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Response to ET1“Change Makers, Thoughts on Transformational Servant Leadership and Strategic Leadership”

This is a response to Sea Breeze’s post: https://create.twu.ca/seabreeze/2018/10/10/change-makers-thoughts-on-transformational-servant-leadership-and-strategic-leadership/

I really enjoy the visionary role brought by Sea as being visionary and getting an assessment is the first step of the strategic leader development (Hughes, Beatty, & Dinwoodie, 2014). Also, visionary leadership, incorporated in transformational servant leadership (Atha et al, 2018), focuses on setting directions, motivating and aligning people (Cameron & Green, 2015). In the education domain, I believe being visionary as an educator and helping students find their personal visions are vitally important. Furthermore, I suggest we could think of adding stewardship and empowering (Northouse, 2016) to this aspect. From my observation, educators have different preferences concerning the curriculums or the age of the students they are teaching. For instance, if the students are in the young ages, besides being visionary the educators also need to enact more stewardship to help students in the ways of thinking, learning and developing skills. When facing adult learners who are more independent in learning and rely more on personal experiences (Merriam, 2001), the educators will need to empower the learners and actively guide them to gain what makes sense to them (George, Page, & Willaume, 2018).

However, I can hardly agree with Sea’s words in the last part of the blog. I understand the hard situation for Christians working in the public school system as other teachers might not have a personal relationship with Jesus. Nonetheless, holding the negative thought of having no expectations on others should not be the attitude adopted by a transformational servant leadership with strategic thinking. It is not appropriate to try to control other people’s belief or actions. But we could strategically influence the others and aim to better them unconsciously as finding faith in work and making commitments to personal growth are at the core of result-based transformational servant leadership (Atha, 2018). Moreover, we could resort to the dual developmental approach to reach the desired result by continuously building talent and learning skills for ourselves and creating a collective culture among the educators at the same time (Hughes, Beatty, & Dinwoodie, 2014). Finally, I want to present my story as an example. I am a Christian and live in China where the main belief is Buddhism. This situation is much more complicated than Christians in the Western public education system. But I never give up to affect the people around me. Although they may not share my belief, my colleagues start to think and behave as servant leaders due to the effort I put into building the shared mental model and collective practices. The transformational servant leaders allow and help people fully develop their potential (Douglas Atha, classroom teaching, August 7, 2018), and the people influenced by them will see it eventually.

References

Atha, D. (2018, July 30). Transformational servant leadership for results – Day one: Introduction-Foundational faith, values and ethics [PDF document]. Retrieved from http://learn.twu.ca/pluginfile.php/130150/mod_resource/content/1/2018_Day_1_Powerpoint.pdf

Atha, D. L. (Ed.), Castellon, A., George, I., Laird, P., Mitchell, K., Page, D., Peregrym, D., Strong, H., Willaume, D., Wollf, R., Wu, T. (2018) MA leadership and MA in educational leadership monograph 2018. Unpublished manuscript. Trinity Western University: Langley BC.

Cameron, E., & Green, M. (2015, March 28). Making sense of change management: A complete guide to the models, tools, and techniques of organizational change. (4thed.). Philadelphia, PA: Kogan Page.

Hughes, R. L., Beatty, C. K., & Dinwoodie, D. L. (2014). Becoming a strategic leader: Your role in your organization’s enduring success. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Merriam, S. B. (2001). Andragogy and self‐directed learning: Pillars of adult learning theory. New directions for adult and continuing education, 2001(89), 3-14.

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

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Layla’s Introduction

Location:  Nanjing South Railway Station in China

Time: 2:03 AM, 23th, September (Pacific Time)

Thank you for watching my film, and you are very welcome to share thoughts, feelings, and make comments.

And this is the message I got from Gary mentioned in the film above.

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Response to Lara Lacroix’s Leadership Story

I want to thank Lara for bringing up the notion of “vulnerability” and connecting it with our leadership stories. I deem vulnerability means showing other people the softer and weaker part of your heart. It also involves the feeling of trust or expecting to be trusted. I used to be a girl that refused to show other people my vulnerable aspect. I wanted to show that I was strong enough to face and handle everything well. Although this disposition had helped me accomplish many seemed-impossible tasks, I was easier to be desperate when I did not handle something well. When I learnt to show the vulnerable part to someone, I felt being understood and gained a lifelong friend. Therefore, I could completely resonate with the words of Lara “we need to allow us to be seen, really seen”.

