Before reading Dare to Matter by Jordan Kassalow and Jennifer Krause, I barely even knew how to define the word “matter”. We had discussed it in my leadership development class, but I was still a little fuzzy on the exact meaning and applications. It almost seemed like an unapproachable word, intimidating and mainly destined for use when describing CEOs and heads of departments. However, by reading Dare to Matter, I learned so much more about the meaning of mattering and what impact individuals can personally make in their own lives.
I had always viewed mattering through the lens of making a difference on other peoples’ lives, similar to the way they describe someone’s life at a funeral—how big their network of people was, what a difference they made for others, and on and on. What I had never considered, though, was that the first step is to matter to your own self. It’s so common to hear about people viewing themselves in a negative light or as a burden to others, living in a lens of constant self-criticism, even from a very young age. People of many different ages view college students as those members of the population who are less affected by that adolescent self-doubt and not yet worn out by professional life; they’re assumed to be invigorated to take on the world, with inspiration from their newfound knowledge encouraging them to be change-makers in their industry of choice. But when a class offered for a semester at Yale University on how to achieve happiness had so many students take it that they decided not to offer it again in order to save resources, it became painfully evident that college students don’t necessarily fit the mold of what everyone expects of them. Kassalow and Krause discuss how distressing this is in Dare to Matter: “[…] college-age students—young people at a stage in life when they have the least amount of responsibility and should theoretically be enjoying the most carefree years of their adult lives—needed a class to learn how to be happy” (Kassalow and Krause 18). As a part of this journey towards happiness, the students had to find how to matter to themselves first. As is discussed by Kassalow and Krause, mattering starts with us recognizing our unique skills and roles in the world as individuals. We each have something unique to contribute to this Earth, and the first step in making a difference is realizing this. Kassalow tells of his personal journey from debating whether or not to study optometry in the footsteps of his father all the way to starting his own business in order to improve the eyesight of the less fortunate. He also tells of his mountain-top moment when he realized that if all else failed, his main goal in life would be to matter. He stated the following regarding what it means to matter: “It means becoming aware that something we and only we possess has been implanted within each and every one of us that will never be replicated in any other human being who lives after we die. It’s first connecting with the idea that our individual life could be so important to the life of the world that what we do—or what we don’t do—can change everything” (Kassalow and Krause 16). With this clarified definition, it’s much easier to apply this innate sense of importance to our own lives. Although I am very inspired by the majority of what Kassalow and Krause write about, it is a complex process to put groundbreaking ideas such as these into practice. Today, I plan to continue spending much of my time and energy as possible on continuing to keep myself accountable for everything I have control over in my own life. If I make a detrimental mistake or receive a grade I’m not proud of, I ensure that I learn what I could’ve done better and apply these lessons to avoid later similar situations altogether. In regards to mattering, I do my best to treat others with kindness while still prioritizing what I enjoy doing and what makes me feel most myself. This helps me function at my highest personal caliber possible and be proud of the tasks I complete. As is discussed in the book, I also do my best to check in with the things that feed me and the things that need me. I make sure I’m continuing to stay in touch with my hobbies of playing piano and singing, and that I continue to challenge myself by always learning new things. I also try to stay balanced by giving the right amount of time and attention to those things that need me, such as my studies, my family, and my friends. When it comes to my future, I believe it feeds me as much as it needs me. However, in order to stay on top of the many current demands in my life, I engage those things that need me in helping me stay on the right track to reach my future goals as well. And with the help of Kassalow and Krause’s wisdom, I will continue on this same track, invigorated to take on the world as college students should be.
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The world is a very ambiguous place. No two people have the exact same experiences, the same interactions, the same upbringing. Even with those we spend a lot of time with, it is likely that we will run into at least one situation where we don’t know the right next steps to take. This ambiguity is what challenges us and keeps us on our toes. We all know the Rorschach or inkblot test as pictured below; sometimes this is what it feels like to interpret real life as well. We simply don’t have it all figured out all the time, and navigating this ambiguity is key to staying stable in our sometimes very tumultuous world.
