The Foundations of Effective Leadership Workshop is focused on providing key aspects of leadership principles and challenges within the DLIFLC context. This two-day foundational workshop is followed by five other stand-alone professional development trainings on the following topics: conflict resolution, communication skills, 1st line leadership, mentoring and coaching/developing people, and decision making.

Department of Defense (DoD) Civilian Leadership Competencies Addressed:

• Integrity / Honesty
• Interpersonal Skills
• Oral Communication
• Conflict Management
• Team Building
• Problem Solving
• Developing Others, Coaching, and Mentoring
• Influencing / Negotiating

Workshop objectives:

As a result of completing this module, you will be able to:

• Develop an understanding of DoD, Army, and DLIFLC values as a leader
• Become familiar with conflict resolution and mediation styles
• Develop an awareness of key principles of communication in the workplace
• Gain an understanding of the differences between leadership and management
• Become acquainted with different leadership styles
• Build an awareness of intercultural dynamics to effectively accomplish the mission
• Complete a personalized Action Plan that articulates your philosophy of leadership and applies it to your daily practice

Complete a survey: Your facilitator will present you with a brief survey for you to complete so we get to know you better and can better understand your areas of interest in leading others.

Make a comment: Tell your peers about yourself (the nature of your work, how long you have been doing it, etc.) and share some information on your supervisory experience (how long you have been in a supervisory position, what are some of the organizational and other challenges you face, etc.)

Create an update: What is Leadership to you? Who or what influenced your experience of leadership? How did they shape your values, tendencies, and biases?

In this update we will explore the differences between the concept of leadership and the concept of management and will discuss why those distinctions are important.

Review the summary chart contrasting leadership and management. The article that follows provides a more detailed explanation.

Watch the following two videos on leadership and management while trying to relate their content to your own experience.

Video 1: John Kotter on Leadership vs management: The Key Differences Between Leading and Managing

Video 2: The Perils of Confusing Management and Leadership

Make a comment (expected length approx. between 150-200 words):

• As a department chair, where do you spend most of your time? Do you see yourself more as a leader or a manager?
• Can you add anything to Northouse’s chart?

Create an update (expected length approx. 200 words):

Consider whether a good manager can be a bad leader and vice versa. Back up your rationale with charts, images and videos.

Respond to at least 3 peer updates posting your comments through the appropriate platform online. (Responses should be 100 words or more). 

In this update, you will look at followership from a dynamic leader-follower interaction perspective and examine the multiple roles followers play and their often complex relationship to leaders.

You will also explore the practice and research that promote positive followership to reveal the part that followers play in setting the standards and formulating the culture and policies of the group.

Video 1: The Art of Followership: How Great Followers Create Great Leaders and Organizations

Video 2: The Art of Following

Video 3: What is Followership

Reading material:

Make a comment: How does your understanding of followership help you in continually growing as a leader?

Create an update: As a first-line supervisor, what strategies could you take to develop more effective followers in your own setting? Choose one type of follower below and discuss some strategies for engaging them in becoming more effective followers.

• Sheep
• Yes-people
• Alienated Followers
• Survivors

Respond to at least 3 peer updates posting your comments through the appropriate platform online. (Responses should be 100 words or more).

Leadership Timeline

Why do certain people become great leaders? Leadership theories seek to answer this question.

Here is a very brief overview of top 10 leadership theories

On Machiavellian Leadership

Machiavelli was born in Florence, Italy, in 1469. He was a politician and writer, and his best-known work is The Prince, in which Machiavelli teaches political leaders of the time how to keep power by any means, including immoral decisions, dishonesty, killing, etc.

There is a lot of debate about whether Machiavelli was really teaching how to do evil in the world to remain in power, or instead representing the worst of the political caste of the time. However, 503 years after he wrote The Prince, it seems that many of the political and corporate leaders of our time still behave in similar ways as described by Machiavelli.

Make a comment:  How do you see yourself as a leader?  How prevalent is the Machiavellian leadership style in your cultural background? Do you think your supervisees see your role that way? (looking at it from the supervisees’ perspective – how do their expectations of leaders affect your work?)

Create an update: Review the Machiavellian leadership characteristics (the left column) in the worksheet below. Write an update describing appropriate behaviors and strategies that provide an alternative approach to this style. 

Respond to at least 3 peer updates.

Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership is defined as a leadership approach that causes change in individuals and social systems. In its ideal form, it creates valuable and positive change in the followers with the end goal of developing followers into leaders.

