At a predominantly white institution (PWI) like Penn State, navigating inclusivity is an ongoing issue that needs to be consistently re-evaluated. There is constant room for growth and improvement, and leaders of the University and large organizations must commit to a continuous learning process. Every year, we should be striving to create an inclusive environment for all students. One of the biggest ways we can do this is through vast representation in large student-run organizations.

With over 40,000 students at University Park, finding your place can be scary and confusing. Joining an organization is one of the best ways to meet like-minded people and find a community. As a tour guide, I know firsthand that Penn State prides itself on having a student organization for everyone. However, some of the biggest and most popular organizations may not feel like a safe space for minority students. There is a lack of representation in organizations like THON, Homecoming, and the Panhellenic Council. With inclusive leadership, this gap can be bridged.

Inclusive leadership addresses the challenges of creating a safe work environment for everyone (Northouse, 2021). This necessitates valuing different backgrounds and creating a space for people to share dissenting opinions. An inclusive leadership setting creates a more cohesive work environment and promotes better morale for the team because people feel valued and heard. Northouse argues that there must be policies in place to promote inclusivity in the workspace (2021). Organizations must clearly outline their plans for creating an inclusive environment and how they will grow their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts.

I have seen many examples of inclusive leadership within large organizations at Penn State that are striving to increase DEI efforts. Within THON, we have a DEI Focus Group with captains who are committed to thinking about the ways that we have not reached different populations. This group then works on initiatives to outreach and increase inclusion. One instance of an initiative taken is enhancing language access for our families and volunteers who do not speak English as their first language. This year, the DEI team worked on implementing subtitles used on all of our Pre-THON events, like the 5k and Family Carnival. While we still have a long way to go to improve these processes, we took a large step in being more inclusive towards the different populations that we serve.

The key to inclusive leadership is a leader who understands that they do not know everything. A leader admitting when they mess up and being committed to growth is crucial. Inclusive leadership is a necessity in creating a diverse workplace that values every member of the organization.

 

References:

Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Theory and Practice (9th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Throughout my educational experience, I have been lucky to have exceptional educational mentors and leaders in my life. Specifically, I think back to High School when I was incredibly involved with the choir. Going into High School, I loved to sing but I did not have a lot of confidence. My first choir teacher really lifted me up and encouraged me to go for more opportunities. She helped me see a side of myself that allowed me to grow into the person I was meant to be. She led with empathy and always listened to my concerns. She was the perfect example of a servant leader. Servant leadership is defined as prioritizing the well-being of followers before oneself to enhance growth and development (Northouse, 2021). Within this definition, many qualities are outlined that servant leaders possess. I would like to focus on healing, foresight, and building community (Northouse, 2021).

The first quality is healing. This quality is displayed when servant leaders work with their followers to help them overcome personal battles or break barriers (Northouse, 2021). My choir teacher showed the quality of healing by working with me to overcome my issues with self-confidence. I specifically remember a conversation we had during my Freshman year when she pulled me aside to tell me to audition for a solo. I expressed my concerns about not being good enough, and she validated my concerns while also encouraging me to try. Because of her, I auditioned for the solo and got it. This was a huge step outside of my comfort zone, and she helped me overcome this personal barrier.

The second quality is foresight. This quality is displayed by leaders who can predict the future and act accordingly (Northouse, 2021). My choir teacher had the foresight to know that I had the capability of going far in choir leadership. She always encouraged me to apply to be a choir officer and instilled a lot of confidence in me to go for leadership positions. By the time I reached my Senior year, I was the President of the choir. Without her foresight in knowing that I would be a good leader for the choir, I may not have applied for the position.

Finally, the last quality is building community. This quality is shown by servant leaders who are able to create a sense of unity within a group (Northouse, 2021). Within the choir, there was an uplifting community of people who supported each other. I firmly believe this community was created because of our teacher. She allowed us the space to be ourselves and express our true selves. Because of the safe space she created, we had a beautiful community and felt truly connected.

In every way, my choir teacher demonstrated servant leadership. She was empathetic, ethical, and valued the growth of her followers. I firmly believe that I would not be the person I am today without her leadership.