My initial view of school was that it is a fun place where I get to challenge myself and hang out with friends. It was early in grade school when I developed my love for learning—my passion for taking in new information that forces me to think differently about the world around me. I thrived in the structured environment with strict rules, high expectations, and clearly defined consequences—nearly the opposite of ambiguity. I quickly adjusted to these aspects and began to rely on the constants: specific classmates acting a certain way, teachers reacting to specific situations with a certain response, and the overall flow of school being largely led by those in authority. This was what I knew and what I was comfortable with. When I moved on to high school, it was an eye-opening experience to say the least. There were the initial challenges of understanding the layout of the building and the relationships between classroom locations, but it was also very different to find my way around the building simply on my own. Instead of being shuttled around to our classes in large groups, each student had her own schedule and was expected to make it to her classes, by herself and on time. Additionally, each teacher had their own expectations of the students’ assignment headings, approaches to tasks, methods of contacting them, and more. Despite having a close friend with the same schedule as me, the personal responsibility of getting to class by myself was a major adjustment. Outside of just my daily classes, there was also the obstacle of determining the expectations in extracurriculars such as club meetings and sport practices. But once I had a feel for how things worked, I enjoyed having an understanding of these rules and helping clarify expectations for others if necessary. However, once I stepped into an official leadership position as president of my school’s FBLA chapter, I began to encounter real ambiguity like I had never experienced it before. As mentioned in previous blog posts, my FBLA chapter cycled through three different advisers during my three years in the club. This put significantly more responsibility on us, as students, to provide the assistance required to help the advisers to be on the same page as the previous one(s) and ensure our goals would be met for the club. When I was selected to be president of our chapter my senior year, our newest adviser was very excited and invested in improving our chapter even past its previous state. But from my perspective of never having led a club before, this involved a lot of ambiguity. She also treated the club as much more student-led than it had been in the past, so it was an interesting challenge for me to be somewhat “in charge” of it. I was tasked with many of the big decisions, leading discussions, and delegating tasks; this forced me to work through the ambiguity and maintain and follow a structured plan for our club, as well as help others do the same. This experience of having to jump right in despite not knowing all the details or how everything would work out taught me that you don’t have to have it all figured out right away. Many leaders experience this ambiguity regularly—when members of a group are struggling, they look to a leader who stays calm in the midst of the storm and handles the ambiguity expertly. Sometimes, this is simply jumping in headfirst, showing everyone else that it’s okay to trust in the ambiguity as well, and knowing that it will all work out in the end. My leadership class recently watched Creative Leadership: Time for Change, a TED Talk by Linda Green. She discussed how creativity has played a role in her particular leadership positions, but also how it plays a role in leadership in companies and the world at large. She discussed how creativity can be broken down into patterns, people, and purpose. There are many preexisting patterns in today’s day and age, whether they are presented as social norms, ingrained thought processes that humans tend to follow, or something else entirely. But with creativity, we can break through these patterns and engineer new approaches to even the situations and problems of daily life. When these new ideas are brought into the world, they may initially endure some criticism and pushback, since they’re so novel and have often never been seen before. However, with determination and tenacity, the ideas can be brought to light and make monumental changes in often otherwise mundane industries. With processes such as Design Thinking, this approach can be applied in a variety of scenarios. As mentioned in previous blog posts, I participated in a design thinking internship this summer, where I was really able to tap into my own creativity and connect with others on my team the same way. Instead of looking at a problem, solving it, and moving on, the design thinking process aims to use creativity and approach problems from a completely different direction. My team had already surpassed the initial empathy and define stages and was moving into ideate and prototype, both of which warrant a fair amount of creative thinking. During our brainstorming session for ideate, we were encouraged to use any and every idea that popped into our heads, and we then converted the most disruptive and practical ideas into prototypes. One of these prototypes originated out of an idea for face-to-face connection between employers and possible employees rather than just “meeting” them through their resumes. We took this idea and fleshed it out on a whiteboard as an in-person connection fair, similar to a career fair. We kept adding more and more ideas until it evolved into a gamified day-long event including punchcards, blockades to restrict an entire section of Omaha, food trucks, and more. This prototype and another, which was developed more into our final product, were both great opportunities to use all of our combined creativity to its full potential and have a very fun time while doing so. But without our team leaders’ original portrayal of the stages and encouragement to think outside the box, we would not have been able to tap into our creativity to the same extent that we did. One great description of our leadership team over the summer and any ideal leader is the following: “Leaders must be creative in order to spark innovation and inspire those that they lead.” I agree with this statement wholeheartedly, because it does take a creative leader to help a team perform to its highest potential. The potential of a team’s tasks can be compared to an iceberg: by exploring the surface, a good amount of ideas and ways to go about solving problems and completing tasks can be discovered. However, whole new realms of untapped potential reside under the surface, and it takes just a bit of creativity to find and access these. By taking a regular approach, only the bare minimum will be achieved in each task. But with creativity, leaders can make a lasting impact on their team and end goal by looking at things from a new perspective and jumping right in. Communication is quite a buzzword in today’s society. You may hear that it’s important to have open communication in relationships, to facilitate connections in the workplace, and more. But so much emphasis is put on active communication that one aspect is often swept under the rug: listening. This can be just as important, if not more important than active communication. It takes a great deal of skill to be tuned into what others are trying to communicate. Being the loudest isn’t always the highest priority—sometimes it’s those who observe the little details who make the biggest impact.
