Early in the ITLP experience the point was made that one's presence is important for first impressions as well as community standing. I don't trust my own first impressions, as they often turn out to be dead wrong. But thinking about community standing, or as I take it, reputation...
A series of interviews for a position at Penn State was a laboratory for studying the power of presence. The candidates in all sessions I attended gave good presentations. The range of personalities, and how they were leveraged during the interview was fascinating. But one candidate in particular simply owned the room. That person unquestionably had presence, in the way ITLP intended it to be understood.
One result of this presence was subtle and hard to notice, but the implications can be profound. The audience was impressed by the candidate's engaging and self confident style, something that is highly valued as a leadership asset. But when evaluating this strong communicator, they seemed to rely less on the candidate's ideas and messages to form their opinion. Advantage communicator!
I'll scratch this into my copy of Robert Greene's “The 48 Laws of Power”: Law 49 - Own Your Audience.
There's a huge volume of resources about leadership. If you need evidence, then scan the bookshelves, catalogs, search engine results, event listings of professional societies, for a start. So, if you're interested, where do you begin, and what trail do you follow? No question, you need the advice of a mentor; and it helps to have the officer's intent.
This was ITLP's start with some of the classics of the literature:
* The Work of Leadership, by Ronald Heifetz and Donald Laurie, defines the role of the leader as guiding the organization through challenges by adapting to the changing environment.
* What Leaders Really Do, by John Kotter, differentiates management - deriving maximum benefit despite the complexity of the present situation, from leadership - learning and adapting to changes in the environment of the future.
* The Leadership Advantage, by Warren Bennis - intellectual capital is key to an organization's future survival; intellectual capital is an artifact of effective social structure, and the role of the leader is social architect.
* The Leaderful Community, by Joseph Raelin - community-based organizations of skilled and motivated individuals is a powerful innovation with a different leadership profile. Leadership is concurrent (there can be more than one leader); leadership is collective (leadership can change hands); leadership is collaborative (community is empowered, and decisions are cooperative); good leadership is compassionate and empathetic, the community adaptive and learning.
The progression of study, the nature of group discussions since, and observations of the ITS strategic plan lead me to think about the overall direction underlying the program, and thus the intent of ITS leadership. (Yes, indeed, this is pure speculation.) We are trying mightily to change the culture and structure of information technology at Penn State to be a collaborative, agile, learning organization. This is a tough, and worthy, goal. The program participants are all over it.
My deepest thanks to ITS for the opportunity to attend Brian McDonald's leadership program. It's engaging, challenging, insightful, and I confidently assume it's authoritative.
This blog is a tool for personal reflection on this program. If there is any other readership, then I hope that what must seem to you as naive and blunt musing is somehow useful to you.
