Shelby Cortez

OGL 300

Paper 7

22 February 2019

Part 1: (Define Leadership)

My definition of leadership now is a person who is flexible in meeting the needs of their
followers, while also having as much transparency as possible, in addition to empathy. Leadership
impacts employee performance in a major way. The way that the leader acts and behaves, really sets
the tone of the team, and this could lead to either great performance, or poor performance. The models
that best fit me are the situational approach, transformational leadership, and authentic leadership. The
situational approach is by far my favorite approach to leadership, because I am a firm believer that each
situation is different, and that the leader needs to be able to read the situations and the employees to
best determine how to respond. Transformational leadership also resonated with me because I scored
this style of leadership a few times with the simulation. Transformational leadership is positive because
it really focuses on the charismatic characteristics of leaders, which can have a great impact on
followers. When you have a charismatic, transformational leader, you have someone who is going to
transform people in positive ways. Authentic leadership is also important to me because I believe that
transparency is leadership should be a given. An authentic leader is someone who is going to be
genuine, which is vital in leadership, especially when changes are occurring. It’s always important to be
honest with your followers. This will not only gain their trust, but also their respect for their leader, and
it makes the team stronger.
The two models that don’t resonate with me are the path-goal theory, and the leader-member
exchange theory. Path-goal theory focuses on “how leaders motivate followers to reach their goals”
(Northouse, 117). I believe that leadership should be more emotional rather than logical, and that’s why
this theory doesn’t resonate with me. Leader-member exchange theory focuses on the exchanges that
occur between the leader and the followers, and although this isn’t a bad thing, I think that leadership
should be more emotional. I believe that the way we feel and how we react to our followers, as well as
how we treat them, are vital in their performance, and I saw this in the situational approach the best.

Part 2: (Activity)
What stands out to me the most is how predominately white it is, along with the fact that it is
primarily males. We see white males in the bulk of the photos. There is such a lack of diversity, it’s
extremely sad. There are only a handful of women, and even less African Americans. In addition to these
minorities, I also don’t see many different people with different ethnicities, such as Asian, Mexican, or
any other ethnicity aside from Caucasian. I think that Sheryl Sandberg said it best when she said that her
generation will not change the workforce, but hopefully they can help lay the groundwork for future
generations. We need to see diversity in all areas including gender, ethnicity, and backgrounds.

Part 3: (Apply Theory)

When I was working at a phone company a few years ago, I was the manager at my location.
One day one of my employees seemed off and not like herself. Typically, she was energetic and ready to
make sales, and very much a go-getter, but on this day, she was down and quiet. I asked her what was
going on and she confided in me about some personal matters with her boyfriend, and I had her take a
break in the back. I gave her some time to herself and then went and in checked in on her and we talked
for a bit. I showed her empathy, and that I was actively listening to her, and by the end of our
conversation she had really turned around. She seemed like her normal self, and she went back out onto
the floor and did some of her best numbers yet. This is an example of the situational approach because I
had to adapt to the situation and have genuine empathy for my employee. If I would have not cared, or
if I would have not actively listened, that would have been a missed opportunity for me to connect with
her, and also for us to form a stronger bond. After this experience, she showed more loyalty to me, and
we grew as a team. This is a great example of paying attention to your employees and having empathy
for them.

Part 4: Simulation Evaluation:

The team led itself by each person contributing every week and staying on top of their work. If
there was one teammate who needed to complete their task for us to move on, then somebody would
send out gentle reminders through our group text. For the most part, we all stayed on top of our
assignments. Leadership was definitely shared amongst the group. Everybody had a point throughout
our few weeks, where they were sending an update to the group, notifying them of what happened. The
updates and reminders are what really helped us stay on track. For me personally, I tried to set a
deadline to aim to have the games completed by Friday of every week, so it gave everyone ample time
to finish their papers. We didn’t hit this deadline every week, but it was something that helped keep our
time management in check, week after week. I learned that I demonstrated some skills that implied that
I had transformational leadership traits. This doesn’t completely surprise me because I tend to focus on
emotions and ethics, in addition to goals, so this was right on track with me. Although the game was
slightly confusing, I did make decisions on how I personally would have made them. I didn’t know what
the game was expecting each week, so I just followed what I would do if I were in the same situations in
real life. I would say that there isn’t a way to prepare yourself for the game simulations because you
really don’t know what to expect each week. In addition to this, I also feel that there are not ways to
prepare yourself for a crisis in real life. The reality is that you can’t control what is going to happen in the
future, and the only thing that you can control is how you react. The best way to stay ready, if there is
any way, is to just always be transparent with your team and ensure that everybody is operating at high
standards. When the time comes where a crisis occurs, take a breath, and get to work. My favorite
leadership style is the situational leadership style. I believe that you have to adapt to your situations,
and you can’t have the same reactions all the time. The teams are going to change, the problems are
going to change, and the leader is going to have to change to these situations. The simulation was really
confusing, and I don’t feel like I am walking away with deeper knowledge after we have completed the
game. But overall, I feel like I have learned how to communicate best with other teammates, and I
learned that setting a tentative timeline for group activities is best for everybody involved. When there
is a tentative timeline, then everybody knows what is expected of them, and when it is expected. This
takes a lot of the guessing work out of the activity, which helps bridge gaps. If I played the simulation
again, I don’t think that I would change my decisions. I still don’t know if I made the right or wrong
decisions because there isn’t any feedback in the game. If there was feedback that explained to me why
the scores were moving up and down, then perhaps I would go back and alter my decisions.
References:

Northouse, P.G. (2018). Leadership: Theory and Practice. (8th ed.). Thousand Oaks, Ca. Sage
Publishing.