LDRS 501 8.1
The Competencies
In their book Becoming A strategic Leader, Hughes et Al outline 11 core competencies needed for the development of a strategic leader to become effective. In my career I have experienced effective leaders whose core goal is to develop other people into leaders, and ineffective leaders who were more focused on organizational budgets, policies and procedures. The competencies I will incorporate into my organizational practice are; building collaborative relationships, promote organizational transition and demonstrate vision (p.268).
Incorporation
I believe in healthcare everything we do goes back to being relational. There is a constant need to build and maintain partnerships. We need to be able to come together collaboratively and problem solve. We rely on our relationships with other departments to succeed. Like all relationships they take work, to maintain. I plan on doing team building activities to foster and nurture those relationships.
Lepsinger explains “when discussing the advantages of changing you want to encourage and support change talk by pressing for specifics and reinforcing positive change statements (p.165)”. By talking positive about an organizational transition, it takes the fear out of it. Change can be scary and difficult for some which are why positive change talk and increasing communication is crucial. When we underwent transition last year it was quite a difficult time. People’s lives were affected, and others feared their fate. No jobs were lost but there was a mass reorganization of jobs, titles, and locations. During this time, I experienced a lot of negative talk surrounding the changes. The negativity influenced many people’s thoughts about the transition. Next time there is a change I will promote organizational transition.
Demonstrate the vision is one thing I am passionate about. I have many ideas of how we can improve. People need to have a clear vision. Vision gives direction and purpose to the work to be done. John Maxwell explains “people will buy into the leader before the vision” (2014, p.37). As a leader, you need to be able to communicate, facilitate and be the vision. To do this I need to get people to buy into my leadership, then they will buy into the vision. As I am new in this role, recently promoted I am still learning how to go about this. One thing I will do is remain focused on the vision for our organization.
The three least important principles
The three least important principles, in my opinion, are act systemically, organizational decision making, and business perspective. Acting systemically in terms of understanding organizational politics there are very few. In our line of work, you need to be able to work together for the greater good. In terms of organizational decision making, it is not important to me because it is far removed from me. Large decisions are made at a higher management level. Business perspective is not important to me in the sense that our business is taking care of people. I don’t think of it as a profit-making entity where I need to consider the outside factors affecting our organization.
The Least effective course text material I encountered was Ungerer & Ungerer. I did find it easy to use due to the online format issues. I also found it very difficult to understand. Over the course of the class, I found myself having to re-read the Ungerer multiple times. I didn’t even feel comfortable using it as a reference in my coursework as I was unsure of how to relate to something, I was confused about.
Conclusion
Overall I enjoyed the lessons I learned through the course. There are many lessons that I will take from the strategic leadership course and use in my everyday work. Such as how to manage conflicting perspectives, and promoting influence, and conducting a SWOT analysis from start to finish.
References
Hughes, R. L., Beatty, K. C., Dinwoodie, D. L., & Center for Creative Leadership. (2014). Becoming a strategic leader: Your role in your organization’s enduring success. San Francisco, California: Jossey-Bass.
Lepsinger, R. (2010). Closing the Execution Gap: How Great Leaders and Their Companies Get Results. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.
Maxwell, J. C. (2014). Quotes from John Maxwell: Insights on leadership.