LEADERSHIP

DEVELOPMENT

NAME Akshita Manwati

MY JOURNEY IN DISCOVERING MY TRUE NORTH

Leadership Development

Leadership Development
FROM THE DESK OF PROF VANDANA SONWANEY

Dear Friend,

Welcome to this module on “Leadership & Capacity building (LCB)”

I am excited to be alongside you on your journey of Leadership because my deep appreciation to the works
of Peter Drucker, Warren Bennis, Jim Collins, John Kotter and Bill George. These gurus who developed
Leaders for great corporations have one belief in common;Leadership can be learnt!!

Your LCB has to be visualized as a self-directed WORKSHOP, where you shop within yourself for your
strengths and then work on it.

I am glad to present you this workbook. It’s a clean slate where you will write your life stories to explore
your leadership and then create your own leadership profile. This is based on references to Bill George’s
“Discover your True North” book

How to use this workbook

Your Leadership field book consists of many activities which will be referred to during sessions. Each activity
has relevance to specific teaching point in relevant session and hence will be required to be referred by you.
Please keep the book accessible during classes. It is advised that you do not try out the exercises beforehand
as it will be out of context.This is exclusively your slam book and everything you write here is for your eyes
only. Sincere efforts to complete the exercise with honesty will reap maximum benefits

The reservoir of my life experiences shaped me as a person and as a leader.

–Howard Shultz, Starbucks

-Prof Vandana Sonwaney

THE LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT BLUEPRINT : WORKSHEETS

Ex
no   Title Pages
1 Your preparation to Leadership Images of your life 4 to 5

Page 1
 2 Your Path of Life 6
3 leading Central Lessons from Path of Life 7
4 Leadership Development Profile 8 to 10
5 Core Values & Sweet spots 11 to 12
6 Sniff & Scratch test 13
Framing Approach to your
7 Blind Spot rating 14
Leadership
8 Hazards & Crucibles 15 to 16
9 Personal Board of Directors 17 to 21
10 Developing Strategic and Map your network 22
11 Critical thinking Debiasing 23 to 25
12 capabilities Gender at Work 26 to 28
13 Your blueprint of Your Leadership Development Plan 29
14 Leadership Integrating your life 30 to 36

EXERCISE 1:LEADERSHIP IMAGES IN YOUR LIFE

The purpose of this exercise is to call to mind what you already know about leading, those implicit theories of leadership
you’ve developed by watching others.(Prefer corporate leaders)

1. Think of four leaders, past or present, whom you have admired. Write their names below, and then answer
the questions that follow.

a) Mother Teresa

b) Elon Musk

c) Jacinda Arden

d) Mahendra Singh Dhoni

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Leadership Development

2. Which of these leaders have had the greatest impact on your conceptions/ meaning of leadership?

a) Mother Teresa

b) Mahendra Singh Dhoni

3. What specific examples of leading stand out in your mind for each of these leaders?

a)Mother Teresa cared for the needy and dedicated her life for helping them

b) Dhoni irrespective of all the pressures maintains his coolness on the cricket ground

4. Which one leader from Q 2 do you consider to be Authentic?

Mother Teresa

5. What reservations or concerns might you have about following the other two from Q2 ?

Name Reservation about the leader

Elon Musk
He is a transformational leader but takes very few inputs from
his team members
Jacinda Arden Being very down to earth and humble towards people
sometimes people take it casually and thus leadership might
get affected

6. Refer to your answer in Q3; How did the context in which he/she led differ from what you face today?

a)Today people think more about themselves and there a very few of them who want to do something for
others

b) After pandemic it has shifted to You Only Live Once and thus caring and thinking about others is remains
backfoot

7. What qualities of your authentic leader, would you like to emulate?

a) Doing something for the greater good without personal benefits

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b) Leading by example and encouraging people around to do the same

c) Remain calm and compassionate in all the situations which sets an example for others as well

d)Make decisions for the team and be with the team throughout the journey

8.What qualities, if any, would you like to avoid?

