A641.7.3.RB - Appreciating Your “Real Self”

A641.7.3.RB - Appreciating Your “Real Self”

Read Chapter 5 of the workbook “Becoming a Resonant Leader”

Complete all of the exercises from page 109-137.

After completing the exercises, compose a reflection blog on what you learned about your lifeline, social identities, strengths, and roles.

This was another difficult assignment. I was cruising right along with the exercises until I came to the part about seeing strengths in myself.  I only found about seven and looked ahead at the rest of the exercises only to feel completely inadequate. I’m not able to see those things in me because I know what goes on in my head and it's not praise about my strengths. I know how I see value in other things, other people but it’s hard to see those in myself. It’s not that I’m not aware that I’m a compassionate person, capable of deep empathy and friendships, and it’s not a self-pity thing. It’s just that I’m not ready to dive too deeply into those things. But I’m going to work on it. Being mindful and self-aware, speeds up the recovery of the negative and leads to resilience. (Foundation, 2013)

Moving on…my lifeline is fairly uncomplicated. We moved a lot and some of the highlights I noted were when I got married the first time, the volunteer work I did while stationed in Germany with said first husband, when I remarried and became part of a huge extended family and also became a step-grandma, and when I started working in the aerospace field and then subsequently at Boeing. The highlights have to do with my family, the giving of my time, and a promising career choice.

The transition points and struggles on my timeline are when my Mom got remarried and suddenly I had two sisters, when we moved from SD to TX, when I moved to NM and met my first husband and moved to Germany, when we moved back to the states and later I had a miscarriage after 8 years of fertility treatments, when I got divorced and had to figure things out on my own, when I was demoted at work and felt crushed, and the most recent was the transition to South Carolina and a new career in final assembly at Boeing.

The biggest regrets on my timeline are that I didn’t take my parents up on the offer to stay in KS and go to school instead of moving back to San Antonio to live with a stupid boy, that my first marriage didn’t work out – it was for the best but it was regretful just the same, when I got demoted and left North Coast Electric – I was passive-aggressive and behaved poorly and I wish I had handled that whole thing much more professionally, and lastly when I left TMX aerospace after a year of 300 hours of OT – I was mentally and physically drained and when the opportunity came to work at the Seattle Times I thought I had won the lottery. I had not. It was a regretful six weeks that weirdly enough ended up sending me to Boeing but at the time, I regretted taking the job in the first place. I quit without notice and that’s just bad form.

My career rhythms are kind of random. I was in retail for the better part of 16-17 years and then I branched into other industries. I found that I really liked working in the warehouse and in the role of VMI coordinator. I liked being on the road and meeting the customers face to face. I liked being a representative of North Coast and a liaison between the company and the customer. This lasted about four years. Then 2008 happened and I was laid-off for 10 months. I finally got hired on at TMX aerospace and that began my career in that industry. I’m still in aerospace and it has been very good to me. I struggle with leadership decisions and some of the normal corporate America “paralysis by process” things but I think I’m going to stay with aerospace at least until I retire or win the lottery and can move on to the next phase of my life…which we know will be a hobby farm in the Midwest and maybe some writing!   

My social roles are pretty common: wife, daughter, sister, niece, aunt, cousin, step-grandma, step-mom, etc. The most important roles and social identities to me are the family roles: wife, daughter, sister…my family means the world to me. They are my strength and comfort and I hope I am the same to them. Secondary is my business and professional roles because those identify my talents and achievements.

I was taught about my identities by watching my family and the people around me. I learned my work ethic from my parents and the people at my first job who taught me to show up earlier than needed and be prepared. I learned how to be a big sister through trial and error…but mostly out of love for my sisters. I learned how to be a parent figure (aunt, step-parent, and step-grandparent) by watching my family and how they behaved. My values have their foundation in how my family lived/and still live their lives.

