Teamwork

TEAMWORK!

This week in leadership we talked about teamwork and how crucial it is. The Athletic Director came and spoke to us about his experiences on the different teams he's played for. He was in the NFL for I think 7 seasons with the 49ers and he won something like 4 superbowls! Anyways, He was a great speaker and taught us a lot about what teamwork is and what it should look like, but what stood out to me most was his theory on Firelighters and Firefighters.

A Firelighter is a person in your life that inspires you and lights that fire of passion inside you. A Firefighter is a person who seeks to put out those fires, these are the nay sayers, those who don't believe in you and tell you your dreams are too big.

What does this have to do with teamwork?

Well, how can a team function well together when there are Firefighters? I mean sure, its reasonable to be realistic, but when you have a team that wants to accomplish anything, its as important as anything that there be a goal and the passion to achieve that goal. In order for a team to be productive and to do work, the team must have Firelighters.

In my leadership role, I want to try to be more of a Firelighter. I want to be a person that others can look to when they need a pick-me-up. I want to be a light that seeks to light the flame of passion in the hearts of those around me. And I want to surround myself with Firelighters so I can always have a productive team that always works together and wastes no energy on a resolving conflict within a the team.

Ethical Leadership

We talked about Ethical Leadership this week in class. Ethical Leadership to me is the moral stance a leader has in their position. Whether they have good morals or bad morals will make or break their reputation and/or their success. You would think, and hope, that a person with good morals would always be more successful than a person with bad, but that usually isn't the case. In this day and age, greed and deceit are often the things that catapult people to the top of corporations. It is refreshing however, to hear of people with good ethical leadership every once in a while on top.

I wish that everyone just chose that route. I'm sure in the millennium things will be different, but for now you just gotta decide whats more important, good moral ethical leadership, with strong character and integrity, or bad moral ethical leadership, that might get you places, but you're reputation would be like moldy swiss cheese, full of holes and bad nasty rotten pieces.

In my leadership role, there is really not very much room to apply this principle, but I think that just going to gym kids and adaptive aquatics when I say I am going to go and being fully engaged and active the entire time will help me develop good ethical leadership. I will develop my integrity which will create good ethics in my leadership by going to volunteer when I say I will volunteer. And like I said before, part of being of service is being fully engaged during the time with the kids, so I will spend my time there wisely.

Anyways, thats what I plan on doing and I'm excited to practice good ethical leadership!

Conflict Resolution

What is conflict resolution?

Well, according to freedictionary.com conflict resolution is:

Conflict resolution is a range of methods of eliminating sources of conflict. The term "conflict resolution" is sometimes used interchangeably with the term dispute resolution or alternative dispute resolution. Processes of conflict resolution generally include negotiation, mediation, and diplomacy. The processes of arbitration, litigation, and formal complaint processes such as ombudsman processes, are usually described with the term dispute resolution, although some refer to them as "conflict resolution." Processes of mediation and arbitration are often referred to as alternative dispute resolution.

Well, after that rather lengthy definition, hahahaha, I think we kind of get what it is.

There are five different styles we prefer in different situations that help us resolve conflict. These styles are:

Competitive

Collaborative

Compromising

Accommodating

and Avoiding

I personally use the collaborative style more.

In my leadership role, I will use these different styles to adapt to situations and resolve whatever conflicts arise. This way, I can become a professional conflict resolutioner! Hurray!

Love,

Christian

Service

Service is totally number one.

Service Leadership is also number one.

The lecture Brother Cox gave about Service Leadership was number one!

He gave a bunch of stories about service and notable people in history who did work while doing service.

In my leadership role, well, its more of a service role anyways, but a leadership role nonetheless. I plan on contributing more of my time serving the kids I chill with by going twice a week instead of just once.

That will be way fun, and I'm suuuper excited! Ksweet... I love service and I love service leadership!

Manana!

Love,

Christian

aka. Service Leader extraordinare