(R) LE 1: Vision and Quick Victories

"Strategy 1　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

  Never lose sight of the ultimate goal, and focus energy on short-term objectives."

                                                                                              Leading at the Edge p.15

In this chapter, Shackleton's quick and wise decision making is mentioned as one of the 10 strategies of leadership that we can learn from his success.
In the lesson, we learnt that it is necessary for a good leader "to direct negative energy toward activities that divert people's attention from their problems and harness this energy for positive results."(26) By finding the "new mark", he, Shackleton succeed to keep team members' motivation high.

Nevertheless, I have one big question.
Was his original long-term goal really to cross the Antarctica?

On page 16, there is a sentence says "Shackleton was able to shift quickly his long-term goal from the crossing of the continent to bringing every man back alive." So obviously, this book says that his original long-term goal was to cross the Antarctica, and his new goal, which he got after the Endurance destroyed, was "returning safely, without loss of life"(16).

However, I have a little doubts on this interpretation.
Let's have a look at again the advertisement he used to gather volunteers for his adventure.
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  "Men wanted for Hazardous Journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success."(2)
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If this was true, (there seems to be some suspicion about whether this advertisement really appeared on the London papers.) I believe that his primary goal was either to get honour&recognition or maybe just to satisfy his curiosity through an adventure in undeveloped region.
And I think probably his goal was the former. It is because he firstly came up with an idea to go to the North Pole, but changed the destination to the South Pole when he knew that someone else already achieved to be the first person to get to the North. From this story, we can clearly see that the destination, Antarctica, was not so important for him, but important thing was to do something great which nobody haven't accomplished yet.
So, I personally think that his ultimate goal was that he and his team get honour and recognition, and crossing the Antarctica was just a means to an end. I believe, this is why he could so easily change his "goal" from crossing the Antarctica to going home safely because it was not actually a "long-term goal" but a "means" or a "short-term goal" to achieve the real ultimate goal.

Thus, as far as I think, when he made this decision, he probably knew that it was enough proud and to be praised by others to return safely with everyone alive, from the Antarctica and the unexpected disaster happened there.

...but this is just my personal view.
I'm interested in how other people think about this.


Anyway, have a nice Christmas and New Year Holidays!*:D

(F) My Vision Statement

Since we didn't hand in our vision statements today (maybe everyone including Ken forgot?), here I'll put my vision statement and activities I did to write it. 

*

1.  Choose 10 qualities

Creativity, Strictness, Courage, Confidence, Patience, Reliability, Energy, Empathy, Flexibility and Positive thinking

2. Choose 5 from the list of ten (+ reasons why I chose)

  Creativity

(including flexible thinking. Creativity is often a key to break an deadlock and find a way to success. Also, I believe that creativity fascinate many people.)

  Courage 

(Sometimes it is essential to make a bold decision with enough confidence and responsibility in order to make an success.) 

  Patience

(with positive thinking. Giving up easily makes no great achievements. In some cases however, it's necessary to concentrate on a short-term goal rather than the long-term one like what we read in the chapter 1 of Leading at the Edge. →Shackleton never gave up the ultimate goal. He just shifted the object to put energy on at the time with wise judgement.)

  Reliability

(People are respected and trusted by others because they are reliable and trustworthy.)

  Empathy

(includes to understand, respect and trust others.)

↓

My vision statement

I, Maya Kojima, living at my highest and best, have: creativity, courage, patience, reliability, and empathy. By having these qualities, I believe that I can help others and myself to demonstrate their/my ability as much as possible, which will bring an great result at the end.

(F) Trust each other

In the lesson on Wednesday, we talked about what makes a good leader.

Through discussions, we found some important abilities related to leadership:

Confidence, creativity, kindness, motivation, passion, patience, positive thinking, pride, reliability, responsibility, strictness, sympathy, thoughtfulness…etc.

In my view, "trust" is one of the most important key words for being a good leader.

Of course it's important that the leader himself/herself is trustworthy, but also he/she need to trust their team mates.

When I was a 2^nd year high school student, I directed an English musical performance to show in the school festival.

Before starting to make it, my teacher asked me to make a performance that all students in my course can appear and speak on the stage, at least once for each person. I thought it was crazy, it's impossible. Usually, the number of casts (who have their own "lines") in one musical performance is 30 at the most. But my course, "International Course", had 2 classes, each consists of 30 students, so I needed to manage 60 casts including me. Moreover, the amount of time we can use for the performance was limited to 45 minutes.

I cooperated with 2 students who had some knowledge and experiences of musical, and finished writing the script after repeated trial and error. However, because we needed to practice it in summer vacation, some students got more and more reluctant to come to the practice. At that time, I thought such phenomenon is caused simply by their personal laziness. And I was too busy on making sound effects, deciding lighting, getting costumes and equipment etc. so I wasn't able to really care about it.