Here is an overview of the 4 transformational leadership factors

Situational Leadership

The situational theory of leadership suggests that no single leadership style is "best." The following video provides a breakdown of the Situational Leadership model

Situational Strategies

Strategies for Directing Style Setting goals and clarifying expectations Telling and showing what to do, when and how to do it Identifying priorities, clarifying roles, and establishing timelines Closely supervising, monitoring and evaluating performance Providing feedback	Strategies for Supporting Style Asking for input and listening Explaining rationale, involving the person in decision making Sharing information, building rapport and trust Encouraging employee to come up with solutions independently Providing perspective, reassuring, praising
Strategies for Coaching Style Communicate your expectations Assess the coachee Define the coaching Agree on a coaching contract Conduct coaching conversations Create the coaching plan Monitor and learn	Strategies for Delegating Style Set a safe climate Describe the task (set goals and objectives) Explains the “Whys” (why choose this person, how the employee can benefit) Plan and organize the work (Discuss negotiable parts of the assignment) Ask for the employee’s input

Make a comment: Reflect on the four transformational leadership factors and try to articulate how your leadership reflects those characteristics and where do you think you can continue to develop your own leadership.

Create an update: Chose one case study (attached below); identify what quadrant the employee falls under (according to the situational leadership model) and post your ideas and suggestions for what strategies to use with the employee. Respond to at least 3 peer updates.

Situational Leadership Case Studies:

Emotional Intelligence, or EQ, is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others, and your ability to use this awareness to manage your behavior and relationships.

Emotional intelligence gives individuals a variety of skills, such as the ability to manage relationships, navigate social networks, influence and inspire others. Every person possesses different levels, but in order for individuals to become effective leaders, they’ll need a high level of emotional intelligence. In today’s workplace, EQ has become a highly important factor for success, influencing productivity, efficiency and team collaboration.

Follow the link below and complete the online EQ assessment:

Online Emotional Intelligence Test

Make a comment: Can you think of any examples of situations or events in your department that were influenced by either poor management or excellent management of emotions? What is your role as a leader in helping your supervisees handle their emotions? 

Create an update: Review the report generated for you by the online EQ test. Based on your results, reflect on which quadrant you wish to explore and develop. Consider some steps you may take to develop the area you wish to work on. 

Respond to at least 3 peer updates.

Here at the DLI, we have been discussing how to teach culture for a long time, and we all understand the importance of cultural awareness for our students and in language learning in general. But, the purpose of this section is not to talk about how to teach culture to our students.

In this workshop, we will be looking at intercultural competence in leadership; how to be an effective leader within DLI’s multicultural environment. While cultural stereotypes tend to be negative and can create an “us and them” atmosphere, leaders need to understand how people are both individuals and also products of their cultural background.

When we work in a place surrounded by others from our own group, basic awareness of human psychological needs and motivations is enough. But, in a place with such a diverse workforce as the DLI, we need the ability to decode cultural differences in order to work effectively with the students, the military, civilians, and colleagues from virtually every corner of the world.

The Cultural Iceberg

When we see an iceberg, the portion which is visible above water is, in reality, only a small piece of a much larger whole. Similarly with culture, the numerous observable characteristics of a group that we can *see* with our eyes - their food, dances, music, arts, or greeting rituals - are merely an external manifestation of the deeper and broader components of culture.

Below the surface are the complex ideas and deeply-held preferences and priorities known as attitudes and values.

Deep below the "water line" are a culture's Core values. These are primarily learned ideas of what is good, right, desirable, and acceptable -- as well as what is bad, wrong, undesirable, and unacceptable. In many cases, different cultural groups share similar core values (such as "honesty", or "respect", or "family"), but these are often interpreted differently in different situations and incorporated in unique ways into our daily lives.

Code-switching in intercultural communication

The process of cultural learning can be helped along by experience, reflection, and training. Intercultural training not only provides information but also develops skills, and encourages attitudes to enable people to progress along the cultural learning curve.

At the lowest level is the belief that all people are alike. Then comes the recognition that there are differences, and acceptance of the differences, seeing ways of synthesizing the different ways, selecting, and making things run smoothly.

“Being culturally fluent means being able to enter a new context, master the norms, and feel comfortable doing so.” (Gibson, 2000)

Stereotyping

Stereotyping is a fixed image created based on limited experience and applied to every single person from that culture.

Generalizing is based on research and looking for basic patterns in different cultures always keeping in mind that an individual might or might not be a representative of those tendencies. Adults process information by creating categories.

Stereotypes

• Fixed, not open to new info
• Permanently assigned to individuals
• Ethnocentric

Generalities

• Open, flexible, changing
• Used as a starting point
• Possible that generalization might not apply
• Non-judgmental

Avoid stereotyping. Stereotyping usually betrays long-held subconscious biases that are often supposed to be innocent but can be actually, offensive. 

The Different Cultural Dimensions

Over the past few decades, anthropologists, communication researchers, psychologists, and sociologists have isolated several dimensions of cultural variability that can be used to differentiate cultures.

Here we will look at 4 main areas: Team orientation, Communication, Task Orientation, and Time orientation.

Make a comment: Look at the document with the detailed descriptions of each dimension continuum and try to come up with one example for each: Team; Communication; Task; and Time orientation.

