Question

The Wharton School has a feature called Knowledge@Wharton, which offers analysis, interviews, and articles on topics such as finance, innovation, leadership, marketing, management, public policy, social impact, and technology.

Using the site, select an article related to personal biases, gender and culture in leadership, or social and emotional intelligence.

Take a moment to scroll through the articles to find one that piques your personal interest. Once you have finished reading your selected article, address the following:

• Provide the title of the article you selected.
• Provide responses to the following reflective questions:
  • What is your takeaway from the article?
  • Why did this interview resonate with you personally?
  • How can you apply what you have learned from the article to your professional and personal life in terms of the five practices?

For additional details, please refer to the Learning Journal Guidelines And Rubric document.

Answer 1

Solution –

The Title – Three Bid Leadership Clichés – and how to rethink them

This article talks about the 3 aspects that a leader does but how it can ruin a leader if it is overdone. The most important thing is that the article not just narrates these truisms but also provide a demonstration on how to control them. The article speaks about the following –

1. Stick to your guns – A leader sticks to their core believes in the face of adverse situation

The article questions the fact that if sticking to your core beliefs would lead to positive change or negative change. What happens when this strategy goes wrong. Here the article speaks about flexibility on part of the leader and a sense of judgement.

2. Question Everything – This is another principle of effective leadership but the article discusses that openly questioning this aspect at times can lead to such a hostile situation can lead to completely dismantling the structure leaving it unamendable.
3. It’s a marathon and not a sprint – A leader looks at sustainability but they have to also look at the possibility to answer short - term goals.

The key takeaway from the article is that there is nothing like old and tested sure shot principles. One has to improvise to be effective.

The article resonates with me personally as it breaks a belief that all leadership principles are applicable. It breaks the stereotype and stimulates a new chain of thoughts. This makes the article interesting also relevant when we look to go back to the basics to innovate.

This article can be applied by challenging the stereotypes at work and sharing this vision with the team to introduce a new chain of thoughts. Anew change in thought process will encourage others. Allow others to test the new thoughts and free them from the fear of failing. Also this new thought culture can help to formulate a path for action. This model can also be replicated across departments and throughout the organization in form of short measures to be taken by the leads at all levels.