the takeaway

There are a handful of ideas that I see myself using that I got from this class.  The first is the idea of authentic leadership. I really enjoyed the mindset that this form of leadership gives, not just in a business setting but in our daily lives. The idea of letting your values and beliefs lead your actions for me is a truly freeing experience. I have had time in my life where I have done things that were socially expectable or what society wanted me to do but inside I knew I was betraying my own beliefs. So for me to have cultivated this concept of authentic leadership where I stand by my values regardless of the consequences is truly liberating. The next idea or concept that I came away with was the idea of privilege. Now I don’t think that there is anything wrong with having privilege or that you should be ashamed of it. I’m most cases it’s totally out of your control so for me the exercises that we did in class mainly making a paper linked chain for every identified privilege that we had. Mine dragged on the floor when I was holding it up and that’s saying something since I’m 6 foot, it just really made me appreciate the differences between not just my fellow classmates but also people as a whole were all different with our own struggles, advantages, and disadvantages. The activity also brought to mind something that my girlfriend told me once. That when she was young she would wonder what it was like to be white, she’s Chinese. But it downed on me that I have never had that though I have never wondered about being any other race and I think it comes down to the privileges and the dominant white male cultural view that we have in America, a privilege that I never even considered. The last idea or technique that I will be taking away from this class is how to enhance our listening and communication skills. Now this is a topic that I have run across multiple times before where it is in classics like Dale Carnegie’s classic How to Win Friends and Influence people, or some of the more modern books on the subject like Leil Lowndes How to Talk to Anyone. The point is that no matter what field you enter, communication is going to be key to your wellbeing and success. We covered some basic material in class like active listening and the different listening styles that certain people have, we also went over some technical things that one can do to improve their communication skills, like eye contact, matching the other person’s vocal intensity, and mirror the physiological ques of the other person. While none of this was new to me, seeing the material again in a class room setting was very helpful and reinforced the idea the communication is key. All in all, I have a great time in the class and will be using some of the skills and ideas that I learned form it moving forward in my career and life.