Yeah – I know it’s a weird title but very true…. I’ll get to that in a minute. Here’s the background on this blog: I am taking an elective right now called High Impact Presenting (as mentioned in my last blog entry). It is one of those courses that has had a big impact on me. Our professor, Dennis Shackel, is a gem. He is truly one of those professors that pushes you to your limits and allows you to explore new territory. How far does he push your limits? Well in the last class, every classmate was asked to recite poetry or sing a song of their choice. Over half the class sang a song! I find this remarkable because I think it’s one of the hardest things to do, but it is proof that he’s pushing us MBA candidates out of our safety zone.
I didn’t think I’d be getting much more out of the MBA program this late in the game, but I was wrong! I’ve gotten a lot out of this class and I’m becoming more comfortable with taking risks and making myself vulnerable during presentations/speeches… which typically leads to a more engaging and captivating performance. Further, I’m learning how to communicate and work more effectively with the four different personality types: Dominant, Consciousness, Influence and Steadiness. Personally, I am in the dominance category and I guess I already knew that. I’ve made a conscious effort over the last couple of years to become more comfortable with not having to always lead and to become more comfortable with delegation and trusting my teammates. I’ve come to realize that a successful team needs all four personality types to excel.
As another exercise we were asked to draw a pig – no joke. Apparently, there is a lot you can learn from drawing a pig. For example, research shows that if it you draw it in the centre of the page you are an optimist. If you draw it on the bottom of the page, you are generally more pessimistic. Based on how many legs you included, how big the ears were, how long the tail is etc….you can determine a lot about your personality type. Below is my pig – I was never an artist as you can probably tell. In fact if I recall correctly I was always a ‘C’ grade art-student in elementary school. Guess you can see why. Here’s what my pig (or perhaps better described as a wolf) tells me about me: I am an optimist, am active, am creative, have a strong sense of detail, don’t remember dates very well, like security, am stubborn and apparently I’m a good listener ;) I admit the listener part is not always true.
As another exercise we were asked to draw a pig – no joke. Apparently, there is a lot you can learn from drawing a pig. For example, research shows that if it you draw it in the centre of the page you are an optimist. If you draw it on the bottom of the page, you are generally more pessimistic. Based on how many legs you included, how big the ears were, how long the tail is etc….you can determine a lot about your personality type. Below is my pig – I was never an artist as you can probably tell. In fact if I recall correctly I was always a ‘C’ grade art-student in elementary school. Guess you can see why. Here’s what my pig (or perhaps better described as a wolf) tells me about me: I am an optimist, am active, am creative, have a strong sense of detail, don’t remember dates very well, like security, am stubborn and apparently I’m a good listener ;) I admit the listener part is not always true.
On a more personal side of things, the last week has been really difficult in some ways. Geeta and I still haven’t found a place in Toronto, my Value Investing elective has been a bit of an academic stretch for me, I’ve been busy on the personal front and I’ve come to realize that I need to work on my ‘crucial conversation’ skill sets. Crucial conversations is a pretty famous book about how to handle/communicate effectively during those critical moments when your emotions are interfering with your ability to say what you want to say in an appropriate and effective manner. A few years back, I used to feel confident in my abilities to face tough situations – I felt that my ‘crucial conversations’ skills were a strength of mine. Over the last couple of years, I seem to be having a lot more of these moments both professionally and personally, and many of those conversations haven’t gone as I wanted them to. I feel like I’ve lost a bit of confidence in my abilities to conduct these conversations and I know that I need to work on it. I took a course on developing ‘Crucial Conversation’ skills about a year ago and it was really helpful. It takes practice and I know I’m going to be spending some time this summer improving upon this.
Until next time…
Sach
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