The other important message of Lara’s story is “label”. Actually, I am trying to influence the students of mine, though all of them are adult learners, that do not label other people. In another word, do not judge other people, even if he/she is your close friend or relatives. Gail Tolstoi-Miller mentions in the TEDx Talks (2017) that due to the mechanisms of our brain which designs the way we think and act, we are naturally to judge people for saving the energy for thinking. Since we were born in that way, it would be crucial for us to keep self-awareness of our thoughts and conclusions. Apparently, labelling other people is the easiest way for us to “know” them. We need to realize that it is a disrespectful attitude we are adopting, and in turn, we could change this bad habit and remind others when they are labelling people.

At last, I would like to end with what Lara said in her video:” The more honest we are, the more vulnerable and courageous we will be, the more we can learn from each other.” I have learnt so much from other classmates and the professor in this course. Thank you all for having this precious journey with me.

Reference

TEDx Talks. (2017, May 4). Unconscious bias: Stereotypical hiring practices. | Gail Tolstoi-Miller | TEDxLincolnSquare. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCFb4BiDDcE

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Response to Shaaz’s Leadership Story

After listening to your story, I felt so proud of you, too. I had anxiety disorders because I was raised by my mom who is still suffering from heavy depression and anxiety. I could feel the way you depicted in the story such as being afraid of somebody hurt you and having no confidence. I am happy for you that you told your mother about the feelings and she understood and was so supportive of you and your choice. I remembered that when I was a teenager and talked to my mother about my anxious feelings, she thought I was weird and refuse to listen to me anymore. I did not feel any better until I met my husband in the college. He helped me go through the darkest days of curing and fighting with myself to stop feeling depressed. I totally agree with you that the depression and anxiety disorders cannot diminish completely, and now I would still feel anxious sometimes. But I believe that is a kind of gift or memory from the past and try to treat the feelings as an old friend, then the feelings will leave unknowingly.

I want to share my feelings with you that we can be proud of ourselves for being with anxiety disorders and depression. We had suffered with them, but they did make us a better person. For example, you have the power of empathy, you can understand other people, you are trying to build a harmonious community to help them, and so on. These are all the positive outcomes you have gained from the experience of living with anxiety disorders and depression. They make you your own hero, and you can be other people’s hero now. They also help you gain the ability of awareness. You could notice the feelings you were suffering and you could tell yourself clearly that you did not want to live like that anymore. So you have changed to be a mentally healthy individual. And you are also aware of the other people’s status to offer the help when they need. Actually, some people do not know they are suffering from anxiety disorders and depression, like my mom, or like the students who bullied you in the school. Because a mentally healthy person would not bully other people or act deviated. They were not genuinely conscious of what they were doing, and in turn, they lost the chance to be the normal and mentally healthy people.

Now I am trying my best to help my mother to get rid of the anxious feelings. It is hard because making her realize the anxious feeling is already uneasy. But I will not give up. I really like your words: Start climbing up, or blaming other people for the rest of the life. I am really inspired and encouraged. Thank you so much for sharing the story!

 

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Unit 10, Learning Activity

Summarization

Task 1: Think about what I have learned from this course and choose one related quote that is meaningful for me.

I have benefited a lot from this course and am going to write down the top three answers.

1. I have gained a whole deep framework of servant leadership including the definition, ten characteristics of a servant leader, the model of servant leadership, and servant leader behaviours from the textbook written by Northouse (2016). Also, I have genuinely understood how a servant leadership could be practically exerted in real problem-solving processes, such as making decisions, guiding the team, and improving organizational processes, and so on. We all know that “serving other people” lies at the heart of servant leadership, which would make the leadership style be considered as a weaker one or a less tough one. Although I honour the servant leadership very much, I was also confused about how to wield it to serve and help the team stand firmly in the organization without hurting other people’s feeling during the processes of negotiating and decision-making. Then I learned from Page and Wong (2000) that “Being just a service-oriented person does not qualify one as a servant leader…a servant leader is one who invests himself or herself in enabling others, in helping them be and do their best…what distinguishes servant-leaders from others is not the equality of the decisions they make, but how they exercise their responsibility and whom they consult in reaching these decisions” (p. 70-71). These words mean a lot to me, and I realize the servant leaders are adept at empowering other people and gathering collective perspectives to move and act effectively. Also, the goal and vision established by servant leaders are mostly long-term and for the mutual good of all the people.

