Human Agriculturalist’s Workshop Cultivates Leadership Character
Posted on 20. Jul, 2010 by Linda Lord in Articles, Blog, Character development, Choice development
Cultivating character leads to personal leadership. My favourite leadership quote is by Willie Jolie, “Before you can be the leader of many, you must be the leader of one.” That one is self. But the question becomes, how does one develop personal leadership?
I recently had the privilege of conducting a personal leadership workshop for a group of high school students, identified for their leadership potential. The lesson was based on several teaching modalities and combining learning with the arts. It was a fabulous experience and I hope to be able to do more such workshops with the leaders of tomorrow.
In the workshop, we discussed the value of cultivating character and making good choices. I referenced three ‘props’ to assist in making the appropriate points. I used a mirror, a mug, and a map. The mirror served the purpose of reinforcing the importance of self-reflection when cultivating character. The time to consider who we are and what we want is vital to developing our personal leadership. The mug reinforced the notion that those we choose to associate with can greatly impact our personal leadership. If they are positive, we tend to be more positive. If they are negative and critical, we tend to assimilate that attitude. If our friends and associates are highly motivated and goal oriented, our behaviour tends to follow. Relationships are key to personal leadership and choosing those relationships carefully influences our personal leadership potential. Finally, I used the map to illustrate the value of knowing where you want to go. To make this experience real for the students, I had them create life maps. On them, they indicated some major life points that had shaped them. Sometimes the best learning tools are discovered by accident and that happened in this case. I wanted to use my own life map as an example, but I wasn’t comfortable sharing some of my less flattering experiences with this group and so I used dark ‘dots’ to represent those dark times in my life. They loved the concept. It became a safe way for them to share some of their negative experiences. It also provided some perspective that our ‘dark moments’ don’t define us. The discussion and the life map exercise provided a wonderful opportunity for these students to explore their definitions of leadership as well as understanding the importance of character and choice.
When considering your own personal leadership, have you done the work these students did? Do you understand the role character plays in cultivating your leadership potential? Do you recognize the power of choice when growing your leadership skills?
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