In my family, listening is very important. My parents have always encouraged my sister and I to respectfully listen before asking questions, to always be patient when others are talking, etc. Although I took advantage of this often in grade school and high school by telling my parents every little detail about my day, I never truly appreciated it until moving out for college. Despite being busy with all kinds of different activities of their own, my parents still make time to check in on me by calling or texting whenever they get a chance. Unlike many people who get lost in the hustle and bustle of daily activities, my parents always prioritize listening. The last few times I’ve gone home for the weekend, my parents have checked in with me about my classes and college life, but I really appreciated it this last weekend when I went home on my dad’s birthday. Just like normal, my parents asked me how school was going. I had more to talk about than normal with everything going on, but they still treated it like any other day, focusing on me and what I had to say. Despite all the pent-up stress I had been feeling about school and making enough time to enjoy my dad’s birthday with them, they were completely content with just hearing me rant about my experience at college. I hadn’t known it before, but I really needed that quality time to get all my thoughts out into the open and destress with them. No matter how much they have going on, they always prioritize what I have to say, and it makes me feel truly listened to. Back in college life, everyone has a lot on their plate, so it’s also very meaningful when people take time to listen. One of my close friends and I have enjoyed studying together since classes began, and we often strictly focus on our homework. However, one night a couple of months ago, we took a break to talk and get to know more about each other instead. What began as a short conversation turned into an hours-long deep talk late into the night about all kinds of different topics, from why we enjoy school to how people perceive each other. Rather than trying to complete assignments, we were instead able to simply listen, getting to know the other person on a deeper level. Experiences like these show the importance of not only occasional late-night talks, but also general connection with others through listening. This is a lesson that can be directly applied to leadership. Although a leader may know their team members on a surface level, it takes more conversation and listening in order to learn more about them and make them feel comfortable in the task they’re trying to accomplish. With unresolved problems or discussions, teams can’t function to the best of their abilities. As you may have read a few blog posts back, trust in the basis of teamwork itself, and individuals can’t trust each other without open, honest communication and listening. Although it requires much practice to learn the skill of listening and paying attention to nonverbal cues of another person, it’s a very important aspect of leadership and teamwork, and leadership would be a very difficult task without it. The empathize stage is a very integral stage of the design thinking process. Although this sentence may not have much significance to the general public, it carries many memories for a select group who shared in my experience during my internship over the summer. It’s a phrase my team and I know all too well from rehearsal after rehearsal of our final presentation regarding our design thinking project. It may seem simple, but it’s only the beginning of a description for a stage that is, truly, an integral part of the process.
