Mike Renfrow

ORGL 620
Program Competencies and Artifacts
My ORGL Journey
ORGL 600 – Foundations of Leadership

Session: Spring 2020

Faculty: Dr. Michael Carey
Summary: ORGL 600 laid the foundation for my ORGL journey and I am glad that it was my first class. In this
course we explored the history of leadership studies and the various leadership philosophies through the 19 th
and 20th Century. This was also my introduction to Ignatius of Loyola and the Jesuit approach to education.
Key Takeaways: Throughout the course I was asked to meditate on the following questions: 1) What are my
deepest desires as a leader? 2) What don’t I want as a leader? 3) What do I want as a leader? 4) What does
this require of me? 5) How does this shape who I am becoming? In my career, I have been through multiple
leadership development programs, however, most of these programs were very prescriptive in nature. This
course required me to think about who I want to be as a leader, not how to be a leader.
Artifact: Leadership Philosophy Paper & 360 Assessment Project
Key Quote: “The community of truth represents knowing quite differently. In the community of truth, as in
real life, there are no pristine objects of knowledge, and no ultimate authorities. In the community of truth, as
in real life, truth does not reside primarily in propositions, and education is more than delivering propositions
about objects to passive auditor (Palmer, 20007, p. 104).
Favorite Reading(s): Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum.
Palmer, P. J. (2007). The courage to teach. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
ORGL 605 – Imagine, Create, Lead

Session: Spring 2020

Faculty: Dr. Michael Carey, Dr. Josh Armstrong.
Summary: ORGL 605 achieved two aims. First, it was an opportunity to visit the Gonzaga campus and gain an
overview of the ORGL program. Second, the course required that you think about leadership through the lens
of creativity, specifically through art, music, film, drama, and improv.
Key Takeaways: My key take away from this course was that it is important to focus not only on the academic
aspect of learning, but that it’s also important to use your “creative brain.” Utilizing your “creative brain” while
on an academic journey can help you grow not only academically but as a whole person.
Artifact: For my “Leadership and Imagination” project, I created a doom/death metal song utilizing lines from
Shakespeare’s Richard III. Final song here: https://tinyurl.com/mrgonzwtdttt (note, there’s a lot of screaming).
Quote: N/A
Favorite Reading(s): N/A
ORGL 615 – Organizational Theory and Behavior

Session: Summer 2019

Faculty: Dr. Dennis Conners
Summary: ORGL 615 asked us to think through the complexities of organizations and view them through a
systems thinking lens. Through this lens we can see how organizational outcomes are achieved by the system
that we’ve created or contributed to. Every action has a reaction elsewhere in the system. Additionally, this
course required us to virtually climb Mt. Everest in small teams. Through this expedition, we learned how our
individual contributions to the expedition impacted, either positively or negatively, the outcome of the
expedition.
Key Takeaways: Everything is interconnected. Focus on the whole, not the parts.
Artifact: I developed a Systems Thinking 101 training for my organization.
Quote: “At the heart of a learning organization is a shift of mind – from seeing ourselves as separate from the
world to connected to the world, from seeing problems as caused by someone or something “out there” to
seeing how our own actions create the problems we experience. A learning organization is a place where
people are continually discovering how they create their reality. And how they can change it” (Senge, 2006, p.
12).
Favorite Reading(s): Senge, P. M. (2006). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization.
New York: Currency Books.

Mt. Everest
ORGL 550 – Team Building and Leadership

Session: Summer 2019

Faculty: Dr. Josh Armstrong
Summary: ORGL 550 was built around a 3-day immersion that was filled with team building activities.
Following the immersion, we applied what we learned about teams to practical application through team
building for improving organizational culture.
Key Takeaways: I really enjoyed learning team dynamics through Coyle’s The Culture Code. In addition to
learning team building activities during the immersion, The Culture Code provided a nice framework for
putting what we learned into action through Coyle’s three skills for building strong teams; build safety, share
vulnerability, establish purpose.
Artifact: I utilized Coyle’s Three Skills to develop a team building training for my organization.
Quote: "Individuals aren’t really individuals. They're more like musicians and a jazz quartet, forming a web of
unconscious actions and reactions to complement others in the group. You don't look at the informational
content of the messages, you look at patterns that show how the messages being sent. Those patterns contain
many signals the tell us about the relationship and what's really going on beneath the surface” (Coyle, 2018, p.
15).
Favorite Reading(s): Coyle, D. (2018). The culture code: The secrets of highly successful groups. Random
House.