a) Being egotist

b) Overconfident

c) Unrealistic

EXERCISE 2 :Your Path of Life

In this exercise you will draw the path of your life to date in the figure below. The left hand bottom corner is
the “Birth” – the starting point and right side upper corner is “Present day”. Map major happenings of your
life from birth till date on the path. Terrain of your journey must be unique to who you are: Indicate people,
places, events, work, hobby, spiritual life anything that is and has been meaningful to you. Begin from one
end to another. Be Creative !!.You can delete the box and draw your own line indicating ups and downs

Symbiosis

Varroc

Sr.
Engineering

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 Leadership Development
Table Tennis

Family

Birt
EXERCISE 3: Central Lessons
Mention chapter/phase wise the lessons learnt/ key takeaways from that phase

My lessons Chapter1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5

About
others/ how
the world is \
was at that
time

About myself

If I could go
back, here is
what I would
do differently

Critical
insights of
my life that
still affect me

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 EXERCISE 4 :Leadership development Profile (LDP)
This profiling tool is designed for the ‘person' to discover and acknowledge the areas they need to work on to improve their
leadership skills( @ Harthill 1998-2012.)  To the best of your understanding complete each of the following 36 sentences.
There are no right or wrong answers. Please respond freely and honestly

1 A child will not join group activities when ……he feels neglected

2 If I had more money, I would…………….donate more

3 Being with other people is ………………fun

4 When I am criticized, I………….get emotional

5 A man’s job isto ………………..keep working hard

6 The thing I like about myself is that I:……….am positive

7 My mother expects me to ……………be nice to people always

8 When people are helpless, they ………………..tend to deviate

9 What gets me into trouble is ………lying

10 Education is……………….power

11 I am powerful because………………….I believe in myself

12 A good boss is ………………understanding

13 At my worst, I am ………….silent

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14 When it comes to organizing my time, I ……………….am not that good in it

15 I feel sorry that………….all people are not good towards others

16 A girl has a right to…………….education

17 Sometimes I wish that…………………world would be more peaceful

18 When I get angry, I ……….remain silent

19 Rules are…….……….to be broken

20 When they avoided me, I …..did my own things

21 Joking, for me is……..……good

22 I just can’t stand people who…………lie and are rude

23 Change is………....inevitable

24 Crime and delinquency could be halted if…………..people are educated

25 He/ She( assume anyone) worries about……..………her future

26 I am ………………Akshita

27 Raising a family is …………..ones duty

28 My main problem is…..I am forgiving even when not required

29 People step out of line at work because……………………of pressure

30 My father……………………is my idol

31 If I can’t get what I want, then I……………try harder

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32 Hurrying …………leads to missing out on something

33 When I am nervous I ………….laugh

34 Teams………..….are best

35 My conscience bothers me if……….…I lie

36 I dream about………..achieving great hights

Key words: Winning, Conflict, Logic, Unconventional, Cause and effect

Your 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

summation1

Exercise 5: CORE VALUES and your SWEET SPOTS

1. List 3 values in the order of priority that are most important to your life and that symbolize your
leadership. Define them :

Priority Value Name Value Definition

1 Empathy
2 Communication
3 Integrity
Being kind and compassionate towards everyone and thinking from their
perspective is what makes a leader different and empathetic towards others
Effective communication from top to bottom or if horizontally aligned is the
most important aspect for achieving the desired goal
Integrity in smallest amounts is what is important in ones life, no matter what
situations are it is very important to maintain the integrity

Core Value 1 Core Value 2 Core Value 3

Mention situation you Giving a deadline is Being in PLC it is very Everyday from joining the
were in, where your use mandatory for everyone to important to communicate PLC it is required to have
of your core value is follow but once somebody effectively with the integrity with what is done by
tested (the 10 percent missed it because of company HRs to mutually the team and which is