Without empathy, there would be no design thinking. The entire process is based in connection with identified end-users, and it truly takes root during empathy probes. Not exactly interviews, empathy probes are a mix of get-to-know-you sessions and consultations on issues a group may be facing. However, the group doesn’t simply state the issue- the interviewer must dig deep for details and emotions to truly see how the problem affects the end-user. When I began planning for my empathy probe with a classmate in my leadership development course about a memorable college experience in the COVID era, I wasn’t exactly sure how to approach it. Over the summer, I had never been the one physically charting the interviewee’s experience during probes my team conducted, so I knew it would be difficult to keep all the details straight while also marking down the highs and lows of the experience. However, I was able to pay more attention to my classmate’s nonverbals during my probe because of my similar experiences over the summer. My classmate began by telling me about her initial college experience. She was enjoying her online classes and spent a large portion of her free time with her friends in other dorm buildings. When our campus’s no-guest policy was put into effect, she and her friends had to find creative ways to still meet up and have fun together. However, when she learned that she had COVID and had to quarantine, she had to make a very difficult decision between quarantining on-campus or going home. Through her nonverbals of raising her eyebrows and being more animated than normal, I could tell this was a pain point for her and that she really struggled with this decision. After deciding to go home, she made it through her Zoom classes with her dog by her side, so it wasn’t as bad as she had anticipated it would be. She smiled and laughed more when talking about this, so I could tell it greatly improved her experience of having Zoom classes in her own home. However, her experience was even more positive when she learned that her test was a false positive and that she would be able to come back to campus. After getting back into the regular routine of classes and seeing her friends while still following the guest-policy, she has continued following a positive trend, but with a heightened awareness of possible signs of COVID in case the next symptom leads to something more than just a scare. Although this empathy probe wasn’t focused on learning about a problem faced by a company or nonprofit, it was still very helpful to practice with another student who will also be conducting empathy probes with businesses. I was able to learn why she took the steps she did, and I also dug deeper to learn more about her real emotions and motivations. Similar to my empathy probe with my classmate, empathy probes with nonprofits or companies will be very beneficial in connecting with them past just the surface requirements of what they need from us. Using empathy, we will be able to find the real pain and discomfort behind the struggles they face. Therefore, we’ll be much better suited to catering our approaches to their specific problems and leaving a l In my leadership development class, we recently watched a TED Talk titled “Transforming healthcare for children and their families: Doug Dietz”. It is a talk by Doug Dietz, an industrial designer who worked on an MR scanner design for hospitals. After securing all the details such as enclosures, displays, patient transfer, etc., he finally had a model in a hospital he was able to go visit in person. When he was in the MR suite admiring his equipment, he was asked to leave in order to let a patient use the scanner. He saw the family of the young girl who needed a scan in the hallway, and his eyes were opened to the actual experience of a patient who would be using the scanner. Instead of simply admiring the equipment like he had been, this family would’ve been experiencing a very scary step in the young girl’s health journey. Before they entered the suite, the father of the young girl reassured his daughter that she would be okay and that she could be strong. This was such a stark contrast to the emotions Dietz was going through that day. While he was feeling excitement and pride that his work was complete and to his satisfaction, the young girl and her family were going through possibly one of the scariest days of their lives. The girl was worried and confused, relying on her parents for support. But her parents were also visibly worried, trying to keep their young girl calm so the machine would be able to do its job. Although intrinsic to issues related to health and survival, these feelings were not those Dietz wanted to elicit when people interacted with his prized piece of machinery. His goal was to help people get through these experiences, not make them even worse. So, in collaboration with a team of people response for designing the MR suite, Dietz began reimagining the experience of getting an MRI scan. Instead of flickering fluorescent lights, mechanical whirring, and a stark, colorless room, the suites became beautiful, scenic adventures, with pleasant associated scents, lights, and audio. However, all of this was only possible with the aid of the design thinking process, and especially empathy. By directly connecting with his audience through empathy, Dietz was able to learn so much more about what the children and their families were experiencing in situations where his machinery was being used. In order to empathize with his end-users, he went to the source — children in daycare. They had a “brainstorming” session, mostly consisting of coloring. However, one child wasn’t even coloring; he was sticking his crayon in holes on the floor. This led Dietz to realize that a large part of the experience of these children was related to their stage in development. They might not be as skilled at drawing pictures with crayons as people of other ages, but these young toddlers have expansive imaginations. If they’re able to keep themselves occupied for hours at a time with a few chairs and a blanket they’ve mentally built into a palace, simply imagine how traumatic it could be to go fully inside of a dark, loud, technological device that seems to swallow people whole. By putting himself in the perspective of a child with one of those thorough imaginations and converting the clanky and technological MRI into an adventure scene instead, Dietz was able to change the entire hospital experience for these children and families. Instead of sedating over 80% of young patients, the hospitals now only sedated something like 0.05%. And the parents were finally able to enjoy the calm, fun environment. Although it was likely still nerve-wracking and stressful, the parents no longer had to worry about the discomfort of their child, which greatly improved their experience as well. Although he thought he had successfully solved the design problem initially, Dietz had to take on this beginner’s mindset to really connect with his end-users and help him cater toward traumatized children instead of tech-savvy adults such as himself. Without the ability to connect with his audience in this way, Dietz wouldn’t have been able to see past his own biases and experiences and wouldn’t have made any progress in improving the product for its true audience and purpose — transforming a confusing and scary encounter into a happy and interesting adventure through the MRI machine. We recently read The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni in my leadership development course. As stated in the title, it discusses the five principal problems faced by any given team, adapted into a story about a group of executives at a company called DecisionTech. As the story begins, it focuses on Kathryn, DecisionTech’s new CEO, and how she begins her process of revamping the executive team. Because of the less-than-suitable previous CEO and Kathryn’s significant age difference from many of the other employees, Kathryn has to work extra hard to prove herself and break the preconceived notions of where the company is headed. Although it was immensely successful and well-known just two years ago, the company has now significantly worsened in many ways and is barely recognizable as compared to its state of former glory. However, with Kathryn’s help, the executive team is completely transformed and DecisionTech’s team atmosphere is turned on its head, all with the help of Kathryn’s off-sites structured around five common dysfunctions of teams.