2. The interactional and interrelated relationship among transformational leadership, authentic leadership, principled leadership, ethical leadership, and servant leadership. Although the different types of leadership are illustrated in different chapters respectively, it turns out that a leader will never demonstrate or embody only one of them. For example, a servant leader no matter female or male, is also a leader with high ethical level, positive psychological capacities, and applies “values and virtues to policy development and decision-making” (Byler, 2017, para 2). There are many sentences I would like to quote here, and I will quote some of them which impress me the most: “Higher levels of moral reasoning make it possible for the authentic leader to make decisions that transcend individual differences and align individuals toward a common goal” (Northouse, 2016, p. 204); “the vision had to grow out of the needs of the entire organization and to be claimed by those within it”(p. 173); “They have a clear idea of who they are, where they are going, and what the tight thing is to do. When tested in difficult situations, authentic leaders do not compromise their values, but rather use those situations to strengthen their values” (p. 198-199).

3. From the unit of learning Andragogy, I have gained a whole new perspective to consider the learning process I am engaged in right now. The journal articles I read in that unit make me rethink about the knowledge I have accepted through learning and the view I am using to examine the things I have learned. Unlike children and teenagers, the adult learners are prone to accept the knowledge corresponding to their intrinsic beliefs, and they are motived to learn for completely different reasons from the youths. Knowing these kinds of information can greatly help me reassess my ability of critical thinking and adjust the way of my professional work. The article: A Transformation Theory of Adult Learning written by Jack Mezirow (1993) has changed my view entirely, and I would like to quote some profound sentences:

Learning may be understood as the process of construing and appropriating a new or a revised interpretation of the meaning of one’s experience as a guide to action. No conscious experience is free from interpretation, indeed, to have an experience means that we have identified its content, we have construed its meaning. (p. 141).

Task 2: What are two course learnings that have impacted my practice?

I would like to present two kinds of impact to answer this question, one for my professional work, one for my life.

1. My work is to train the stuff for the organization, to make sure the stuff acquire the needed skills and knowledge for the professional work. I used to find that some employees, especially the senior workers, were indifferent to learning and training. I liked to construe this phenomenon or attitude as them being ignorant. Anyway, it is my duty to deal with whatever happens during the teaching process, and I was overwhelmed when facing this setback. Fortunately, I got to know the knowledge of Andragogy in this course and realized the adult learners’ motivations were different from teenagers. They do not mechanically learn in the class like the children and teenagers do. More important, the motivation factors for adult learns “can also be a barrier” (Lieb & Goodlad, 2005, p. 3) because adults have to “balance many responsibilities against the demand of learning”(p. 3). For example, the motivations for adult learners are “a requirement for competence or licensing, an expected promotion, job enrichment, a need to maintain old skills or learn new ones, a need to adapt to job changes, or the need to learn in order to comply with company directives”(p. 3). If the adult learners were not motivated by any of those factors, they would have no interests to learn and take the classes. Lieb and Goodlad (2005) also mention that “the best way to motivate adult learns is simply to enhance their reasons for enrolling and decrease the barriers”(p. 3). Inspired by the points showed in this article, I designed a questionnaire for them to find out how can they be motivated to learn and what kind of skills they are interested in. After one month, the outcomes of the course are significantly remarkable, and the staff all come to me and tell me they like to have my classes. These positive results not only reinforce my faith in my professional work but also shape my ways of thinking and applying the methods in a critical and reasonable way.

2. The book Light from Many Lamps (Watson, 1951) has kept me company entirely through this course. I do not want to restate how profoundly this book has influenced me in my life. Instead, I would like to talk about how my family has been influenced by the stories included in this book as well.

