedule I currently work within is wonderful for me and I have surprising self-discipline and haven’t struggled with managing the freedom with productivity.

Challenges are important to me because boredom is my worst enemy. If I’m bored, I’m unmotivated across the board. The challenges can be all shapes, sizes, forms, and types, but as long as they keep coming, I feel as though I’m learning and growing, which is good for everyone!

Contentment is a relatively new feeling that I’m still getting used to. Personally and professionally I’ve been in the same place (geographically and career wise) for the longest stint of my life. It’s because I’m happy, and learning to be content and quell the ingrained (hereditive?) feeling that I need to move on/up is a constant growth process.

Leadership styles

In the Leadership Assessment section, we were asked to list people that we think are exceptional leaders and why. The leaders I chose are all women. And, coincidentally or not, their leadership styles are considered “servant leaders”. When I talked to Vera Cole, my superviser, we talked about this and she relayed to me that early on in her career, someone told her, “A good leader points people in the right direction and then gets out of the way.” I feel like this statement encapsulates the type of leader I aspire to be.

Why it matters

In responding to the prompts in the “Why it matters” section of the self-reflection activities I realized that I get out of bed and work every day because people rely on me. That may seem trivial or inconsequential, but it’s really the only reason I could come up with. My students, my co-workers, they rely on me, and I don’t want to let them down.

This section also asks “What needs to happen each day for you to say “This was a great day”? Simply, I need to have good interactions with my peers and my students. Those interactions are really what the sunshine or the clouds are built on in my daily routine.

Additionally participants are asked, “If you were to give advice to a young person in just five words, what would you say?” My response: Be proud of yourself. I heard my husband say this to my niece recently as she faced a move far away from us and expressed trepidation about the change. It’s good advice that I’ve heard time and time again in one form or another and it implies so many things –

  • conduct yourself in a way you can hold your head high;
  • don’t trivialize the efforts you make – your life is the result of the choices you’ve made; make the choices that you’ll be proud to own
  • don’t let others decide your fate/determine your happiness

Finally we are asked to complete an exercise to determine our most important values. In order, mine are:

  1. Integrity
  2. Health
  3. Adventure
  4. Freedom
  5. Competent (i.g. capable, effective)

In conclusion, the self reflection activities did seem to be a bit repetitive, but really made me contemplate my career, my personal life and my inner motivation for the choices I’ve made. Surprisingly, the self reflection responses weren’t all that different than the data I received through the Multi-Rater Leadership Profile feedback and then also the Reflected Best Self exercise responses. More on that in the next couple of blog posts…