 

 

Through being involved with multiple student organizations at Penn State, I have learned the value of peer mentorship within these spaces. Peer mentorship involves using one’s own experiences to better mentor others within the same organization. I feel extremely connected to Penn State because of the widely diverse backgrounds that make up the student body. Acknowledging these backgrounds allows for the community to come together in a unique way. From each other, we can see new perspectives and experience growth.

In one of my primary involvements, Lion Ambassadors, peer mentorship is highly valued and encouraged. We use a “buddy system” where older members are paired with one new member when they get into the organization. This year, I had the honor of being paired with a younger bud. As a member of the Executive Board, I have gotten to use my experience to better mentor him. This is an incredibly time-consuming organization, and new members must pass a large exam about the history and traditions of Penn State to get in. Preparing my younger bud for the exam was a new experience of leadership for me that pushed me to grow in empathy and connection. I had to put myself back in the shoes of a new member preparing for the exam. Although I was helping him study and prepare, I realized through this experience that peer mentorship is reciprocal. It was not always me teaching my bud, but he taught me so much along the way as well. His perseverance and determination inspired me.

This experience models Leader-Member Exchange. Northouse defines this as the process of interactions between leaders and followers (Northouse, 2021). Studies find that leader-membership exchanges that are overall positive produce better results for both the leader and the follower (Northouse, 2021). This implies that communication, support, and trust are extremely important in leader-membership exchanges for both parties involved. LMX also discusses the importance of the in-group and out-group. The in-group consists of followers who go above and beyond formal role responsibilities, while the out-group consists of followers who do only what is formally required of them (Northouse, 2021). The followers in the in-group will have more support as they go the extra mile, which gets noticed by the leaders, thus getting rewards (Northouse, 2021). This explains the reciprocal relationship between leaders and followers.

I definitely experienced this reciprocal relationship with my younger. Being on the Executive Board and having my main social group within Lion Ambassadors, I pushed him to get involved and buy into the experience as much as possible. As he dove right in and made the organization a priority, it created an “in-group” of sorts. I was very proud and happy that he was expressing interest in also being on the Executive Board, which resulted in more support on my end. If he did not care as much and only did what was required to get by, my reaction would have been different. This illustrates the primary concepts of the Leader-Member Exchange.

 

References:

From personal experience, I have had many different excellent leaders in many different settings, but if I were able to pick them up and interchange them I know that wouldn’t go well. I think most people’s intuition would arrive at the same conclusion, and if this is the case then there must be an explainable reason: leadership trait theory. Modern leadership trait theory proposes that both traits and situational factors play into creating great leaders (Northouse 2022, pg. 29). A great example of how inherent traits and situational factors merge to create strong leaders is my director for THON this past year, Bobby.

Before we can dig into my personal story, it is important to define what traits and situational factors are. Northouse argues that “Traits refer to a set of distinctive characteristics, qualities, or attributes that describe a person. They are inherent and relatively unchanging over time” (Northouse 2022, pg. 28). The important distinction to make is that these cannot be taught or developed overtime, they are something that people are born with and are manifested as these people go throughout life.  Stogdill’s second survey determined 10 traits that are important to developing leaders, but which traits are most important is dependent upon the environment. This dependence on the environment is what situational factors are. Certain traits are more valuable in different environments, while some are less valuable. The most recent list of traits was created by Zaccaro, Kemp, and Bader in 2017 (Northouse 2022, pg. 31). This list is what we will apply to my director, Bobby.

When thinking about THON, the environment calls for certain kinds of leaders. For example, while in the military effective leaders are strong, stern, and confident, in THON effective leaders are diligent, compassionate, and have strong people skills. Based on these situational factors it can be surmised that from the list of traits the ones that are most essential to a THON leader are problem solving, social intelligence, self monitoring, motivation, and agreeableness. The other 6 could be helpful in certain situations, but these 5 are the pillars of what a THON leader needs based on our understanding of the environment. Bobby has to solve problems everyday, ones that come from committee members all the way to higher up decisions. He has to have social intelligence to navigate sensitive topics and scenarios, and to come across as friendly and supportive. He has many tasks that he must complete each day, and there is no one to hold him accountable except for himself; there’s self monitoring. In order to accomplish all of these he must have a high drive and reason for doing so, and the phrase “why you THON” is very meaningful and impactful in the organization. Lastly he works with many different people from all backgrounds and situations, and so appearing eager to help and friendly is essential. As we can see, this model of traits can be applied quite easily to an effective leader. If a THON leader was not self monitoring, they would slack off and get behind schedule, which would result in tasks not being completed and other directors or captains not being able to do their jobs. These 5 are all essential.