One day in May, our family was driving the car to visit the mountains nearby our city. I was doing the reading of Light from Many Lamps (Watson, 1951) on the way. I just started to read the words louder in the car:

Let me taste the whole of it, fare like my peers. The heroes of old. Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad life’s arrears of pain, darkness and cold. For sudden the worst turns the best to the brave, the black minute’s at end. And the elements’ rage, the fiend-voices that rave, shall dwindle, shall blend. Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain, then a light, then thy breast. O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again, and with God be the rest! (p. 59).

After several silent seconds, my four-year-old son suddenly asked:” Mummy, what’s next?” I said:” It’s over, my dear.” He then added:” Where is God?” I asked him:”Where do you think he will be?” He said:” He is in the mountain, and we are going to find him.” I smiled and asked:”Is it going to be hard to find him?” He answered:” God has light! Follow the light, we can find him.” I was shocked and surprised. I did not know how much he had understood the poem, but clearly, he had construed the words and meaning in his own way, and it was a marvellous way I had never thought about. After that, I always read the stories from Light from Many Lamps to him. Sometimes he listened very carefully, and sometimes he just lost his patience and went to play. This reminded me of the definition of leadership which is a reciprocal process of influence (Northouse, 2016). And is not the process of parenting another form of leadership? My construct of leadership has been expanded through the process of learning from the stories of Light from Many Lamps. And I am recommending this book to my husband and mother.

There are still so much I have learned from this course, such as the interview with my role model Olivia for the assignment Women in Leadership, and the reflections of other classmates. I will keep all those in mind and revisit the blogs written by us to refresh the knowledge regularly.

References

Byler, K. (2017, July 30). Why we need principled leadership? [web log comment]. Retrieved from http://highergroundcg.com/need-principled-leadership/

Lieb, S., & Goodlad, J. (2005). Principles of adult learning. Retrieved from http://carrie-ekey.com/handouts/Rotterdam2012/Eu_Coaches_Conf2_Rott_Day_1_A4.pdf

Mezirow, J. (1993). A transformation theory of adult learning. In Adult Education Research Annual Conference Proceedings, 141-146.

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.

Page, D., & Wong, T. P. (2000). A conceptual framework for measuring servant leadership. The human factor in shaping the course of history and development, 69-110.

Watson, L. E. (1951). Light from Many Lamps.  New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, Inc.

https://create.twu.ca/ldrs500/unit-10/unit-10-learning-activities/

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Unit 9, Responses

This is a response to Kwantlen Branda’s blog https://create.twu.ca/kwantlenbrenda/2018/06/27/unit-9-activity-2/

Question: Am I not the only one that see that self-checkouts have a ways to go before they truly make the shopping experience easier? Or will self-checkouts become redundant in retail as we head toward more online sales?

Basically, the country I am in right now does not provide self-checkouts service in the supermarket or other shopping patterns. I think it is due to the huge population which could lead to crowd disorder during checking out or difficulty in supervision. But I did experience once of self-checkouts service in Ikea last year, not Walmart. To be honest, I like self-checkouts. It is convenient and shows the level of civilization of the country. Everyone was waiting quietly in line, the staff of Ikea walked around to see if there was any help needed rather than expressing the feeling of monitoring. I really enjoy this kind of atmosphere full of peace and trust.

Besides, I do not think self-checkouts become redundant comparing with online sales. China is full of online shopping right now due to the prevailing of Taobao. People are crazy about shopping online and I even buy the roll paper, towels, bowls online. Of course, Jack Ma benefits a lot from it, but this kind of consuming pattern do create potential danger. For example, the commodities showed on the web page are not real ones presenting in front of our eyes. Therefore, it is usual that customers feel being cheated and return the goods back to the sellers. Also, the buyers always suffer the huge pressure of credit card bills as the sense of money transaction has been minimized in online shopping. Sometimes you are not aware of the amount of money you have spent until the bills are delivered to your hand. In my opinion, I like to shop in a real mall or market and feel the quality of the goods. Also, I could find a salesperson to ask the questions regarding the good face to face which makes me feel assuring. We are all social creatures and need to build connections with other people with trust. I would like to vote for the increasing use of self-checkouts rather than shopping online.