There is one aspect of my social roles I have been thinking about digging into deeper but it’s pretty personal. I have dealt with the experience and how it has buried itself in my brain, but it’s begun to become obvious to myself that I need to work it out professionally. I want start therapy in an effort to work through this experience more…maybe find better coping mechanisms…so that I can grow more into my social roles. On the one hand, suffering less and being more aware of our inherent wakefulness would be changes from how we experience ourselves right now, or at least most of the time. On the other hand, though, the way to uncover brilliant sanity and to alleviate suffering is by going more deeply into the present moment and into ourselves as we already are, not by trying to change what is already going on. (Wegela, 2010)

The only sense of relative importance of my social identities has been the feeling of personal responsibility to conduct myself as a good role model for my nieces, nephew, grandbabies, and cousins. I am the oldest everything in my family…oldest daughter, first grandchild, first niece, oldest cousin…I was the first. I carry that responsibility and take it seriously because as we know…the first one through the wall is usually the bloodiest and I want to be supportive as my younger relatives go through it.  

Working in the electrical distribution industry and then later in aerospace, my role as a woman has always played a big part in how I’ve experienced those professional roles. Weirdly enough, 16 years in retail and I never really encountered any kind of discrimination…it’s like retail is more a woman’s world. However, the more education I have and the better jobs I’ve been able to get, the more I’ve encountered more glaring misogynistic behaviors (as I’m sure many women have) and being underestimated and undervalued because of my gender. Usually it’s benign…unintentional, like automatically being assigned the duty of putting together a team gathering but never the first to be assigned a major project at work. But I have been threatened for speaking out although never at Boeing. At Boeing, it’s usually just that women tend to have to get loud and become bullies in order to be taken seriously. These kinds of things really grind my gears.  I will never get used to that, and it always comes as a slap in the face.

This is about as far as I get with this assignment. It has been insightful and it’s shown me that I have a lot of work to do on myself still; a lot of work on becoming more mindful. We are all works in progress though and I hope I never stop evolving and growing to be a better version of my real self.

References:

Boyatzis, R., Johnston, F. & McKee, A. (2008). Becoming a Resonant Leader. Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business Press.

Foundation, N. (2013, February 12). Becoming Conscious: The Science of Mindfulness [Video file].Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TeWvf-nfpA&feature=youtu.be

Wegela, K.K. (2010, January 19.) The Courage to Be Present. Psychology Today.com. How to Practice Mindfulness Meditation: Mindfulness is important; how do we develop it https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-courage-be-present/201001/how-practice-mindfulness-meditation

A641.5.3.RB - ICT at the Team Level

A641.5.3.RB - ICT at the Team Level

Read the article: “The evolving group: towards a prescriptive theory of intentional group development” by Kleio Akrivou, Richard Boyatzis and PoppyMcLeod.

Using the concepts within ICT focused on the team level, reflect on why the Olympic US Women’s Soccer team won so often and the US Dream Team basketball men’s team did so poorly in 2000 and 2004?

I don’t know much about women’s soccer or the NBA much less the US Dream Team men’s basketball teams in 2000 & 2004. However, from what I’ve read about these teams is that both the women’s soccer teams and the men’s basketball teams either failed or succeeded because of the leadership they had. The differences had to do with coaching styles, teamwork, and the expectations from each coach.

My 15 year-old niece plays soccer for a local team near Milwaukee, WI. We’ve gone to see her play a couple times and that team is incredible. These young women really communicate well and trust each other. You can see that they have learned the basics together and are now coming into their own trying some trick shots here and there. They just all work so hard. Their coach is a former professional player and he talks to them and guides them throughout the game whereas other coaches we’ve seen yell at their teams. There is a respect there and it shows. [T]he initial phase is an authority one, with key issue the issue of individual independence, while the second phase is an interpersonal one, with the key theme the issue of interdependence. The group can resolve its internal conflicts and perform only if the individual can resolve its internal conflicts in regards to his/her boundaries in the group. (Akrivou, et al., 2006) My sister-in-law films all of the games and has told me that compared to other teams, “her” girls always get up from a hit or trip; they usually get right up. They play with integrity as much as they can. The support and coaching these girls get is top-notch and will eventually help some of the players earn college scholarships.

