Personal Leadership: Short note

MINDFULNESS - INTRODUCTION

“Mindfulness is the slow brain. It’s executive control rather than autopilot and enables
intentional actions, willpower, and decisions. But that takes some practice. The more we activate
the slow brain, the stronger it gets.”Kayra Bobinet.

Mindfulness is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we’re
doing, and not overly reactive or overwhelmed by what’s going on around us. Whenever you
bring awareness to what you’re directly experiencing via your senses, or to your state of mind
via your thoughts and emotions, you’re being mindful. And there’s growing research showing
that when you train your brain to be mindful, you’re remodeling the physical structure of your
brain. The goal of mindfulness is to wake up to the inner workings of our mental, emotional, and
physical processes. Train both your body and brain to become more open and authentic, and to
feel more alive and awake through mindfulness exercises.

LEADERSHIP PRACTICES

1. MODEL THE WAY

Titles are granted, but it’s your behavior that wins your respect. If you want to gain commitment
and achieve the highest standards, you must be a model of the behavior that you expect of others.
To model effectively, you must first believe in something. As a leader, you are supposed to stand
up for your beliefs, so you had better have some beliefs to stand up for. The first commitment
you must make, then, is to find your voice by clarifying your personal values and then expressing
them in a style that is authentically your own. Exemplary leaders go first. You go first by setting
the example through daily actions that demonstrate you are deeply committed to your beliefs.

2. INSPIRE A SHARED VISION

When people are at their Best Leadership Experiences, they imagine an exciting, highly
attractive future for their organization and community. Leaders envision the future. They gaze
across the horizon of time, imagining the attractive opportunities that are in store once they and
their constituents arrive at the destination. Leaders have a desire to make something happen, to
change how things are. Their clear image of the future pulls them forward. A person with no
constituents is not a leader, and people do not follow until they accept a vision as their own.
Leaders cannot command commitment; they can only inspire it. Leaders enlist others in a
common vision. To enlist people in a vision, as a leader you must know your constituents and be
able to relate to them in ways that energize and uplift them. Leaders breathe life into the hopes
and dreams of others and enable them to see the exciting possibilities that the future holds.
Leaders communicate their passion through vivid language and expressive style.

3. CHALLENGE THE PROCESS

Leaders venture out. Those who lead others to greatness seek and accept challenge. All leaders
Challenge the Process. Leaders are pioneers—people who are willing to step out into the
unknown. They search for opportunities to innovate, grow, and improve. The leader primary
contribution to the search for opportunities is in the recognition of good ideas, the support of
those ideas, and the willingness to challenge the system. Leaders know well that innovation and
change require them to experiment and take risks. One way of dealing with the potential risks
and failures of experimentation is to approach change through incremental steps and small wins.
Little victories when piled on top of each other build enough confidence to meet even the biggest
challenges. The key that unlocks the door to opportunity is learning. Great leaders are great
learners. You must create a climate in which people can learn from their failures as well as their
successes.

4. ENABLE OTHERS TO ACT

Grand dreams do not become significant reality through the actions of a single leader.
Leadership is a team effort. Exemplary leaders Enable Others to Act. They foster collaboration
and build trust. In today’s “virtual” organization, cooperation cannot be restricted to a small
group of loyalists; it must include peers, managers, customers and clients, suppliers, citizens—all
those who have a stake in the vision. Leaders understand that the command-and-control
techniques of the Industrial Revolution no longer apply. Instead, leaders work to strengthen
others to deliver on the promises they make. You can’t hoard the power you have as a leader;
you must give it away. When you trust others and give them more discretion, more authority, and
more information, they are much more likely to use their energies to produce extraordinary
results.

5. ENCOURAGE THE HEART

The climb to the top is arduous and long. People become exhausted, frustrated, and disenchanted.
They are often tempted to give up. Leaders Encourage the Heart of their constituents to carry on.
Genuine acts of caring uplift the spirits and draw people forward. Encouragement can come from
dramatic gestures or simple actions. It’s part of the leader’s job to recognize contributions by
showing appreciation for individual excellence. Leaders also celebrate the values and victories.
Encouragement is curiously serious business. It’s how leaders visibly and behaviorally link
rewards with performance.
WHOLE PERSON DEVELOPMENT

Discover your voice – unopened birth-gifts:

Everyone is born with the potential to be great. What you do with this potential is up to you. You
must remember that the more you use and expand your present talents, the more capacity you are
given, and the greater your ability becomes.