When looking at the other 6, we can see that they are not as important. For example, cognitive ability is less important because most directors do not need to invent new ideas or strategies, just effectively implement what has already been done. Also, they do not need the openness trait because a lot of things can only be known among higher ups to protect everyone’s safety and privacy, so if one were to appear to open they might not be able to be trusted with sensitive information.

As can be seen, the trait approach to leadership can be effectively applied to any leader. Simply determine what traits would be the most necessary for a position based on the situational/environmental factors, and then ask if your leader shows examples of having these traits. This exercise also gives anecdotal proof that environmental factors are very important when a leader is being chosen. One can also self analyze what leadership traits they believe they possess, and from there look for positions where these are needed. The trait approach is a very effective way for evaluating a leader’s abilities and effectiveness, as long as the situational factors are taken into account.

 

Source: Northouse, Peter Guy. Leadership Theory and Practice. SAGE, 2022.

When I worked at my church over the summer as a student intern, I saw many different and dynamic leadership situations. This blog will discuss expert power and how it influences the relationship between leaders and followers, or specifically in this case the leaders and students.

I worked as a student intern for the youth ministry that served 5th to 12th graders. I specifically worked with high school girls, and as a college student and assigned the student intern role I had a certain authority over them. This kind of authority is called by our reading “expert power,” described as “Based on followers’ perceptions of the leader’s competence” (Northouse 2021, pg. 48). The key word here is competence, and what factors influence whether or not a leader is seen as competent. The three different types of leaders were high school graduates who just graduated in the spring and are now student interns in the summer,  college student interns, and the ones fully in charge are adult leaders.

It is fascinating the difference that certain characteristics, all of which I argue influence the leader’s competence, change the way the students respect, listen to, and learn from the leaders. The recent high school grads lack very little authority because they are seen as largely incompetent, even though they were given this certain position. This is because they were friends with many of those they are now leaders over, and these students know their new leaders’ flaws. They have seen these people act out and know their imperfections. This lowers their competency. Additionally, these high school grads often fell back into the friendship role rather than the leader role, and when this happens there is no exchanging of ideas and learning (Northouse 2021). It could then be argued that for a leader to have expert power, they have to be largely personally unknown to their followers or else they cannot be seen as fully competent. Of course, being personally close can relate to other leadership powers, but not expert power which is the most important in a learning and growing environment. Next looking at college student interns like myself, we had significantly more power. Many of us did not know the students before we took on this role, so the separation existed. We were also a few years older, so it was assumed we knew more and were farther along in our faith. Additionally, because we were able to start out as a mentor role rather than starting from a friendship role, they took what we said more seriously and respected our authority. That being said, however, there were moments when the college leaders would slip into a friendship role because the ages were close enough that it was possible, and whenever this happened authority was lost. By establishing a friendship relationship, they students would relate the teacher to being similar to themselves, who they know is flawed, and in turn the competency was lost. Whenever a crack is seen in someone’s ability, even the tiniest crack, their entire competency comes into question.

Lastly, looking at the adult leaders we can see how expert power is meant to function. These leaders have a large enough age gap where even if jokes occur, it is clear there is never a friendship relationship. Adult leaders rarely show emotional cracks, and even when they do it is controlled and they do not lean on their students for comfort as younger leaders did. Adult leaders have all of the assumed values of knowledge and experience, so their competency is untouchable. They wield the true authority that created the environment where students learned and grew the most.

All of this is not to say that college or even high school grads cannot mentor or be leaders to high schoolers. These leaders accomplished many great things over the summer at my church and it could not happen without them. When analyzing from a leadership lens though, we can see how large an impact the age has on these interactions and on the expert power leaders can hold. If the adults were not at the helm, the younger leaders would not be able to hold the ship together nor have much power at all.

Northouse, P.G. (2021).  Leadership: Theory and Practice. Ninth Edition. Los Angeles, SAGE Publications.