This is a response to Kunal Singla’s blog https://create.twu.ca/b4ntu/2018/06/27/activity-2-3/

Question: Have you ever been suffered from wrong product ? The product you have seen online but get a totally different one and how you respond to that situation ?

I think I am the perfect one to answer this question. I started shopping online since 2005 when Taobao first came out in China. At that time, it was common to receive a bad product which was completely different from the one showed on the website. Some sellers allowed the buyers to send back the goods and returned the money after negotiating through online chat. Sometimes, I could not even find the seller after receiving a wrong product, and there was nothing I could do about it. However, the huge population in China do contribute a lot to the increasingly prosperous situation of online shopping because there are always buyers. I can vaguely remember the exact time point, but when the returned good service appeared, the untrustworthy transactions disappeared. Nearly all the sellers of Taobao are obliged to offer “7-day unreasonable return” service. It means the buyer could return the goods for no reason in 7 days after receiving the goods. Of course, the goods have to be exactly the way they were when they reached the hands of buyers initially, and the buyers have to afford the delivery fee. This service has significantly assured the online shopping. I used to buy the dresses and clothes online and return the ones do not meet the expectation or are apparently different with the pictures on the page. However, the delivery fee is much less than the total money I have to spend shopping in the real mall including the cost of oil, parking, beverages and snacks. With the returning service and the regulations of the Taobao, the situation of selling the wrong product is completely under controlled.
Hope you will find this response useful.
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Two Responses to Light from many lamps

1. This is a response to Kunal Singla’s blog referring to Light from many lamps https://create.twu.ca/b4ntu/2018/06/22/light-from-many-lamps/

I was really moved by the sentences that Kunal wrote in her blog about the little gesture and the small chat at the end of every conversation she had with her parents about when she would go back home. These words remind me of those lonely days in Vancouver last year. Every day I had the video chat with my son who was far away from me in my hometown, and he asked me in his innocent voice:”Mummy, when will you come back home? I wanna hug you.” I had to make a great effort to control the tears and showed him the smiling face every time, but it was really hard and cruel for both of us. Therefore I could deep understand the feeling Kunal shared in her blog that she wanted to ditch everything, go back home and start over. That was exactly how I felt and told myself thousands of time in my head last year. I totally agree with her idea that the life is about to maintain the proper balance between every chapter. And I believe that home is the source of the strength and courage that we need to overcome life issues and obstacles. Additionally, home is the place where we could rest our spirit in peace, just like Pliny’s philosophy that “Home is where the heart is”(Watson, 1951, p. 256).

We all need to leave home for a while, learning, working, or pursuing self-actualization, and so on. It is the home that gives us the strength to explore the world and finding the true selves away from it. When we are out there and fighting alone, we should be grateful and firmly believe in ourselves and our home. No matter how far we have gone, our hearts are always connected with home. Besides, we can always comfort ourselves by saying that we can always go back home no matter win or lose. The home never judges, just embraces. Even the ship which has travelled around the world, it still needs to anchor in a warm bay to get repaired and maintained occasionally. And the home is that bay.

2. This is a response to Charlie Mable’s blog referring to Light from many lamps https://create.twu.ca/charliemable/2018/06/22/love-and-family-life/

This blog post by Charlie is my favourite blog regarding the reflection of reading stories of Light from many lamps. Maybe it is due to the same experience of undergoing the divorce of the parents helplessly. My parents got divorced last year after spending 35 years together in their marriage. I thought I would not be so heartbreaking because they had not lived in the same house for several years. When the day of divorce registration came, I burst into tears and the unbearable feeling is still fresh today. It turned out that I was much more dependent on my original family than I thought. After realizing that, I invested a lot of time to care about my mom and dad separately, and tried my best to transfer the attached feeling of family to my own family: my husband and my son. Although the painful feeling is still there, I could at least face it, minimize the adverse impact the divorce had on me, and keep the optimistic faith about my own marriage and the future of my family.