Nevertheless, I finally noticed that it was not solely because of their individual problem. I found that it was because I did not trust them. I looked upon them as unmotivated people. Although they trusted me (so they agreed that I would be the leader) and probably had an attitude to cooperate together at the beginning, I did not entrust them with any works other than the minimum = work as a cast, just memorize the line and act. I didn't even consult with them about their role in the play.

My big mistake was that I put too much confidence in my own ability, and did not try to know what others can do. Thus I tried to do most of the tasks by myself or few of my friends who were familiar with musical and whom I could only trust. 

The performance itself ended with success outwardly, and many teachers, parents and students of other courses praised for the quality of the show as well as our hard work. But I could not pleased with such praises because I felt maybe we could have made more amazing show if I had trusted each of the members.

If the leader did not trust his/her team mates, the followers would be discouraged. What I learnt from this experience is that good relationship and cooperation won't materialize without trusting each other.

...This is an summary of what I wrote in the analysis of myself as a leader, which was required for the AO entrance exam of this university in fact.（゜▽゜))))

I found an interesting article refers to the power of trusting.↓

Americans Don't Trust Each Other Anymore - Business Insider

This article talks about "trust" not just in a company/team but in a broader society.

Please have a look if you have time! :)

A system error...?

Hi everyone,

There seem to be a system trouble in my blog that some of you can write a comment but others cannot. I don't know what the cause is, but if you couldn't leave a comment on my post, please try again with Google Chrome (not Internet Explorer/FireFox). Or, please select Name/URL instead of Google Account where it says コメントの記入者(=the writer of the comment), and try again. Then, I hope it works...:,( If it wouldn't, please let me know → maya713k@gmail.com

(R) WSJ: Strike a Powerful Pose

Our first reading in this class was about "Powerful Pose" and how it affects a person's power and leadership. 

I was surprised that posing can change a person's hormones and mind.

We can easily recognise that 

A, D and F are high-power body language, and B, C and E are low-power posing.

According to the text, "striking a powerful pose can reduce symptoms of stress", and it gives courage to the person and makes it easier to take a risk. I guess leaders tend to have more stress because they need to care about not only him/herself but their subordinates, and they are often required to do big decision-making with enough confidence, so I agree with an idea that it's better for leaders to strike high-power poses rather than the weak ones.

However, I don't think high-power body languages described above always give positive influence on people around him/her while he/she may feel comfortable and confident.

This is just in my view, but many workers probably feel uncomfortable if their leaders' poses were A or F because such posing is too much like "important-looking" at least in Japan. (I think D is acceptable though.) Many Japanese people expect every worker, including leaders, to have "politeness" rather than power. This is why they make a bow regardless of their status, in order to show "respect" to the other person.
Also, particularly for women, I think it's not very good to open limbs expansively like F...

I think this is a cultural difference. Especially in western societies where people see equality is more important than politeness, followers' probably react differently from the way Japanese workers do.

(F) Hello!:)

Hello, everyone, nice to meet you all!:) My name is Maya Kojima, from section 2A.

To begin with...

・When you see (F) at the beginning of the title, the post is based on my free choice.

・When I put (R) instead, the article is about our readings like Harvard Business Review or the textbook: Leading at the Edge.

I'll use these signs in order not to forget what I need to do every week, so you=readers actually don't have to care about these though:P Sorry to waste your time!

---

Now, it's been for almost 1 week since we've done the first Research Writing lesson. In Monday's class, we practiced self-introduction to make positive first impression, keeping SOFTEN in mind: Smile, Open stance, Forward lean, Tone, Eye contact and Nod. It was very interesting but still I haven't talked to some of my classmates, so here I'll briefly introduce myself. (I now wonder how I can make a good impression with written self-introduction…)

Again, I'm Maya from section 2A.

As we have another person named Maya in this class, please be careful when you call me or tell me if you have a good idea of nickname :D

I was born and had been raised in Kyoto for about 17 years, except 1 year studying abroad in Eastbourne, England when I was a high school student.

A picture of Shosei-en in Higashi Honganji Temple in Kyoto

which my father sent to me with an e-mail about a week ago.

Also, I belong to ICU Kagekidan, a musical club. We act, sing and dance. Next spring, we are going to perform the famous "Les Miserables" in the Auditorium so please come to see!!! Or let me know if you are interested in making the show with us, either as a staff/cast!* Especially, for people who are not very good at talking/doing something in front of many people, you may be able to overcome and improve the skill by experience of playing in Musical...?