My name is Eric Cogan, I am a senior at the University of Oregon’s Lundquist College of Business studying small business management and accounting. I currently am part owner of two local small businesses. Paradise Shaved Ice operates in the Pacific Northwest May-September, specializing in sporting and music events. I hope for this to become the premier shaved ice business in the Pacific Northwest in the next 7-10 years. Grass Roots Landscaping LLC is a small landscaping firm operating mostly in the Eugene/Springfield metropolitan area with the goal of eventually servicing the entire Willamette Valley.

My Eportfolio contains four sections: Understanding of effective leadership models, Understanding and working with others, Understanding and managing self, and Effective professional communication. It is meant to demonstrate my progression towards becoming an effective and eventually great leader.

Our group project is starting to come together! We met Tuesday night and had a half hour of near-panic; none of us really understood what would be expected of us during our Monday presentation. At about the 25 minute mark I began guiding the team away from discussing Monday and towards expanding our need statement. I think this was an example of 5ps, in particular Modeling The Way. It took an effort to settle down and focus on our expanded need statement. Once we started a concerted effort our POV statement really flowed; we went from nothing to a final draft in a half hour.

I also had some excellent practice improving my ei, my emotional intelligence, later in the week. One team member is from China and sometimes he has a hard time understanding our perspective as Americans. For instance, it took me five minutes to explain to him what ‘hands-on’ was, but I got there in the end. Now he even uses the term occasionally, which actually feels quite rewarding. A couple members of our group get a little frustrated when he can’t understand, but as a student of foreign languages I find it east to stay patient. English is an incredibly difficult second language and I have lots of empathy for anyone who learns it.

Meeting up with the group again tomorrow afternoon–i eill add to this post if anything comes up!

For my first ever post on any blog, I think I will simply discuss what I have taken away from class after four meetings.

The first part of professionalism is ARRIVING ON TIME. I was a few minutes late to our first class and unsurprisingly, Ron was rather brisk with me. We have been told to think of this class as real life and Ron as our boss or supervisor; I never would dream of being late on the first day of a new job, so really there is no excuse to be late for class. Since then I have had a couple close calls but am always in my seat by 08:00.

On that first day we discussed Good Leadership; leadership that is effective, authentic and moral. Leadership only works because it is authentic and moral. I am still thinking about that; the authentic side of leadership is clear to me, morality’s role is still fuzzy.

Something Ron said that first day stuck with me–to paraphrase;

“…Another thing to think about this term–Courage. There will come a moment this term where you will need it.”

Second class was mostly meeting and getting to know our team. I feel SO fortunate to have the team I do. I’ve never had a truly dreadful team experience (knock on wood) but I think this is going to be an excellent one, something I haven’t experienced before. I am genuinely excited for us to collectively tackle the group project. My notes are filled almost entirely with personal anecdotes; Ron is from Texas, moved to OR in ’96 (year of floods), lives on a small farm with horses and chickens. I have many more notes on each of my team members and its almost shocking to me we’ve only known eachother a week, I know SO much more about them today than I did then.

I enjoyed the memo reaction exercise, I thought it was practical and a fine example of what NOT to do. I took detailed notes on what a proper business presentation should be and I think they will be very helpful for the project.

I enjoyed the design/creativity exercise we did this week, but the most important thing I took away from our discussion was actually one sentence

“Connect with professionals in your field”

That is what I have done with my father and my small business, and it has paid off dividends I could never have expected. I helped a fellow vendor load a heavy stove into his truck when I was 17 and the next summer he called me with an invitation into the Olympic Trials. That event propelled our business from basically a corner stand to elite events all over the Pacific Northwest. The last few summers I realize I have slipped into the attitude that I already “know enough” of local vendors, but that is such a dangerous thought process. I hereby recommit myself to networking, socializing and exchanging information with my fellow vendors as frequently as possible. To stay informed is essential in my line of work and the best way to do so is to stay in constant contact with your peers.

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