I love the idea of “Art box” created by Charlie. It is more like the container of the memories, and I believe the most meaningful meaning of it is what Charlie mentioned in the blog: we capture the good and keep moving forward. The future is unpredictable, and we cannot control family members’ decision. But the memories, the time we spent together can always be the cherished moments from which we can obtain love, care, strength, and courage, and those moments never fade away. I would like to follow Charlie’s idea and make a memorable corner for my family as well, to create a shared memory reservoir.

Speaking of leadership, Charlie asked a question finally: As a leader, what do you do to show your people they matter? I believe the best way to let other people feel they matter is to value what they value and respect their interests regardless of your preference. Also, I would like to address some effective ways I learned last semester about how to strengthen the intra-group connection. I examined some of the methods in my team and found that not only the intra-group connection but also the identification of each team member has greatly increased. And the methods are weekly meeting, holding the family day, and increasing the chances of communication which can show concern towards each other and eliminate worries within the team (Bridges, 2009). I perceived from the performance of the team members that when they formed a sense of belonging to the team, they would feel valuable and being valued.

References

Bridges, W. (2009). Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change. Philadelphia, PA: De Capo Press.

Watson, L.E. (1951). Light from Many Lamps. New York: Simon and Schuster.

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Light From Many Lamps: Our Thinking in the Future Must be World-Wide

I was completely moved by Wendell Willkie after reading just three paragraphs that “he was to have the opportunity of seeing the world at war…and of visualizing the world at peace. He was to have the opportunity of contemplating the best moves in the direction of international understanding and co-operation” (Watson, 1951, p. 298). I honour his tremendous courage and deeply sense the extraordinary empathy he had for the whole world. Wendell Willkie did not discard the faith, conscience, and the tolerant heart for the world during the time of war when most of the people felt too desperate to keep the virtue and righteousness. Then it is mentioned that “the impression he got was not of distance from these people, but of nearness to them” (Watson, 1951, p. 298). This depiction has assured me that Wendell Willkie genuinely gained the empathetic feeling of the people who were suffering the war or fighting for the future of the world. And his message One World further demonstrates his generous attitude and complete understanding of the entire human beings and the future of the world. Wendell Willkie said:” There can be no peace for any part of the world unless the foundations of peace are made secure throughout all parts of the world” (Watson, 1951, p. 298). I do believe the whole world, either in the war or out the war, different races or not, understands this philosophy as the world has united many times in the history to end the wars. And now it is the whole world’s will and obligation to maintain the era of peace.

Wendell Willkie has shown many traits and behaviours of servant leadership with high ethical level. First, he was a good listener as he went close to the people of other countries to listen to them and talk to them. The fact that he understood them very deep proves that Wendell listened  “receptively to what is being said and unsaid” (Spears, 2010, p. 27) and gained the real feeling of the people from their deep heart. Second, Wendell Willkie had shown the extraordinary power of empathy. Empathy is defined as “standing in the shoes of other people and tempting to see the world from those people’s point of view” (Northouse, 2016, p. 227). Wendell Willkie listened and talked to the people around the world, and he found out that the pain and hardship people suffered from the war were generally close and common. He connected the feelings around the world which led to his profound message. Besides, empathy is always coupled with listening. Spears (2010) states that the servant leaders are “those who have become skilled empathetic listeners”(p. 27). Third, Wendell Willkie’s action of visiting different groups of people around the world during war manifests that he held strong and high ethical standards. Instead of running away from the war, he devoted himself to the fighting front, discussed with leaders of different nations, talked to the teachers, farmers, and workers, and so on. He was not living for his own good, he was striving for the welfare of the whole world while ignoring his own safety. And fourth, the value created by him has significantly influenced the world from generation to generation. The notion of “one world team” (p. 299) brought up by him, the sense of being a citizen of the world (p. 300), and the faith of building a house in justice and freedom with room for all (p. 301) all illustrate the passion triggered by his message to build the peaceful consensus among the world which would be benefited eventually.

At last, the most important message for me reflected on this story is to further believe that it is the servant leadership that can change the life and world significantly. And I will keep the practice on the way toward mastering servant leadership eventually.

References

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.

Spears, L. C. (2010). Character and servant leadership: Ten characteristics of effective, caring leaders. The Journal of Virtues & Leadership, 1(1), 25-30.

