Personal Leadership Philosophy
Throughout my experience as a peer leader on Virginia Tech’s campus, I have learned how to be an effective leader and how to affect concrete social change. I have focused my efforts in three different areas: service, academics, and research. This transdisciplinary combination of leadership opportunities allowed me to learn from people in completely different fields about how to lead unique groups effectively and happily. As a result, I culminated my experiences to understand leadership as a dynamic process between followers and leaders.
Leadership is a dynamic process between followers and leaders. Leaders have a duty to serve their followers, to help them improve, and to guide the mission of the group. Leaders should have a guiding vision and remain on-task throughout the leadership process. I believe leaders should be motivated and transparent as well as encouraging. Personally, I value intelligence and kindness in leaders. I believe that leaders should have knowledge about their areas and the social skills to impart the importance of this knowledge. This notion of knowledge and effective communication is evidenced in the charismatic form of leadership which argues that more socially skilled leaders may encourage members to be more invested in their group or project (Duta 2005:4). In addition, leaders should have a vision and be able to influence their styles of motivation to cater to each group of followers. I believe this high level of motivation will contribute to the overall success of the group. In addition to the success of a group, the happiness and cohesion in a group is just as an important, if not more important, aspect of leadership. I believe that leadership is a constant relational occurrence between leaders and followers that can foster strong, or create poor and disjointed, working connections (Branson and Mara 2019:5). Without cohesion and a sense of personal responsibility and autonomy in a group, the success of the group is meaningless. With this responsibility comes the necessity of understanding and diffusing conflict within the group. Leaders should be willing and capable to bring out-groups back into the larger group and should make each member aware of the impact of their contributions.
I think that followers and leaders should have an amicable, respectful, and communicative relationship. This belief follows the authentic form of leadership that maintains successful leaders will maintain open lines of communication (Lopez, C.G. et al 2015:3). Without a comfortable and motivating environment, leaders will not be as successful. However, leaders need to have a firm hand and lead in a strong manner. In addition, leaders should maintain a high level of respect within their groups. I aspire to reach all of these goals. I aspire to be transparent, motivating, and respectful. I understand that leaders are not perfect and try to take criticism in a non-defensive manner to better my type of preferred leadership. I believe that leaders have a responsibility to cultivate and motivate future leaders. I want to lead with a strong hand and collaborate with followers to create a cohesive and productive group. Lastly, I aspire to set a positive example to followers and to allow for the growth of followers throughout the entire process.
My leadership philosophy has been influenced by several leadership and follower experiences. As an Ambassador for the Office of Undergraduate Research at Virginia Tech, maintaining open lines of positive communication allows for more dynamic conversations and increased levels of productivity. Situations in which leaders are transparent invited followers to join in the process and improve relationships and personal development for both leaders and followers. As a peer advisor for the Service Without Borders organization, I recognize the positives of our leadership model in that we focus on cultivating young members to become strong leaders. We do this through maintaining personal relationships, engaging in service projects, and giving members a high level of autonomy and responsibility. By fostering strong relationships and allowing members to think creatively, our organization has seen the growth of young leaders into people who are able to present and negotiate grants with university officials. Overall, through my experiences and personal growth as a leader during my time through Virginia Tech, I have come to understand that leaders need to remain invested in their followers and their goals to help develop the leadership skills of others while reaching and surpassing expectations.
References
Branson, C. M. & Marra, M. (2019). Leadership as a relational phenomenon: What this means in practice. Research in Educational Administration & Leadership, 4 (1), 81-108. DOI: 10.30828/real/2019.1.4
Duta, A. (2005). Meta-Level Dialectical Interpenetrations in Transformational and Charismatic Leadership. Conference Papers — International Communication Association, 1–32.
López, C. G.-G., Moriano León, J. A., Alonso, F. M., & Morales, M. M. (2015). Authentic leadership, group cohesion and group identification in security and emergency teams. Psicothema, 27(1), 59–64. https://doi.org/10.7334/psicothema2014.161
Ainsley's LDRS 4044 Blog 