The initial dysfunction, absence of trust, forms the base of the pyramid model, which all the other dysfunctions stem from. One main example of this in the book is the initial distrust harbored by many team members against Kathryn. Her radical new approach of spending so much time in off-sites is off-putting; many employees are used to focusing on their work a large majority of the time, and this seems counter-intuitive to spend so much time trying to bond as a team rather than getting their work done. One certain employee is a great example of conflict- she doesn’t get along well with the other executives and tends to doubt others, including Kathryn, which contributes to a team-wide negative outlook on the off-sites and Kathryn herself. However, Kathryn works with the team on their commitment skills by forming smaller teams to work on tasks for hours at a time, and she sees improvements in the dedication and sense of responsibility the members have for their own work. Alongside responsibility, they also put extensive effort and time into improving their lack of accountability. With the improved base of trust, the members slowly improve in calling out themselves and others on behaviors that shouldn’t be happening. Kathryn aids in this process with her great attention to detail- she pays attention to changes as small as shifts in the way someone is sitting, then inquires and effectively learns more about the person’s real opinion on the situation. Working through these five themes together greatly improves team morale and productivity, leading the team members to appreciate Kathryn’s contributions and view her in a new light. Although he does apply the dysfunctions to this specific story in order to better explain them, Lencioni’s ideas are widely applicable to any team situation. Throughout the book, I was often reminded of my experience in the Scott Scholars Design Studio Internship Program this summer. During the initial internship Zoom call, I was introduced to my team: a senior and sophomore who would co-lead the team, a second sophomore, and two other freshmen, like myself- all of which were boys. Despite efforts to unite the team and help us learn more about each other, it was still an adjustment to become comfortable enough with the other members of the team to have conversations and collaborate on tasks. However, as the weeks progressed, we all slowly grew closer as a team and began to trust one another more and more, which greatly improved our work and collaboration on our tasks we needed to complete. The initial lack of this culture of trust made it significantly more difficult to be productive during our Zoom meetings- during group conversations, we would hesitate before sharing our ideas; it was difficult to decide who would be doing which tasks; and most importantly, we simply weren’t comfortable around each other. But as we established a basis of trust, we were able to get much more done and collaborate with confidence in the skills of our teammates. You may be a bit confused by the title of this blog post. You may be thinking, isn’t there another word for that? Or maybe, doesn’t she mean empathy? And you would be right. It’s not a real word, as far as spellcheck can tell. And when I accidentally said this word a couple weeks ago, I was trying to think of the word empathy. However, I think this word is a great way to describe empathy, or our ability to use emotion. Even if we don’t notice it everyday, empathy is just as important as emotion in our daily lives. I recently read an article in my psychology class about a study disproving the theory that being disagreeable has a positive effect on gaining power in the workplace. Although this aggression may have been effective in using fear for intimidation and coercion, those who lacked empathy also made a worse impression and less of a connection with their peers and superiors, inhibiting them from gaining more power. This also related to a TED Talk video we recently watched in my leadership development course: “The Empathic Civilisation” by J. Rifkin. In this video, he goes into detail about human nature and how empathy fits into our world. He says, “We’re not soft wired for aggression, violence, self-interest, utilitarianism; we’re soft wired for sociability, attachment, affection, and companionship.” He also talks about our strongest drive as humans: to belong. Alongside the findings in the psychology article, it then makes sense that those who didn’t display empathy were not able to gain any more power than those who did display empathy and connect well with others. One common application of this empathy is in writing thank-you notes. In my family, this was engrained in me as very important from a young age; my sister and I would always race to be the first to finish our Christmas thank-yous, and my mom would remind us daily until we had them all done. So when we were asked to write a thank-you note in response to the video we watched in leadership development, I was initially excited since this is something I enjoy doing and have a lot of experience with. However, it became much more difficult once I had to decide who to write my thank-you for. I thought back to high school and decided on one teacher, affectionately called the “grandpa” of my high school, primarily for his reliable guidance and knack for having all the random items on hand that one could ever need. He was a fairly challenging teacher and had high expectations of his students, but he was always willing to put off the scheduled content for another day if we needed to have a talk about current events, school drama, stress, or any other