Chapter 1 - What Is Leadership
Communication?
L Notes
The introduction to leadership communication establishes the
foundation for the rest of the book and, thus, is essential for the students to
read and understand. The primary
objectives of Chapter 1 are to teach students to do the following:
•
Identify
leadership with an emphasis on transformational leaders.
•
Connect
leadership to communication.
•
Define
leadership communication and the leadership communication framework.
•
Appreciate
the importance of projecting a positive ethos.
•
Recognize
and manage ethical issues.
Communication self-assessments and development plans are
important for all students to complete.
The self-assessment helps them to determine what skills they need to
develop, and the plan helps them to establish an approach to developing the
needed skills; therefore, this chapter of the instructor’s manual includes
discussions and examples of self-assessments (note that Appendix A provides a
complete leadership communication self-assessment form) and development plans,
and an easy to score Excel version of the assessment is included in this
instructor’s manual.
Key Concepts
1. What
does it take to be a leader today?
2. Who
are some individuals they see as exemplifying transformational leadership?
3. What
role does communication play in transformational leadership?
4. How
does leadership depend on communication?
5. Why
isn’t communication as simple and easy as the drawing of the rhetorical situation suggests?
6. What
are some of the barriers that interfere with effective communication?
7. How
would they define leadership communication?
8. Why
is it important to view leadership communication as a spiral instead of in a
way that suggests a hierarchy of skills?
9. Who
are some people from history or living today who project a positive or a
negative ethos?
The text points out that the
ethics beneath the perceived ethos should align with the surface perception;
but, of course, we know from history that they may not. However, we would hope leaders (or future
leaders, as are many of our students) look critically at their motivation and
their intentions when writing or speaking and strive to achieve integrity
appropriate for the cultural context in which they are communicating every time
they communicate and interact with others.
Instructions
for CDP
The CDP is
designed to provide students an opportunity to focus on their specific areas of
needed communication improvement and to allow them to create a clear roadmap
for reaching defined personal communication improvement goals. It is the key to students attaining
measurable improvement in their leadership communication ability.
Objectives
This assignment allows you to
accomplish the following objectives:
· Identify
targeted improvement areas in oral or written communication
· Establish
specific approaches to achieving goals in each
· Document
a specific improvement approach
· Demonstrate
commitment to spending time on specific communication skill needs.
CDP Contents
The CDP should contain the following
sections:
1.
Current assessment – Strengths and weaknesses in leadership communication
a.
Go back
to your self-assessment forms provided in LC.
b.
Include
what you need to improve in written, oral, interpersonal, group, and organizational
communication. (If you are very strong
in areas, you may elect to focus only on those needing work, although most
students usually choose to work on oral and written at a minimum.)
c.
Use the
feedback obtained in your CDP meetings on your usage assessment, letter
exercise, and oral presentations.
2.
Communication improvement goals – What you would like to achieve
a.
Be very
specific and make the goals measurable.
For instance, just saying, “improve in oral presentations” is too
broad. Instead, you would want to say,
“Remove 95% of the “uhs” from my presentation,” “always include sub-topics in
introduction and conclusion,” “open up my gestures more so that I look natural
and comfortable,” etc.
b.
Establish
levels from easier to reach to stretch goals.
3.
Actions to achieve goals – Clear and specific activities to reach
each goal
a.
Make
actions specific and measurable.
b.
Include
work from other classes as part of the activities if you wish.
4.
Timetable – Deadlines for reaching your goals
Timetable – Deadlines for reaching your goals
a.
Set
deadlines reasonably spread throughout the semester that will ensure you reach
your overall improvement objectives by the end of this semester.
b.
Be
realistic in what you can accomplish by each deadline you establish.
5.
Measurement – Methods to determine your progress, even on less tangible objectives,
such as improving confidence in presenting.
Format your plan in such a way that it is
clearly logical and easy to follow. You
can use a table format similar to the one illustrated in LC if you wish. If you
decide not to use a table format, keep your format brief and concise and use
headings and bullets to make the content easy to read. Place the date and your name as a footer on
each page.
Submit a hard copy of your plan with the following attachments:
1. Completed Self-Assessment at the end of the
introduction to LC
2. Oral presentation self evaluation
3. Written communication self evaluation
4. Original CDP feedback form
5. Corrected usage assessment
6. Corrected letter assessment.
The following is an example of the improvement areas and actions a
student might submit:
|
Improvement areas
|
Example
actions/activities
|
|
Oral
|
·
Attend Toastmasters meeting
·
Give Toastmasters talk
·
Attend oral comm. workshop
·
Work with speech therapist
·
Speak in a business setting
·
Practice presentation skills using videotape
|
|
Written
|
·
Attend writing workshop
·
Attend grammar/usage workshop
·
Take daily business grammar e-mail quiz
·
Take on-line mid-term usage quiz
·
Edit paper/letter/resume for someone else
·
Rewrite own paper to improve writing, grammar,
or usage
·
Read business writing book(s)
·
Complete exercises in Leadership Communication
|
|
PowerPoint
|
·
Attend PowerPoint workshops
·
Create a PPT presentation for my team
·
Create an individual PPT presentation
|
|
Emotional/cultural literacy
|
·
Complete self-assessment in Leadership Communication
·
Read a book or article on
emotional intelligence
·
Complete on-line or other
personality assessments
·
Read a book or article on
international communication
·
Participated in an
international club or activity
|
