Collaboration is key to success. On all spectrums–from small scale classroom groups, to executive teams, to large scale mass internet collaboration–working together is part of human nature. Successful teams and leaders are capable of collaborating with other team members, organizations, or executives to accomplish a common goal. Collaboration is effected by every individual in the group—if someone slacks off or causes friction within the group, then they are hindering the overall productivity. In BA 352, it was evident that groups that worked well together, created better ideas and had more effective presentations.

My experience in BA 352 has taught me the importance of inspirational leadership. In regards to the relationship management component of emotional intelligence, I have strong communication and conflict-resolution skills, but I need to work on influencing and developing others. One aspect of leadership is being able to direct groups of people, but the harder part is being able to enable others to act. There needs to be a balance between encouragement and direction. I struggled with this during the term, because I often lead the discussions instead of allowing my teammates to provide input. I do value their opinions, but I was too focused on being productive and efficient that I forgot to slow down and ask for their intake.

One of my teammates suggested that I focus on delegating work better, instead of taking on all of the tasks by myself. Throughout the term, I often took on most of the work load, because I wanted to take more initiative in this class  and model the way for the rest of my group. Unfortunately, this backfired on me, because this didn’t motivate my team to be more productive. As a result, our meetings were less efficient, I took on more work than I would have liked to, and my teammates felt like they didn’t contribute as much. Because, “you should work on enabling others to act”, was one of the feedbacks I received from our final peer evaluations, I will be focusing on this for next term.

In addition, the feedback I received from midterm peer evaluations were similar–practice more inquiry and less advocacy.  After receiving this feedback I worked on stepping back from the conversation–listening more, and waiting until others had an opportunity to share their ideas before I expressed mine. In addition, I asked my teammates to explain their reasoning so I could have a better understanding of their point of view. I enjoyed new ideas and suggestions that weren’t previously said, because I was controlling the conversation too much. Even though I made progress throughout the term, I am still working on balancing advocacy and inquiry.