The Birth Gifts:

 Natural laws or Principles:

These are universal, timeless, inarguable principles that transcend culture and geography. These
principles include kindness, fairness, and honesty.

 The Freedom and Power to Choose:

You have the power to direct your own life based on your values. Between stimulus and
response there is a space-our freedom to choose.

Four Competencies/Intelligences

Physical intelligence (PQ): Our ability to maintain and develop our physical fitness. It
corresponds to body. To Live

Mental intelligence (IQ): Our ability to analyze, reason, think abstractly, use language,
visualize, and comprehend. It corresponds to mind. To Learn

Emotional intelligence (EQ): Our self-knowledge, self-awareness, social sensitivity, empathy

and ability to communicate successfully with others. It corresponds to heart. To Love

Spiritual intelligence (SQ): Our drive for meaning and connection with the infinite. It
corresponds to spirit. To Leave a Legacy
Succeeding in leadership begin from a balanced self-development. Invest in yourself continually
so that you can continue to influence in a positive and productive way. The final goal of any
personal or professional development is for some change to take place. Change in the way I
think, act, behave, reflect, relate, and learn. One way to drive greater fuller retention of learning
and greater application is to develop the whole person.

THE POWER OF PARADIGM

What does paradigm mean?

 The lens through which we see the world

 Our internal interpretive framework

VALUE CLARIFICATION

Values are

 Values are universal

 Values are expressible

 Values are hierarchical

 Values are not fixed, they change over time

Values are important, because

 They inform our thoughts, words and action

 They help us to grow, develop and create the future we want

 When shared they create internal cohesion

 When we use our values to make decisions, we make a deliberate choice to focus on what
is important for us.

Individual Values

 Individual values reflect the principles you live by and what you consider are important for you.

Relationship Values

 Relationship values reflect how you relate to other people in your life, be friends, family or
colleagues in your organization.

Organizational Values

 Organizational values reflect how your organization shows up and operates in the world.

Societal Values

 Societal values reflect how you or your organization relates to society. Societal values
include: future generations, environmental awareness, ecological suitability

“Personal values reflect what matters most to us as an individual, thus shape the way we behave.
When personal values are in alignment with those of the organization, employees feel a sense of
connection and are able to bring their full selves to work in commitment to its purpose.” (BVC 2020)

EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

While basic emotions are instinctual and common to us all, the meanings they take on and the
feelings they prompt are individually based on our programming past and present. Feelings are
shaped by a person’s temperament and experiences and vary greatly from person to person and
situation to situation.

Your emotions and feelings play a powerful role in how you experience and interact with the
world because they are the driving force behind many behaviors, helpful and unhelpful. It’s
possible to react to emotions and the feelings they evoke which are guided by unconscious fear-
based perceptions which you may not buy into anymore, yet you’re living your life, making
decisions and behaving according to these out-dated tendencies. Living unaware like this almost
always leads to problems and unhappiness in the long run.

Emotional intelligence is an approach for developing the leader’s BEING.

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION

Learning points

 Our listening will influences the quality of our relationships

 We can make people feel discouraged or inspired by our listening

 We can attract or repel people by our listening

 Listening is a huge access for leaders to learn from others, see different perspectives,
enter the world of others, empathize, etc

Introduction to Media Literacy

Media literacy is:

The ability to access, analyzes, evaluate and create media messages in a variety of forms. It aims
to empower citizens by providing them with the competencies (knowledge and skills) necessary
to engage with traditional as well as new technology media.

Key Elements of Media Literacy

Media literacy includes

• Recognizing that there is lots of information out there in different media forms and
finding the information (OBSERVE & ACCESS)

• Identifying the hidden messages in the media and the tools of persuasion the media uses.
(ANALYSE)

• Becoming conscious of how those messages affect us. (EVALUATE)

• Taking action – choosing not to let the media define you, manage the amount of time you
spend on watching TV, on social media and be extra vigilant and careful when producing media
messages, liking, sharing, commenting and posting on social media etc.(CREATE)