Managing, Leading And Stewardship: Reflection Of Personal And Professional Growth As A Leader

Pre-Subject Reflection

Being a Managing Director or a CEO of a company was something that I admired a lot as I was in school and that influenced my choice of undertaking Finance and Marketing course. Once I graduated in the Finance and Marketing field the interest of being a CEO in a company at some point in life escalated and became a dream that I wished to come true. Any graduate with dreams of being at the top of any company is aware of the hard work and the mindset of the people in top management so as to be able to know the strategies required to reach that peak point of management. In my MBA study I came across an important topic where it pointed on the right ways that are necessary to lead a company. However, this topic gave me an entirely different reflection on management, leadership and stewardship requirements contrary to what I initially had in mind. To me leading a company meant understanding how to manage but this topic gave me an insight on how to separate leading a company where prioritizing investors and stakeholders come first and leading a company where people priorities come first. My choice to study Finance and Marketing was important as it enlightened me on three crucial pointers. One is it was my choice as it fitted with my career field. The other reason is because of my interest in learning leadership and finally this subject granted me the power to be able to change how management is seen externally. Stewardship in my assumption I can define it as the way people are supervised in an organization. Stewardship was also a subject of interest to me as I wanted to know its different approaches and dimensions. Other topics of interest that I came across was Organizational Dialogue and Theory and Practices that majorly dealt with importance of good leadership in an organization and both topics go hand in hand. Choosing this subject was a good idea to me as it helped me in learning and adding my interpersonal skills as well. Any leader should possess good interpersonal skills that help in efficient way of conversing as well as being an effective listener. This subject therefore will sharpen my interpersonal skills as a leader and I will be able to blend in into the corporate world.

Another example of a challenge I faced as a leader was when I was employed as a Manager in a Sports Consulting Company. During that time as the Manager, most of the times I was not able to prioritize work for the team that I was leading. Having a team comprising of 12 people and working on different projects at a time was a challenge. We mostly dealt with handling of the brand partners of the company, manning the office in India as well as ensuring customer satisfaction and customer care functions. All these responsibilities sometimes weighed us down and at some point, my team and I would work for 10 hours straight in one day and this was very strenuous because sometimes I would ignore calls from the brand partners which was bad for business. I got out of that company and now sometimes I look back and I am ashamed on how I handled business there and I think I could have done better in my work as an effective leader.

Mid-subject Reflection

In the course of undertaking my bachelor degree, our school had a drama society whereby I was the President of that club. Drama groups are normally huge and contain a lot of participants and our drama group was no different. There were about 250 students who participated in drama and that was a challenge to me in terms of managing such a big number. I faced challenges as the President of the drama group especially in allocating equal opportunities to all the members and ensuring that all members felt their presence was valued. Being a leader (President of the drama group) made me feel like I was not fair enough to all members involved and this made me feel like I could have handled the leadership better. Undertaking this subject though, made me learn and gain more advantage in personal and professional growth as a leader.

During my first semester in my lectures in MLS, I encountered other students who were from vast cultures and backgrounds that were interesting as they shared their opinions and views in terms of their personal encounters and experiences with leadership. Incorporation of lectures and series of insightful tutorials every week was an eye-opener to us on what real world leadership problems were as well as sharpening theories that we learned in our lectures. Combining both class lectures and theories together with tutorials was insightful and made us understand leadership wholly.

Real and complex activities in week 4 put my mind to test and made me think even harder on real life practices. We were given a case study to work on as a group and I did a role play as the director of the company King Gee being Managing, Leading & Stewardship (MLS) Jatin Hooda-128719625. I was to role play as Bill Quinn. The director and the HR manager were bearing news and were mandated to break the news to the employees. The news was not good and it shocked both the employees of King Gee and the town of Kempsey. This tutorial made me ponder about life especially the part where Bill’s father told him while driving to the airport that he(Bill) has ruined Kempsey. Here I learnt that due to the decisions of the company management, Bill made a decision also to relocate the company from Kempsey. This decision from the management negatively affected the people of Kempsey as for many generations they relied on the company. The management made a poor decision to relocate instead they could have looked for a better solution to that issue. In every tutorial each group got a chance to role play Bill Quinn and each applied the theory of stakeholders to come to a solid solution. My group came up with concerns and we presented them to the executive board of King Gee, the employees and the stakeholders. As Bill Quinn in my group, we came up with ideas through discussions on how to avoid shutting down the company by injecting long term plans that would sustain the company in Kempsey instead of shifting. Such plans were like working long hours to increase company revenue or alternatively reduce pay. We discussed on ways to prioritize tradeoffs of the employees while keeping in mind methods of taking care of King Gees executive concerns.