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Leadership Development
that’s hardest to pull off)?
Which leadership
principle will help you
better honour your core
value in those difficult
situations
extreme health issues and
thus it was very important
to be empathetic and
extend it for him
Work together to achieve
more
benefit for the same and beneficial for the batch
recently due to some
external factors it led to
miscommunication but
was resolved later
Focus on the change Lead by an example

How will you put in place
effective and regular
feedback from others on
how well you are living
your core value in these
difficult situations
People not taking benefits
of the nature that I possess
is a feedback which keeps
me stay motivated
People understanding your
point of view and
following that is a form of
feedback that you are able
to do your job nicely
People not knowing about the
things associated with the
PLC is itself an example of
staying integrated

Identify and define ethical boundaries for your leadership.

Sr. no I will always……….. I will never……….

1 Maintain integrity Take advantage of my position

2 Help people Cheat

3 Listen to people queries Avoid people’s problems

Your Sweet Spots

List your Extrinsic Motivation and rank them ( 1 most important..)

1. Money

2. Fame

3. Recognition

List your intrinsic Motivations and rank them ( 1 most important..)

1. Satisfaction

2. Pleasure

3. Fear

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Avoiding Motivation traps: What traps can you foresee?

Trap of failing multiple times and yet doing the same thing over and over again

Exercise 6: Sniff and Scratch test

List three people from you batch who are important to you. Rate them on the basis of how they
fare in response to your scratch-and-sniff meter( your views of their authentic leadership? (on
scale of 1 to 5 where 1 is most authentic)

No Names My Rating
1 Revati Jadhav 1

2 Piyush Deshpande 2

3 Harender Singh 2

Ask these3 important people how you fare in response to their scratch –and-sniff meters?
( their views on your authentic leadership) Record their names & assessments here.(1 to 5 where
1 is most authentic)

No Names Their Rating

Key
1 Revati Jadhav 1

2 Piyush Deshpande 2

3 Harender Singh 2

insights & observations :

Exercise 7 : Blind Spots

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 Leadership Development
Questions Self rating Rating by
(Rating scale: 1=high and5=low . Avoid giving 3 ) others
Self - How self-confident am I ? 2 2
Awareness How self-accepting am I ? 1 2
How comfortable am I with who I am ? 1 1
How aware am I about my moods, my emotions and my drives ? 2 1
How aware am I of the impact I have on other people ? 2 1
Overall assessment of your self-awareness 2 1
Self How effective am I at regulating my moods so as to minimize their 2 2
regulation impact on other people?
To what extent am I able to suspend judgment of others and their ideas 2 3
in order to gain full understanding first?
When confronted with situations that disappoint or anger me, to what 2 2
extent am I able to pause disengage and think clearly before responding
or reacting?
When I receive critical feedback how well am I able to actually “hear 3 2
it” and respond in a constructive manner without getting defensive or
attacking source?
To what extent am I comfortable in novel situations? 2 2
To what extent am I comfortable responding to ambiguity and change? 2 1
Overall assessment of your self-regulation 2 2
Empathy How good am I at understanding another’s perspective or experience? 1 2
How well do I understand emotions of others? 1 1
How likely am I to respond in a sensitive and helpful way to others’ 1 1
emotional needs?
To what extent do others view me as sensitive and emphatic? 1 1
Overall assessment of your empathy 2 2
Your image about me in one word Calm
Your Blind Afraid to ask for help and avoiding conflicts
spots

Exercise 8 : Leadership Hazards & Crucibles

1. (a) When did you find it difficult to make decisions because of self-doubt?

Before playing for the district Table Tennis match.

1. (b) What would be your colleagues’ response when you fail?

My colleague will motivate me and say these are the part and parcels of life.

2. Describe a situation when you felt an overwhelming need for external recognition for financial rewards to
enhance your self-worth. How did you deal with the desire for glory?

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When the salary offered to me at the time of UG placements was way less than what others received as an
offer. I motivated myself that in a span of time I will also be able to meet my expectations.