Create an update: Reflect on your experiences and try to describe an encounter/challenge you had involving a cultural misunderstanding. Analyze what happened and your assessment of what cultural dimensions were involved and where each participant probably fell in the continuum and how that translated into the misunderstanding. Then try to offer some ideas for clearing up the misunderstanding and how to work productively together. 

Respond to at least 3 peer updates.

Case Study:

Midwestern Intercom

• Read the case-study below
• Watch the video of the Japanese meeting (first half of the video)
• Try to identify the behaviors from the video that exemplify each dimension. Not all dimensions are present in the video.

Now watch the recording of the Japan/U.S. meeting (the second half of the video).
 

Make a comment: Answer the following questions.

• Were the two parties successful in communicating with each other?
• Where did some of problems occur?
• What were some of the assumptions of each group?
• How did they interact with members of the other group?

Create an update: Read the two scenarios (attached). What are some of the issues? Chose one scenario and analyze it using the 4-step method described below. Respond to at least 3 peer updates.

Leveraging Differences:

This is an opportunity for you to engage in a process for reflecting on a specific interaction, for filtering out cultural biases, and to learn from and use cultural differences with the Four-Step method:

1. Reflect on your experience to discover how you are feeling, your intentions, and the reasons you attribute to what others have done.
2. Analyze why you feel the way you do. The goal here is to realize your own expectations, and to see the cause-and-effect links often unconsciously made between behavior and intentions.
3. Discuss with others to understand their intentions and experience. This requires setting aside your own conviction that you are “right” and they are “wrong,” at least temporarily.
4. Decide how to proceed, including whether you will try to develop a new communication style or skill, how you will collaborate, or perhaps whether you feel it worthwhile to try to collaborate.

(source: Communication Highwire: Leveraging the Power of Diverse Communication Styles. (2005) Hofner-Saphire, Mikk, DeVries)

 

When faced with disagreement or conflict, people react in different ways. Some may get defensive; others may avoid it altogether. Here is a short video describing the ways people deal with conflict, based on the Thomas-Killman Conflict Styles. 

TKI inventory

Because no two individuals have exactly the same expectations and desires, conflict is a natural part of our interactions with others. The TKI is an online assessment that takes about fifteen minutes to complete. Interpretation and feedback materials help you learn about the most appropriate uses for each conflict-handling mode. 

You should have received your TKI assessment and upon completion, an individualized report was sent to you.

Make a comment: Answer the following questions.

• Based on the results of your TKI inventory report, reflect on your style and consider:
• When does this style work well for you?
• When not so much?

Create an update: Share some techniques or approaches you use to resolve conflict in your department, with teachers, other chairs and/or your supervisor.

  

Make a comment: Answer the following questions.

• What types of decisions are typically made in your department?
• Think of the types of decision and put them on the grid: try to come up with three for four examples for each column.
• Consider if any of the items on your list could/should be moved to the right, why and how?

Create an update: Research the six-step decision making model, then apply it to a decision you have to make in your department. Explain each step and how you will apply it to your situation/decision. 

Six-step Decision Making Model

In order to involve others, it is good to have a structured approach. This model offers steps that can assist in increasing involvement from supervisees.

In our institute, civilians work side by side with military instructors, staff and students. We need to be able to bridge the gap between civilians and military. We begin by looking at the army values and reflecting on what they mean to each of us, and how these values translate into our everyday practice.

Make a comment: Choose 1 of the Army Values that resonates with you, or pick a value of your own choosing. Write it down and explain what it means to you. Why is it important/ meaningful to you?

Create an update: Reflect on the Army Values and create an update describing how these values (plus other values of your choice) influence and affect the work you do as a department chair. How do these values translate into actions and behaviors? 

 

Supervisor Leadership Development Action Plan:

Create a plan of action for how you will develop your own leadership skills, behaviors and practice in each of the following areas:

1. Followership: How will you develop more effective followers among your supervisees?
2. Leadership Style: How do you see yourself as a leader and how are you working on your own leadership development?
3. Emotional Intelligence: Based on your Emotional Intelligence Assessment, identify the areas you wish to work on and describe how do you plan to work on it.
4. Cultural Awareness: Identify a scenario or situation from your own experience and analyze it using the Differences Leveraging Model: Reflect, Analyze, Discuss, Decide
5. Conflict Resolution: Based on your TKI Inventory Report, reflect on some techniques or approaches you use to resolve conflict in your department, with teachers, other chairs and your supervisor.
6. Decision Making: Reflect on how decisions are typically made in your department and describe your process for determining how each type of decision is made and steps you take to involve your supervisees.

 

​Following is the peer rubric for the learning module, against which others will review your work, and against which you will do your self-review after completing your final draft. You can view this rubric while you draft your work in Creator => Feedback => Reviews => Rubric.