Reading Reflection: Good to Great by Jim Collins - Chapter Three: First Who...Then What

You will often hear the saying that people are your most important asset. Well according to Good to Great, "In a good to great transformation, people are not your most imporatnt asset. The right people are." I guess in our day to day lives, one wouldn't necessarily question that; however, when you think about it, it makes sense. Why waste valuable time training and fixing the work of an unfit employee, when you could just take care of the situation from the beginning?

This chapter was an eye opener for me. They talk about not being a "genius with a thousand helpers"; it's who you pay, not how you pay them; being rigorous, not ruthless;  and first who, great companies, and a great life. When I look back on the concepts, I think to myself these are very simple concepts. Why didn't I think of that? Why wouldn't I think that if you have the right people in line, doing the job because they want to do it, then it will get done? I believe because it goes back to being a Level 5 leader, and creating the rigorous culture that is mentioned in Chapter Three. Not so much about being cutthroat but about applying the same exact standards at all times, at all levels.

The main jist of all of this is be a leader who finds teamwork irreplaceable, don't worry about paying your staff a nice compensation package to keep them, worry about finding the right people for the job and paying them nicely to get them in the door, if you must make the hard decisions, make them right away and be consistent about your work, and once you have all of that in place, you won't need to worry about working a ton of hours because your company will be on the success track by having the right people, in the right seats on the right bus.

Mid Semester Exhibition Reflection

Below is my feedback using the mid semester exhibition feedback form:
Discuss my learning plan - 3
Describe my progress in the Big 10 Learning goals - 3
Share their framing questions - 4
Share what they have learned in realtion to their framing questions - 4
Share what they have learned about self - 3
Share a plan for moving forward - 4
Interact with auidence/ facilitate a conversation - 3
Use their slides as an effective visual aid - 4
Proofread/edit so that slides are error free - 4
Appear prepared - 4

My favorite part of this presentation were: getting to talk about my project, creating the Prezi presentation and getting feedback on some additional resources/ books

Something I am still wondering is: what ways can I take this project even deeper (using my Creativity WhackPack!)

I could have improved this presentation by: going more in depth about my learning and not so much focused on presenting the work and project.

So...what have I learned...
Based on my exhibition, learning plan and my readings
I know the work that I am doing but I need to be able to demonstrate how I am learning and growing.
I need to come to my exhibition ready to present, not just ready to show my work.
The project work that I am doing is great, but personally, I would like to find ways to infuse some of my natural creativity into it so I can further my desire to learn and excel.
I must make sure that I am regularly updating my blog with the work that I am doing...it doesn't look like am doing the work if I don't have it readily available.

Whole Foods: Employment Brand

I realized that before I could start thinking about what the website would look like, I would need to know what message had to be portrayed. When a current or prospective employee of the MET utilized this website, what did I want them to understand about the MET? What can they expect to learn about us? All of these questions lead me to an employment brand. I did some research on employment brand, and found the Wall Street article below especially helpful.  I looked up some of the great places to work  in the US, as a starting point. I found Whole Foods came across a few different lists, and was able to find this video on You Tube featuring Whole Foods Co-founder & CEO, John Mackey. In this video, he expresses what he believes makes Whole Foods a great place to work for...

Whole Food Employment Philosophy

Wall Street Journal - Employer Brand article

Reading Reflection: Good to Great by Jim Collins - Chapter Two: Level 5 Leadership

When  you think of a successful company, what assumptions do you make about their leader? Would you say that their leaders are likely to be extroverted? Listened to what needed to be done and trusted that it would work out?Ambitious and Humble? According to the research performed by Jim Collins and his team, every good to great company had a Level 5 leader during the years of important transition. 

A Level 5 leader has a mix of personal humility and professional will. They are motivated by great results, and will do whatever it takes to make the company great; regardless of how big or hard the decision will be. What most of the "celebrity leaders" of the world lack is humility and the ability to accept responsibility when things go wrong. They are often so consumed with their own personal status as the company's leader, they are not able focus on the long-term goals and results of the company; which, is why many companies with a celebrity leader tend to fall apart once that leader is gone. A Level 5 Leader is able to transform a company and make sure that the choices and staff in place will carry this success even when they are no longer working for that company.

So can anyone be a Level 5 leader? I think anyone can evolve into a Level 5 Leader, you just have to know what to look for and be dedicated to the success of the company, not themselves.

Big 10: CREATIVITY

Blue Monday by Annie Lee

Who isn't blue on Monday morning?? I love the play on words and how the colors tie into the title!

Creative Whack Pack
I think what I love about the work that I do with College Unbound, makes me bored at the same time because it was lacking the element of creativity to it. I thought the Creative Whack Pack was a great way to help me start thinking of ways to insert some creativity into my project.

The Explorer: I plan to think of ways to use random ideas to stimulate some new ideas for my project - if I think of the word broom, I think of people being swept up under a rug, becoming more transparent, cleaning up employee relations issues, giving the MET a clean sweep on the Employee Relations front. Creating a positive employment brand!

The Artist: I want to find ways to change the name of my project and reverse my viewpoint. I think the Human Resources name may ensue some negative thoughts so I want to find some other ways to spin the name to encourage a more positive reception. If I am able to reverse my viewpoint and look at it from both the leaders of the MET and employees point of views, I think I can find ways to get that positive reception.

The Judge: Trying to focus on where the focus should be is really tough. By really sitting and answering/evaluating that question, I am not sure if I am focusing on the right aspect of human resources at the MET...

The Warrior: I always feel like can do better so I am never satisfied. I always question myself, but I am not sure if that is because I know that there will be opposition or because I feel the work can be better.

Four C-Model of Creativity

I found the Four C-Model of Creativity to be pretty self explanatory. I was able to understand and apply the model to myself and see where I fall in different aspects of my life; and what transition places I am at as well. I never really looked at being creative in stages, I always just figured that if you are creative you are - and that's it. What I also learned and was able to apply to myself was the concept of using extrinsic rewards to cultivate one's creative interest. I was able to take my more recent interest of cake decorating, and saw that when I started to sell custom cakes and cupcakes, I lost the interest. I no longer felt the fire in my belly to do it, I actually started to resent them. So while, I knew how I felt, I didn't realize that it wasn't just me that felt that way. It could happen to anyone.

Reading Reflection: Good to Great by Jim Collins - Chapter One: Good is the Enemy of Great

Upon recommendation from my Academic Liasion, I decided to go ahead and read the book, Good to Great by Jim Collins. I figured it couldn't hurt to read the book, even though initially I was thinking I wasn't really in the place to make a change at the MET; but then I remembered a lesson that I learned last year in College Unbound. Anyone can make a change, be a leader - it is not just the person at the top of the hierarcy. So with that, I began to read and become engaged in my "Little Red Book", as it has become affectionately known.

So what makes a company good? Great? So-so? How do those companies differ from one another? In what ways are they the same? How do you even begin determining those factors? In this book, they used a systematic approach, of compiling data, and comparing and contrasting that data, looking for patterns and relationships throughout all of it. Some of the surprising information that I found was the "First Who...Then What" concept. With this concept, the research showed that contrary to the expected, good-great leaders  got the right people in line, wrong people out of line and the right people in the right spots. Then they would figure out what the vision was. I would have expected that a good-to-great leader would have came in with a vision and then picked the people that they would need to fulfill that vision.

The first chapter was very informative of the research process behind the book. It was interesting but I look forward to getting more in depth in the coming chapters.