3. Describe a situation when you retreated into yourself rather than asking for advice. How do you deal with
your feelings of isolation and stress?

Hiding about the placement activities from my close friends led to a feeling of stress and isolation but
thinking about its positives help me deal with it.

4. Describe a run up to a situation in which you were becoming shooting star and what happened?
During my table Tennis match I was becoming a shooting star and because of my hardwork and motivation
of others I won the competition.

5. List 2-3 of your greatest strength as a leader? 6. How these strengths may become weaknesses?

Empathetic If somebody doesn’t understand your actions and

Integrity continue doing the same things again and again it
Calm might become a weakness as then it might lead to
anger and take harsh decisions

7. What is the most likely scenario for losing your way?

When somebody blackmails and tries to bring emotional context that is the most likely scenario for losing
my way.

Exercise 9 : BUILD YOUR PERSONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS

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Leadership Development
The purpose of this exercise is to learn about how you will draw support from those around you. Looking at
your life story, think of times when you most needed support from others.

1. Identify the 3 most important supportive people in your life, past and present.What was the impact
each person had on your life?

Name Relation Impact

Kuldeep Magiri Manager
Changed the perception towards working
style

Karan Raina Friend Helped me to be straight forward

Shourya Vardhani Colleague Pushed me towards hard work and success

2. What might have happened if these people had not been there to support you?

If these people had not been there , then my perception towards life would have been different , and
negative. Also, I would have not been that confident

3. Amongst those listed inQ1,THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON IN YOUR LIFE whom you
look to most in supporting you goals in leading is:………Karan Raina………………………...................

because:….he has helped me to overcome my biggest weakness of always saying yes to things

4. You look to this person for support in the following ways:

a) Emotionally
b) Work life Balance
c) Confidence

5. What role has your family played in your development as a leader? In what ways have they
supported you through difficult challenge and helped you grow?

They have played a big role specially my mom, they have supported me and also believed in my
decisions , which has boosted my decision making skills

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 6. The following people have helped mentor you over the years:

Kuldeep Magiri – Manager

7. Describe a relationship that did not work for which you feel some degree of responsibility. Describe
why this relationship did not work out for you.

A relationship with my ex-manager , where he was very bossy but I didn’t tried to understand his
pov also . I think manager was very strict and used to shout without any reason. So this was the
reason that formal relationship didn’t worked out

8. Reference Q7, If you had the opportunity to do it over again, you would do things differently in the
following ways:

I will try to understand his pov and explain him that strictness wont help much and even the people
under you are getting demotivated because of that

9. Have you had a personal support group? What value and meaning it brings to you and your goal
achievement. If you have never had such a group, would you like to form one? If so, what kind of
people would you like to have in your group?

No, I didn’t had a personal support group and I don’t like to form one

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Leadership Development

BUILDING A PERSONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS.

The purpose of this exercise is to identify your personal board of directors. You must determine the
combination of mentors and advisors that would be most helpful to you at this point in your life.
Consider including both people that you see on a regular basis and those you meet with two to three
times a year. These people should have either a deep understanding of your professional world or
have known you for a long time. A key criterion is that they should be more focused on who you
are becoming as a leader versus who you were in the past.
Your personal board of directors for this phase of your journey may include any one from your
Support team , Family, person who matters to you most, mentors, close friends, personal
support group, professional network etc
Prepare a photo collage of these people as below with you in the centre

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Name/s Role that the person Major 3 milestones Frequency of dialogue
should play in your and Date next meeting
growth

Exercise 10 :Map your network

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Leadership Development

Name of the contact Who introduced you To whom did you

introduce contact

Exercise 11:De-baising

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 Exercise for building your “Essential library” of biases and fixing them

Think of a recent experience where the biases listed below surfaced. List at least 3biases. Note the
experience in short and elaborate on how you will now tackle them.