reason we might need a break. Reflecting on my experience in his classes, I was able to see how much of a leader he was in my high school and what a positive impact he made on his students. Being able to write a thank-you email to him helped me remember that no matter how much of an effect someone may have on you, they may not know until you tell them. The empathy and connection demonstrated in J. Rifkin’s TED Talk is very important in being an effective leader. As he states, “We extend our identity so we can think of the human race as our fellow sojourners and our other creatures here as part of our evolutionary family, and the biosphere as our community. We have to rethink the human narrative.” Taking this view of collaboration and empathy with others is a beautiful way to see the world and connect with others across any distance. Where we are today can be attributed to the interdependence we have on one another and the importance of tapping into our own personal “emotionability”, which can all start with a mere thank-you note. When the average person thinks about a design project, an interview probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. However, this is exactly how the design thinking process approaches the start of solving a problem. Rather than beginning with identifying the end-goal and dividing up the tasks to get there, design thinking takes a much more human-centric approach. The critical first stage, empathize, helps the designer connect with their audience in many different ways. The designer assumes a “beginner’s mindset”, eliminating previous bias or other details that may sway them in a certain direction. They start fresh, not ready to jump in and solve the problem, but with the simple goal of getting to know the personal experiences of those affected by it. This and other stages of the design thinking process are demonstrated in Extreme by Design, a movie documenting the experiences of Stanford students in their efforts to create life-changing but inexpensive solutions for major problems faced by other countries, using the design thinking process. In the movie, the Stanford students did more than just interview their end-users. They were able to experience the real situations their end-users were living in, which helped the students truly empathize with their experiences. In the current state of the world, we all know how important and helpful it is to interact with others face-to-face, and this is exactly what the students did. They got to know their audience personally, and this helped them in effectively approaching the problem. One student in the movie, Pam, connected personally with her team’s audience in Bangladesh. Three of Pam’s grandparents were from Bangladesh themselves, and she felt very drawn to help the young mothers there since she saw her own self in them. She talked about how she could very well have been in that situation too, but instead she happens to be a Stanford student with so many opportunities to treat her own children. Connecting with Pam provided the Bengali mothers a sense of trust that they were in good hands and the people truly cared about them, and this was an instrumental step in the design thinking process. Creating a relationship with those they were working to help inspired them to take personal responsibility for the quality of the work they were doing. While empathy is a very integral step in the design thinking process, it can even be applied to the necessary collaboration that happens between the actual team members throughout the process. All that connection with end-users, and even the tasks completed in the other phases of the process, require teams to be able to work together well. The team members must be patient and comfortable with one another so they are able to bring up conflicts and possible issues and civilly resolve them. There will inevitably be conflicts as well, which must be worked through together. Depending on the situation, a conversation may need to happen, or even a break from the project. In the movie, this was very evident near the end of one team’s project, when the person working on the final task was causing some conflicts for the group. He wanted to do it all himself, but his work wasn’t satisfactory for a few of the other members. They needed to have it finished very soon, so they all had to let him take a break then support him and help him get through the last pieces of the project. He may have felt as though his team members weren’t happy with his work, but he had to push through and do the best he could with the time they had left. This final collaboration and teamwork is just another example of what made all the projects function: empathy. The members had to trust each other, realize and be ready to help when one member was struggling, and support each other through it all. They were all acting as leaders in their own way, even if no one had the official title. As a united group, they were able to design and implement their projects and make a real difference in other countries, all while leading with empathy. Creativity. Upon hearing this word, leadership probably isn’t one of the first thoughts that comes to mind. For confidence, however, it very well could be. Although somewhat different, creativity and confidence are equally important in leadership. In my leadership development course, we recently watched a documentary called It Might Get Loud. It recounts the journey of three electric guitarists — The Edge, Jimmy Page, and Jack White — both as individuals and together, and it also shows what it means to be a creative and confident leader in the music industry.
