Unit 6-Learning activity 2
I had the pleasure of learning and connecting with Brenda within her busy schedule. She is an indigenous woman, working for her community as the Vice-President of the Indigenous economic development organization. She has a lot to say about her work. Her goals are to create capacity through employment opportunities for indigenous people and in creating economic wealth for her nation.
Brenda works in a firm that she need to have organizational, time management, and networking skills. She works well in times of crisis. She described her self as someone that gets things done on time and effectively. An example that I quoted during the conversation
“when my company was asked to set up a campsite in 5 days, it required utilizing my network to get tasks accomplished and to get my project a priority with vendors. I set up a project plan so that all staff knew what was needed to get done. I set timelines and followed up with others to ensure they completed tasks on time and also ensured that they were not running into any obstacles, I equally did my share of the work so that staff could see the pace of work that was required to get the job done. ”
She is organized on her tasks; she keeps them achievable and straightforward by knowing which tasks could wait and which were crucial to opening operations. Brenda’s plans for next five years is to have her MA in Business Leadership and to be the President of her company, and apply the skills that she learned on the job.
It’s a new field for Brenda working with the indigenous economic development company. It might be challenging as she explained:
“Many First Nations have joint ventures; however, they are not actually operating companies while my community is operating entirely on its own.”
Choosing the top three skills that she believes they are needed to bring to her organization are:
“Fiscal Responsibility – create economic wealth for the nation through land development. To date, we have focused on a capacity for building and creating employment. We have achieved that goal, and then some having grown from 1 to 160 employees in 5 years.
Improve the relationship with the Kwantlen government by extending the olive branch and improving communications – the business arm of the nation is often influenced by government and can effect community support. First, it means setting the record straight in terms of what can be provided and when. Then having ongoing meetings to keep them informed of progress and any changes. This will relieve some pressure and will help to create a feeling of us all being in this together.
Bring other employees in on decision making and encourage capacity building – instead of jumping in to give answers I need to work on saying “What do you think” to allow the employees to grow and make decisions for themselves. With this will require feedback as not every decision will be a good one.”
Brenda earned a lot in her career path to bring to her organization and she still wants to give more by pursuing her MA in Business Leadership. She is an example of servant leader in her organization. Brenda firmly believes in putting reconciliation in action through teaching her employee and youth in her community, self-reliance. In turn, she thinks this will creates a healthy and productive community and a better world for future generations. She presented skills through her work plan, serving her community, and fits appropriately within her organizational goals.
Reference:
Read Rockwell, D. (2017, March 17) The Anatomy of Performance Enhancing Coaching Conversations.