Notes
1. Loss Vs Gain framing: decision-makers tend to be more risk-averse when uncertain outcomes are framed in terms
of gains as opposed to losses.
2. Threat–Rigidity: Decision-makers are more likely to “freeze” cognitively when they frame new situations as
threats rather than opportunities.
3. Anchoring & Adjustment: decision-makers typically make assessments (Eg estimates of an outcome, modelling of
a highly uncertain world, etc.) by starting from an initial anchor which may be based on prior beliefs, historical
precedents, or even random events. Adjustments from this anchor tend to be irrationally close to the anchor.
4. Availability bias: Decision makers tend to use information that is immediately available or easy to get
5. Confirmation-trap: decision-makers tend to search for information that confirms their prior beliefs as opposed to
searching for disconfirming evidence.
6. Overconfidence: decision-makers tend to be irrationally certain about events or situations they don’t know about.
That is, they often transform actual uncertainty into perceived certainty. Overconfidence is more likely to arise in
areas outside of our expertise.
7. Overoptimism: decision-makers tend to exaggerate in a positive way the likely outcomes of a situation. The
phenomenon has been documented to be broadly occurring and relatively general. For instance, we not only
exaggerate our own talents, but also: a) systematically underestimate the time we need to complete complex and
uncertain tasks; b) exaggerate the control we have over events; c) forecast more positive outcomes than is rational in
complex and uncertain events involving our own inputs and work.

8. Dangerous Analogies: decision-makers have a tendency to be seduced by superficial similarities between the
problem they face and the comparisons they draw on to solve the problem. This is a well-documented cognitive and
behavioural fact with clear neural underpinnings.

Bias 1:

Experience:

How will things change :

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Leadership Development

Bias 2:

Experience:

How will things change :

Bias 3:

Experience:

How will things change :

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 Exercise 12 :Gender at Work

True False
Please answer the following questions in true or false and be prepared to explain your
choices.

JOB TRANSITIONS

(1) Men are more likely than women to pursue a new job. Tru
e
(2) Men are better negotiators than women False

(3) High-performers who move to new organizations are equally likely to be successful F
at their new firms, regardless of gender. False

(4) Women are less interested than men in international assignments. False

DIVERSITY AND PERFORMANCE, COMPENSATION, AND PROMOTION

(5) Women get paid less than men. True

(6) Women are more likely to be appointed to leadership roles in False

troubled companies.

(7) Women must meet a higher standard for promotion than men. False

(8) Diversity benefits financial performance. True

BIAS AND STEREOTYPES

(9) Gender biases can create obstacles and barriers even when True
people are aware of them.

(10) Women are perceived similarly at work, regardless of their race. False

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 Leadership Development
(11) Stereotypes about someone’s gender or race can affect his or True
her performance.

(12) Women are penalized for displaying traditionally masculine False

characteristics at work.

(13) Men and women hold different views of women’s professional True
capabilities.

LEADERSHIP
(14)It is hard for women leaders to be viewed as both competent False
and likable.

(15) Men and women have different leadership styles. True

(16) Senior women leaders typically have a stay-at-home partner. False

(17)A lack of role models inhibits women’s ability to become leaders. False

WORL/LIFE

(18) Flexibility policies are more important to women’s careers than False
men’s.

(19)Changes to work that help employees meet family needs can True
improve organizational outcomes.

(20)Mothers are viewed as less committed to work than fathers. False

(21) Professional women with children frequently opt out of the True
workforce because of a preference to stay home full time.

(22) Laws can influence societal views of working mothers. True

RELATIONSHIPS

(23) Women generally do not support other women in the workplace. False

(24) Men have stronger networks than women. False

(25) Men are rewarded for being alruistic at work, but women are not. False

(26) Managers should focus on finding similarities and minimizing True

differences among team members.

(27) Women receive less mentoring than men. True

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What perspectives you need to change:

Perspective of men being a good leader needs to be changed as Mother who from start of our birth is the best
manager one sees.