Music, by nature, is a creative profession. It’s about imagination, creation, and originality. Musical artists spend much of their lives brainstorming, coming up with new ideas and unique approaches to producing music. They collaborate with other team members, and sometimes other artists, to create music that inspires and brings people together. They value the unique and distinctive contributions other musicians bring to the table, and use elements of these contributions in their own work. Unlike the stereotypical nine-to-five job, this requires immense creativity and a drive to keep bringing new and exciting ideas to the industry each day. Without these creative musicians, music would hardly be a form of entertainment. The way people connect with it is through the diversity, the always-changing but ever-constant output of song after song into the world. Similarly, a leader must use creativity to connect with their audience. Each member of a group has different life experiences and opinions but is also constantly working on improving and reaching a common goal. It takes creativity to unite a group in a shared process and objective despite everything happening from the individuals’ perspectives. Another important part of being a creative leader is being able to make sacrifices for others. In the music industry, this is very evident in touring artists’ lives. The documentary mentions some of the sacrifices made by the musicians, such as having to sleep on piles of equipment in the back of their van. It also details John White’s childhood experience in southwest Detroit in the 80’s. He explains how it was uncommon and sometimes embarrassing to play an instrument in his neighborhood, and even though his siblings were all musically inclined too, his taste in music was very different from the house and hip hop common in the area. White loved music so much, his room was filled with two drum sets, a guitar, and more; he even sacrificed his own bed to have more space for his music and slept on a piece of foam. Average leaders might not have to make changes as drastic as these, but they still make sacrifices for the good of their group. As mentioned in my last post, the transition to our new FBLA adviser my junior year made a huge difference for our chapter, and this can be largely attributed to the sacrifices our new adviser and officer team made for our chapter. Since our previous adviser had missed out on so many important tasks we needed to be completing, there was a lot of catching up to do to make sure our chapter would be ready for our state conference. For nearly the first two months of second semester, our adviser consistently spent hours of their weekends contacting FBLA to get our chapter registered, setting up meetings, organizing our existing information, etc. to get us back on track in time for state in April. Both our adviser and the whole officer team spent much of our free time working on brainstorming ways to fit everything in, fundraise, and prepare our chapter for the conference, and much of this was made possible by our confidence that our chapter was capable of succeeding despite our many setbacks. The confidence that guided us in making sacrifices for our chapter is an integral part of every leadership position. Without confidence in their work, a leader can’t effectively communicate their vision to their team members or take the necessary risks to achieve it. Sacrifices are born from the passion a leader possesses to create something they’re proud of and confident in. And by having confidence in the work of their team, a leader can more easily delegate tasks and achieve their long-term goals. A confident leader is also in touch with their emotions. This is a huge part of the music industry; in order to connect with their audience, musicians evoke emotion through their music. Even non-musical leaders can relate through emotions; it’s their job to keep their team together when something negative affects the while group, or even when something great happens. They are the role model for their team, and often team members refer to their leader to help interpret a situation. Many leaders often make a lasting impact on their team in this way and pave the road for later leaders to follow. The lasting impact a person leaves, or if they matter, is often very important to them and sometimes how they measure their success. But what does it truly mean to matter? Mattering simply means taking up space. Therefore, any physical object matters, but there are even different ways to interpret taking up space. Leaving an impact can equate to occupying a lot of space in others’ memories, but everything a person does can be argued to leave an impact on at least one person. Being a cybersecurity major, I’m in an Introduction to Computer Science course, which has been talking about storage and memory on computers. Although sometimes minute or almost invisible, each seemingly insignificant event simplified down into flashes of light is something that happens, requires energy, and therefore matters by taking up space. Similarly in human interactions, a person might not think their actions have any affect or leave an impact, but they can never truly know how many people are paying attention. So I believe mattering is something that happens simply by existing, and leaving an impact isn’t necessarily the most important thing in life. Musicians are leaders of very widespread audiences, so I think they do leave more of an impact on the world than most people do. Personally, my main goal isn’t to make the biggest impact on the world, but I do hope to make a positive impact on the people I interact with. I plan to continuously work on improving myself, my relationships, my professional position, my achievements, etc. as well, but focusing on impacting those who mean the most to me is the way I plan to matter. No matter the leadership position or situation, every leader must use their own creativity and confidence at times. It requires a vast amount of creativity to lead a group and keep items organized, and it requires a lot of confidence to trust the other members and complete large-scale tasks. However large or small each person’s leadership positions are, everyone matters and leaves an impact and therefore is a leader one way or another. |
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