In-class activities

After the 4th week, I came to realize that unethical practices have negative impact on people as they could affect the trust of people towards a company. As a manager, it is crucial to concentrate on stewardship and as a leader it is important to make responsible decisions as regards to other people instead of company’s executives. At that point I decided to try and be a leader who would always bear in mind results of my decisions as well as balancing the organization’s vision and take care of organization investors interests. My other responsibility as a good leader was to set up an organization culture that ensured each person was valued and felt equal to the rest devoid of bias.

It is important as a leader to balance the company’s visions, ensure there is a health organization culture where every person feels valued and equal and also to ensure the needs of investors and customers are met. Unethical practices should be avoided in organizations so as to maintain trust of people towards the company. After my 11 weeks of assignments, tutorials, lectures and discussions, I was able to get a clear understanding of the subject and it has impacted me positively. This subject has influence me in looking at work in a pure manner and that has encouraged me to want to pursue it even in the outside world.

MLS has taught me how to respect both people and work at the same time and also how to be a leader in an organization following ethical ways. Different class case studies shed some light in my way of thinking for example e, the letter that Martin Luther King Jr. wrote while in jail. The letter showed how learned and educated Martin Luther was and it shocked me how it revealed so much in a very subtle way. I learned how unethical leadership behaviors such as greed, arrogance, pride can bring giant companies to its downfall. In my debate group, we debated on corrupt practices found in organizations. For example, the unethical practices in FIFA World cup Qatar 2020 officials. The actions committed that made them have it rough to face the society with such bad allegations against them such as bribery. These unethical practices of an organization make it quire tough for both the defense and opposition sides to answer for them. The case studies taught us to be grounded individuals and be able to make sound and tough decisions as leaders based on truths and following ethical practices at all times. I also got to learn on different organization structures from different countries and make comparisons.

At the beginning of my 1^st tutorial, we did a case study whereby we made an employee redundant; here I got the opportunity to act as a presenter. However, at the end of the course, I got to get more insight on this subject and faced situations in a different perspective by being keener on good business practices. I have been able to become a better task master, better in oratory skills as well as a better judge and a good listener. All these qualities will enable me to work on any weaknesses I might have and help in realizing my strengths all which will be useful in my pursuit of being a good leader in the world of work.

During my stay in school and study of MLS, I have gained sound philosophies that will lead me in my career path towards being a great leader. I intend to be transparent, fair, and diverse in culture and be a person that advocates for positive changes in an organization. The subject has also instilled the importance of being morally and ethically upright and always takes ownership and responsibility my actions. It has also made me realize that being a leader one needs to be discrete and trust whenever making changes in the organization by yourself as it true as per the saying that ‘it’s lonely at the top’. At the beginning of my study of the subject, the concepts were very vague, but throughout the learning process through use of case studies, lectures, discussions and tutorials, the concepts became clear and I developed my knowledge. The use of the case studies examples that were offered to us especially, have sharpened my acute understanding of the subject and this has enabled me to look at cases in a manager’s eye and perspective. In so doing, am able to look at situations presented from a leader’s perspective and make decisions as should a leader in the real world. All the tutorials, lectures and case studies as well combined discussions with other students were an Eye-opener for me and greatly helped in me in depth understanding of the subject. The study of the subject and the understanding of the same will surely help me in my career path towards becoming not only a leader in the corporate world but also a great ethically upright leader for that matter.