Exercise 13 :My Leadership Development Plan

Objective Action Success Measure

To further develop 1) Complete the leadership Formal and informal appraisal of
my skills and development programme task success
qualities 2) Attending leadership
workshops
To contribute to my 1) Complete the leadership Build a team of employees and
ability to set a vision development programme conduct a survey among team
for my company and 2) Communicate the members
realize this vision company’s strategic vision
through achievable and objectives to
objectives subordinates
To widen my Observe and learn from more Ensuring the attendance of
understanding of experienced leaders by attending the workshops/meetings
leadership workshops and their meetings

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Leadership Development

Exercise 14 :Integrating your life

1. Buckets of your life

BUCKET Two word definition ATTENTION DESIRE

(%))
PROFESSIONAL
LIFE
PERSONAL LIFE

FAMILY LIFE

COMMUNITY AND
FRIENDS

What prominent 2 actions will most contribute to you doing just that?

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BUCKET Actions
PROFESSIONAL LIFE

PERSONAL LIFE

FAMILY LIFE

COMMUNITY AND FRIENDS

2. Aspects of your integrated life

The purpose of this exercise is to design an integrated approach to your life based on the ways in which the
buckets sustain you and your leaderships.

Your personal life.

1. The most important aspects of your personal life are:

2. How do you set time aside for yourself and for your personal development? In what ways do you
nurture your inner life?

3. In what ways do they contribute to accessing your deeper wisdom when it’s most needed or helps
you to step back and see the bigger picture?

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Leadership Development
4. When faced with difficult news in any part of your life, what have you done that help you stay
grounded?

Your Family Life

5. What are the most important aspects of your family life?

6. How do you manage your family’s time requirements and conflicts between your family’s needs and
the requirements of your work?

Your Close friends

7. What role do friendships play in your life? Do you look to your friends for regular counsel and
advice on challenging issues you are facing? How much time do you devote to developing and
nurturing your friendships?

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Your Community

8. Is your community an integral part of your life? In what ways do you serve your community? How
does community service helps you become a better leader?

9. What will you do to ensure that you stay grounded professionally?

10. In what ways will your family life, personal life, friendships, and community life contribute to your
professional life?

11. How will you cope with the seductions and pressures of professional life and still focus on your True
North?

3. The purpose of this exercise is to examine how you measure success.

12. Where do the metrics of success come from for you as of now?

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13. How will you measure success in your life later?

14. Think about your experiences of happiness. We define happiness as feeling of pleasure or
contentment. What would bring you the greatest amount of happiness in your life?

15. Think about your desire for achievement, those important goals that you strive for. What are the long-
term achievements you would like to realize in your life?

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16. Now consider your desire for significance in your life. We define significance as the extent to which
youwill have made a positive impact on people you care about.
How would you define significance in your life? What is the positive impact on others that you
would like to have?

4. Integrating your life : Assemble a vision of your integrated life that would fit your life and your
leadership. Start with your experience of making choices and trade-offs between various aspects of
your life.

17. What is the most difficult choice or trade-off that you have had to make in the past?

18. What would you do differently later ,based on what you now know about your True North?

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19. How will yoube able to be the same authentic person in each environment, or do you behave
differently at work compared to the way you act at home, with your friends, or in your community?

The Last Lecture

Hope you had an insightful time exploring the depth and breadth of your leadership:
past, present and future!

To start is easy but to continue is difficult. So if you continue no matter what, you become
a Great Leader that you are happy to live as, that your people are inspired to be with and
that one who is the yourorganizations’ pride.

Happy Leading !!

References :

Graham Winter, High Performance leadership- Creating, leading and living in a high performance world,
John Wiley & Sons

Bill George, Discover your true North, Times group books

Ebook -Peter G. Northouse - Leadership_ Theory and Practice

Leadership by the Book - Ken Blanchard, Bill Hyels and Phil Hodges

Leadership theory and Practice - Richard L. Daft

Leadership Development Activities - John Adair

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