ORGL 550 Summer 2019 Immersion Group Photo

ORGL 610 – Communication and Leadership Ethics

Session: Fall 2020

Faculty: Dr. Pavel Shlossberg
Summary: ORGL 610 was a deep dive into organizational ethics through the lens of communication. The
culmination of this course was the development of a personal Ethics Action Plan.
Key Takeaways: If I’m being honest, the key take away for me was that I didn’t find much interest or value in
this course. This was my least favorite course in the program. While I certainly appreciate the value of ethics in
an organization, I believe this course was at times too abstract for any practical application. Further, I felt that
the discussions in this course led to everyone trying to “out ethics” each other by showing how ethical they
are. However, I did find some value in in the personal Ethics Action Plan. In the Ethics Action Plan, I was able to
apply the concepts to the values in my organization.
Artifact: Ethics Action Plan
Quote: None
Favorite Reading(s): None
ORGL 535 – Listen, Discern, Decide

Session: Fall 2019

Faculty: Larry Spears
Summary: ORGL 535 asked us to listen, really listen, to ourselves, and develop a plan to improve our capacity
to listen in our everyday lives. Building off the work of Greenleaf, we focused on listening as the key servant
leader skill. According to Greenleaf, listening is both the hardest and most important servant leadership
capacity to develop.
Key Takeaways: I took this course before ORGL 530, Servant Leadership, and I wish I had taken 530 prior to
535. My key takeaway is that listening is a practice that I need to focus on daily. I also really loved reading
Siddhartha. Also, during this time, the most important servant leader in my life retired, so the concepts of
servant leadership and the profound impact it can have on a person hit me really hard.
Artifact: Servant Leader Listening Action Plan
Quote: “Truly, nothing in the world has occupied my thoughts as much as this self of mine, this riddle of my
living, of my being one person sundered and separated from all the rest, of my being Siddhartha. and there is
nothing in the world I know less about than myself” (Hesse, 2012, p. 21)
Favorite Reading(s): Hesse, H. (2012). (W.K. Marriott, Translator). Siddhartha. Lexington: Simon and Brown.
Greenleaf, Robert. (1996). On becoming a servant leader. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
ORGL 518 – Transforming Leadership

Session: Fall 2019

Faculty: Dr. Michael Carey
Summary: In ORGL 518 we examined transformational leadership through the lens off Burns and Palmer,
applying transformational concepts to the organization and individual, respectively. We also explored the
practical implications of transformational leadership through a contemporary literature review.
Key Takeaways: To transform other (an organization, society, company) you have to be open to transforming
yourself. And it’s hard, very hard. Change is hard. Also, I took 518 while I was in 535, so it was interesting to
contrast and compare the differences between transformational leadership and servant leadership.
Artifact: Thus We Have Made It: The Transforming Organization paper.
Quote: This one is simple, but I’ve said it probably 100 times since reading it; “good work is risky business”
(Palmer, 2004, p.110). Don’t let hard work keep us from doing great things.
Favorite Reading(s): Palmer, P. J. (2004). A hidden wholeness: the journey toward an undivided life:
welcoming the soul and weaving community in a wounded world. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
COML 507 – Mindful Leadership and Communication

Session: Fall 2019

Faculty: Dr. Michael Hazel
Summary: COML 507 was built around the three-day immersion that focused on developing the capacity for
mindfulness. Additionally, we explored the science behind mindfulness and how a mindful organization can
improve performance.
Key Takeaways: The visit to the Sravasti Abbey was a transformational experience for me. I need to be
surrounded by that environment and sense of calm. As a complete aside, I get a 2-hour massage once a month
and went for my massage the day after I returned from the immersion and I meditated and went into another
space for the duration of the massage. And, I prefer a particularly rough massage style, and still zoned out.
Artifact: Several books that I picked up at the Abbey. The picture below which I had printed on a 36x48 inch
canvas.
Quote: None, however, several things I heard from the monastics at the Abbey have stuck with me
Favorite Reading(s): N/A
ORGL 530 – Servant Leadership

Session: Spring 2020

Faculty: Dr. Dung Tran
Summary: ORGL 530 was a deep dive into all things servant leadership and was the most reading-heavy class I
took during my ORGL journey. ORGL 530 not only explored Greenleaf’s original works on servant leadership
but also explored more scientific approaches to understanding servant leadership through works like Horsman
and Sipe & Frick.
Key Takeaways: Servant leadership is about who you are as a person and how that informs your leadership
style rather than your leadership style informing who you are as a person. Additionally, the journey to
becoming a servant leader is an endless journey that requires the servant leader in training to continuously
improve their servant leader capacity.
Artifact: Servant leader action plan.
Quote: “Motivation then becomes what people generate for themselves when they experience growth”
(Greenleaf, 2002, p. 158).
Favorite Reading(s): Hesse, H. (1988). (Hilda Rosner -Trans.). The journey to the East. Noonday Press
Greenleaf, R. K. (2002). Servant leadership: A journey into the nature of legitimate power
and greatness. Paulist Press