From what I read about the women’s soccer team, they didn’t even have a real team before about twenty years ago. They had to figure out where to pull the talent from because the college teams weren’t fully matured. In many ways, the creation and growth of women’s soccer in the US was a process of assembling the components. College soccer, the youth programs, amateur clubs, the national team, tournament success, the US Open Cup, farm clubs and finally a professional league. (Litterer, 2011) The women had an uphill battle in the historically patriarchal sports field, as well as in establishing themselves as formidable opponents on an international level. There was a notable ebb and resurgence of activity at the national level in these days; [much] work was limited to training and conditioning. (Litterer, 2011) The women shared a vision of what they wanted the Women’s soccer league to be. The equivalent of the ideal self at a group level is an image of the ideal or a shared vision[.] (Akrivou, et al., 2006)

After researching the 2000 and 2004 USA Men’s basketball teams, I ran into a lot of blogs that chided them for being poorly coached and ill-prepared. After the 1992 true US Dream Team, subsequent teams started falling short to the point of utter embarrassment. Part of this was due to many of the great players retiring and the new up-and-comers not yet reached a maturity level of play.  There were also interpersonal clashes and poorly placed players. U.S. Basketball decided to go with a younger team but picked an unbalanced roster that lacked shooters on the wings and a true lead guard. It didn’t help that this young group was being led by Larry Brown, who was notoriously tough on his younger players. He clashed with several members of the team, including the point guard (in name only) Stephon Marbury. (Ruiz, 2016)

The take-away from studying both of these team’s stories is that when a team works together and is able to solve problems internally, they can sustain a winning team. We believe that a group’s shared vision of what they want to be and do is the driver of the intentional change. (Akrivou, et al., 2006) When a team is poorly assembled, emotionally immature, and lacking of a shared vision or dream, maintaining the winning edge and cohesion of a winning team is difficult.  

References:

Akrivou, K., Boyatzis, R.E., & McLeod, P.L.(2006) "The evolving group: towards a prescriptive theory of intentional group development", Journal of Management Development, Vol. 25 Iss: 7, pp.689 - 706

Litterer, D. (2011, August 17).Women's Soccer History in the USA: An Overview. http://homepages.sover.net/~spectrum/womensoverview.html

Ruiz, S. (2016, June 28). A definitive ranking of every USA men's Olympic basketball team since the Dream Team. For the Win. USA Today. http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/06/2016-olympics-basketball-united-states-dream-team-rankings

A641.4.3.RB - Tipping Points of Emotional Intelligence

A641.4.3.RB - Tipping Points of Emotional Intelligence

I’ve talked about this before in my Reflection Blog for this program but the experience works for this exercise as well. When I came to Boeing South Carolina (BSC), it was with excitement and hope for something new and the opportunity for growth. I didn’t want to leave WA or Boeing Fabrication but I knew that the time was then, the opportunity presented itself and I needed to trust myself and take a huge leap of fate. Until then, I’d been working with the same group of people, or in close proximity to the same group of people, for the last 5 years. It was a safe haven, but one with limited possibility for career growth. I don’t think I’ve ever actually admitted this to anyone but I wanted to see if I could be successful on my own…away from the people who held the net under my tight-rope. I wanted to see if it was just a fluke, if they were protecting me from how bad I really was at my job…from how much I really didn’t know. I didn’t feel like I deserved my job at Boeing.

At first I didn’t know if it was the amount of sunshine available, a new environment that was empty of the heavy stress we felt in WA, or some combination of those things, but I felt incredible! I felt lighter, confident, and less intimidated than I thought I would. BSC is different from Boeing Washington in many ways but also very similar in culture and processes so it wasn’t that big of a learning curve. Or so I thought. The time came for me to learn a scheduling software that I was only vaguely familiar with. I was taking over two packages from two different people and they were both trying to help me with this transition. One of the people was helpful but I could see she really cut corners and the way she talked about things was mostly negative. The other person was younger, and her method was to show me once and walk away. When I had follow-up questions, she rolled her eyes and would be condescending. It wasn’t a great learning environment. I was falling further and further behind because I didn’t understand what these people were trying to help me with, or not help me with. I felt defeated, stupid, useless, and old. Maybe my fears were founded…maybe I didn’t deserve to be there. Maybe I just talk a good game but can’t actually follow through.

