Learning Styles and Leadership Sep28
Tonight we talked about different learning styles and the different leadership styles they create. It was quite a shock to me when after taking the LSI test I found out that I belong to the diverging style group. I even questioned my presence in an MBA program; especially when during the class I found that almost all other students –and most MBA students- have converging or accommodating style. Working in a bank, I am surrounded by converging “Thinkers” and “Doers”, and even though I have found my way of survival, I have never been able to completely adapt myself to do things the way my colleagues do. For example, I believe that decision making is a group work, and always like to gather the team to brainstorm issues; my manager however, has perceived this as an attempt of free-riding, or transferring the responsibility to others in the group. When I first started my work, I had a hard time explaining the reason I called for a team-meeting, and even worse, I could not understand how a manger can sit in his/her office making decisions for a bunch of people and expecting them to follow contently. After almost two years of talking to different people and getting to know the culture of the company, I have found a way to consult my team unofficially. So technically I don’t break any “rules”, but I haven’t been able to accept them, and have even sometimes judged the people who can accept such rules. The LSI has made things clear to me. Maybe I and my managers do not share the same values. Maybe they don’t appreciate group spirit and other people’s feelings as much as final results. Maybe they don’t realize the necessity for looking at a task from different perspectives. Maybe they need to spend more time alone -to think- by themselves, rather than spending it with others and trying to get more information about the tasks and people they work with. These are my values,...