Watson, L. E. (1951). Light from Many Lamps.  New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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Unit 9, Learning Activity 2

I am going to have FedEx Canada be the example. I would like to choose the organization I am familiar with to share more opinions and reflection on this blog. I have a very close friend who had worked for FedEx for a year, and we talked about this company many times.

FedEx:

FedEx is mainly running for the delivery of goods. According to my friend, the division of FedEx she was in also took charge of printing for mailing and posting. She was very enjoying working there with other coworkers. They usually wrapped the packages together, put them in the truck, and waved hands behind the truck. I was so moved by the satisfactory emotion implied in her tone of hard working and harmonious teamwork.

And there is a lot of use of technology in FedEx. The company has designed the official page in beautiful purple colour that you could find from https://www.fedex.com/en-ca/home.html. Also, the company has incorporated the relevant information, such as the location of the FedEx companies and the terms of service, and the diverse business items on the page. It has greatly helped the customers find and proceed to the services they are seeking. For example, the customer could establish an account first to fill in some personal information such as name and Email address; then, he can choose the service he wants and fill the details in another page; further, he could track the record from the page by typing in the codes of the package. As for the staff, my friend mentioned that they had their own information system to compute the time the delivery might need, take record of every package, and so on. The technology has made the delivery service more convenient and effective. Rather than writing the address of the destination and simply waiting for the package to arrive with no idea of its current location, the information on the computer is clearer and the trackable service can create a sense of reliability for the customer which could trigger the intention to choose the FedEx continually.

However, my friend did mention some adverse aspects regarding the technology. First, the company relies too much on the technological means. Since every detail of the packages and all the information were kept in the computer system, it was a complete disaster when the system crashed or the computer died. And they had run into this kind of situation many times. Once it happened, they were unable to keep the work going on anymore and the complaints from the customers appeared day and night. Second, the technological hardware is easy to become outdated. These years, the world is witnessing a series of technological evolution. The high-tech means is updated rapidly, and consequently, the software and the hardware need to be renewed in time. Clearly, the FedEx company was not taking care of this aspect because the staff were complaining about the outdated computers and printers which greatly affected the working efficiency. 

As far as I am concerned, the leaders in the FedEx company should fully exert the ability of foresight in depicting the vision and establishing the long-term goal for the company like John Smart (2015) has strongly suggested. The leaders have to realize that the technological evolution is not a one-time thing. The next step of the technological evolution is unpredictable, and the technological means has become an indispensable factor in the business items. Therefore, it is crucial for the leaders to incorporate foresight in making decisions and equipping the organization. Apparently, the leaders of FedEx should update the systems and buy in computers, printers and hard disks regularly to keep the business and service running at the higher level. Also, my friend had mentioned that the training programs of FedEx company were not well-designed and effective. Considering the widely used teleconference in many organizations, I believe that the FedEx company could resort to it to learn from other organizations. Then the higher manager can impart the new training programs to the store managers of all divisions through teleconference to facilitate the training. At last, there should be a feedback mechanism set in the staff information system. As John Smart (2015) says ” Most stuff happens bottom-up”, it would be necessary for the leaders to keep track with the bottom line of the organization where the real problems and needs rise up. The workers or employees at the bottom line are the people who are actually communicating with the clients and customers. Therefore, devoting more attention to them can get to know the real requirements of the market. Besides, if the workers at the bottom line are equipped with the high-tech devices, they would accomplish the work efficiently and serve the customer effectively. 

Question: I would like to ask a question regarding the ability of foresight. According to Malgeri’s (2010) definition about foresight which “can be considered a behavioural inclination, referring to an individual’s tendency to devote a significant amount of time engaged in thought or activities concerning the future”(para. 1). What are the key traits or abilities of a leader which can contribute to the ability of foresight in your opinion?

References

John M Smart. (2015, April 8). John Smart – Leadership of Tech Change – WFS 2013 [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhdWqLNUJns

Malgeri, J. (2010). Organizational foresight and stewardship. Public Manager, 39(4), 39-42.

https://create.twu.ca/ldrs500/unit-9/unit-9-learning-activities/