I wallowed in self-pity for about three months. Struggling to get a hand-hold on the schedules, the metrics, and finding a cadence that I could maintain. Finally, I stopped asking for help from anyone, sat in a small conference room, and just worked. It took me a long time to really grasp what the software was all about…a lot of trial and error. Then one of my co-workers started sitting with me while I was working. He had projects in my areas so with him sitting there we could talk about the projects and work on the schedules simultaneously. It turned out to be exactly what I needed. I really had just needed someone to sit with me while I noodled through the process and answer questions as I went along. No one else was willing to do this for me. In two weeks, I had gained confidence and was feeling much better about my situation. It felt like the first time in months that I had been able to look up and see my surroundings again. That had been my tipping point. [I]t seems that the process of change is not a continuous one and that happens with these tipping points or on these moments of emergence. (Boyatzis, 2013)  It just took someone who could take the time and sit with me, and talk me through the questions, to bring me out of the negativity and back into a positive space.

Since that point we’ve switched to a Visio based scheduling program that really boosted my confidence because I’d used Visio a lot before with value stream mapping and process flows. Suddenly, the people who had been helping me, were coming to me for help! It was and is really cool. The work statement was also reallocated and once again I found myself face to face with having to get training from Miss Condescension. This time though, after a couple of eye rolls and “I already told you this.” situations, I just stopped asking her anything. Instead, I relied on my team leads and the manufacturing managers I supported. It is a tactic that has proven very successful. I did not want another negative transition that brought me back to the point of questioning every decision I had made that got me to that moment. It’s still stressful, and I still have those negative days but its better. [R]emember in that moment that you’re feeling stressed, there’s actually some positives to those things happening to that feeling of mental arousal. And that’s that you are going to be better equipped to handle the challenge in front of you. (Carmichael, 2016)

What would I have done differently? I could have stopped being stubborn and asked for the help I needed…not the help I was getting…sooner. I let stress and my own insecurity get in the way of my ability to learn something new. The crippling self-doubt was winning. If I could do it all again, I would brush off that negative self-talk and give myself more credit. Confidence reinforces positive attitudes. Feeling like you’re capable or at least able to become capable lowers stress and enhances an affirmative approach. Confidence eliminates, “I can’t.” Positive people say, “I don’t know but I’m sure we can figure it out.” (Rockwell, 2010) I also would have recognized sooner that while I can adapt to change, I do not like change and that stresses me out and that’s when I get angry. It’s not worth getting angry over. Now, I try to acknowledge stress ahead of time. I kind of say to myself, “Okay, this is going to stress you out. You have to rise above it. Write in your notebook, take deep breaths, and think before you react…don’t yell. Don’t allow these people to make you look like a crazy person.” So really when you start to notice whatever your signs of stress are– and you should take some time to think about what are they. (Carmichael, 2016) Suffice it to say that I’m trying, working on self-awareness and the reality of what I can control and what I can’t. There are also lot of things written in my notebook that I’m super glad I didn’t say aloud.

References:

Boyatzis, R. (2013, September 11.) Module 2 The Positive PEA) and Negative (NEA) Videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=197x4dmuug8&feature=youtu.be

Carmichael, S. G. (2016, December 1). Handling Stress in the Moment. Interview with Amy Gallo. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/ideacast/2016/12/handling-stress-in-the-moment

Rockwell, D. (2010, July 8). “N” is for Negativity. Leadership Freak. https://leadershipfreak.blog/2010/07/08/%e2%80%9cn%e2%80%9d-is-for-negativity/