GRAD 702- Reflections on Module 4 Concepts

While preparing and working on the team's metaphor, I was reminded that a learning experience can also be fun at the same time. My group and I had a great time preparing for this assignment, and it made us loosen up a bit and get to know each other even more. I believe that friendships were built as well, and ideas began to flow a bit more easily than in times past. I also learned that by using a metaphor, it is sometimes easier for the audience to understand concepts by using this form of communication rather than simply standing in front of a group and discussing the concept in a more dry sense. Audience interaction and attention is obviously key to get one's point across, and I feel that our team was able to accomplish that by simply having a little fun while learning something at the same time.
At this stage in my career, I feel that I am stuck at a manger level by telling people how to do things and when to do them. I believe much of this stems from the fact that I work for "Corporate America" where I have very little discretion on how to "mix things up". They expect everything to run and operate a certain way, and diverting from the regimen is sometimes unacceptable. However, my strive to be a true leader of my organization is not halted because I am already pursuing some of the action items in my PDP by training with my national sales manager to think outside of the box and prepare my career for the next level.
I felt that my first meeting with my coach last week went VERY well. My coach is also my branch manager, and she was an easy choice to ask to be my coach since she was so quick to earn my respect at the office. She was able to take the rough draft of my PDP and help me to expand my viewpoints that were somewhat narrow at first. I was struggling by simply looking at the next six months versus the full 17-month picture, and she gave me a lot of great pointers to look at more of a long term approach. Also, we were able to lay more of a structured game plan of what we expect out of each other in the next 16 months and how this relationship will be beneficial for the both of us. (it's not all about me!)
I felt that week four's assignments brought the class at a point where our hard work is being applied and that our last three weeks of preparation is being used at many different levels. The last of the assessments in 702 (LPI and Project Manager Card Sort) further proved to me that there are strong definite trends to my line of thinking and my overall personality, and this helped me to formulate some of my summaries in the PDP. These assignments helped my flow in the paper, and helped me to manage all of these tests to discover trends that I didn't see before. In particular, the LPI sparked my curiosity on how other people perceive my leadership. Since I scored lower than I would have hoped for, I plan to talk with my coach (AKA manager) on how she feels about these results, and what I can do to improve my leadership qualities.