Final Narrative

Being here at the Marble for quite some time now, I have trained multiple people. Were a tight, close knit group of family here and we like to make everyone feel as though they are a part of this family. Having this attitude about our relationships here at work does transfer to the guests and adds to their experience here. That is the goal from the minute the guests walks up to that menu board until they are walking out the restaurant after eating a full meal. We as hostesses are the initial contact and lasting impression of the guest experience. As Dave our manager always says, we have guests not customers. This is our place and we invite our “guests” to dine here. It sounds cheesy, but having that mind frame and taking pride in what you do really does show whether you believe it or not. Hostessing is viewed as a simple job but its not all about just walking people to a table, its about setting the pace of the restaurant from the servers to the kitchen. You control who sits when and where. But the difference between hostessing downtown and in other restaurant locations is you have to entice the guests to come into our restaurant. In that sense it is extremely important you know what is on the menu, explain the random ingredients like capers and leeks. Most importantly you need to be friendly and present yourself in a welcoming engaging manner. Standing in this outfit really forces you to have self confidence and be proud of what your rocking. I do not know how many times I have been looked up and down and each pair of eyes land on my chest and I hear “nice boots”. Though most people I want to give a disgusted look, I just smile and say “thank you”. Because I am standing in a corset and fishnets people are going to remember me and think about that one place  with the girl in a cool outfit, they will remember I was nice and not a cocky person. So you must always present your best attitude. I do not want to see you not talking to guests when they are out front at the menu board or giving off unwelcoming body language. Personality is valued here as you can see we all show it in different ways from what we say to guests to how we dress. If a guest decides they want something that’s not on our menu recommend them to a place that has it. They appreciate it. I will not always be a around to watch your every move and I don’t want to have to be. Making mistakes is okay, it’s a way to learn. You need to be able to be confident in the reasons why you did something. When I make a decisions I will always explain to the reasoning behind it so you can begin to see type of thought process you need to have. It will be confusing at first but you’ll pick it up! This job requires you to think on your toes and always have a smile on your face. Being a team player is valued here and I want to see you helping out the bussers or runners when you have a free hand. It only adds to the efficiency of the room and respect between you and coworkers. Based on how the night is going, how I teach you will change. I mostly want you to be hands on and doing it yourself to learn but sometimes I will have to step in. Do not see this as me saying you aren’t doing something right but use it as a tool to see how I handle situations and you can take aspects of it to use when you run into the same situation. Here at the marble room we value teamwork, personality, being quick on your feet, ability and confidence. We hired you because we feel you possess those qualities. I am always here to answer any question you have. Ultimately I am here to support you in your training so please find me if you are every unsure of anything. I believe in feedback as a learning tool so you will hear back from me on your progress from time to time. I look forward to building a friendship with you so lets go put on your fabulous corsets and get this place rolling.

Leadership Theory Map

Emotional Intelligence

In my search for other leadership theories, I came across a theory called Emotional Intelligence.  It was created by a man named Daniel Goleman and the goal of his leadership theory was to answer the question what are the elements that characterize a leader? Goleman wanted to understand what made people effective leaders. Besides leader’s intelligence level,  Goleman believed there was something that separated leaders from pure intellectuals. It was their emotional intelligence because he felt that intelligence was not enough to define a leader.  After looking at different leaders and examining their behaviors, intelligence and characteristics, Goleman developed five components to make up is Emotional Intelligence theory. The first component is Self Awareness and it is defined as the ability to understand your personal strengths and weaknesses. Next comes Social Skills, which is how a leader is able to relate to others and build a relationship. Third is Self Regulation, which is the leader’s ability to look at consequences of a decision before reacting to the situation. Leader’s need Motivation, their strong will and drive to succeed. Lastly leader’s must possess Empathy, the capability to understand another person’s point of view. Goleman takes it a step further breaking down his own Emotional Intelligence model into to two areas, Self-Mastery and Social Intelligence.  Self-Mastery takes the areas of self-awareness, self- control and self confidence. These three areas of Self- Mastery enable the drive to improve performance, staying calm under pressure, and have  a positive outlook. Goleman recognizes that the areas of Self-Mastery only look at the individual. Those who can master those specific areas are the ones that will be promoted to leadership positions but with their lack of Social Intelligence these leaders will not fully succeed. They will not be able to build relationship with others around them and be a true leader.

 The Emotional Intelligence concept took on the business world swiftly and became the way to measure leaders. The Harvard Business Review has hailed emotional intelligence as “a ground-breaking, paradigm-shattering idea,” one of the most influential business ideas used.  The Rutgers University-based Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations which led the way in ground breaking scientific work and collaborating with organizations to measure  the levels on Emotional Intelligence of their employees. Today companies worldwide routinely look through the lens of Emotional Intelligence in hiring, promoting, and developing their employees. Consortium for Research on Emotional Intelligence in Organizations continues to produce research, which has offer evidence-based guidelines for organizations seeking to enhance their ability to achieve their business goals or accomplish a mission.

This theory is a way to also self-assess your Emotional Intelligence and see if you encompass those five main concepts. Looking at all of the leadership theories, this one follows my own personal leadership beliefs closely. I feel leadership is an individual act but how well you work with your followers can either make or break a  leader. Trust is a huge part of leadership and it can be built with the recognition of these concepts.

http://danielgoleman.info/topics/emotional-intelligence/

http://danielgoleman.info/2008/02/28/leadership-social-intelligent-is-essential/

http://www.money-zine.com/career-development/leadership-skill/leadership-theories/

Crash

Transformational Leadership

James Mcgregor Burns is creator of Transformational Leadership. He coined the term in 1978 with his book Leadership. With a doctorate in political science from Harvard, Burns specializes in the study of leadership among the American political system. Because of his career focus on biographies, he won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for his biographies, Roosevelt: The Lion and the Fox in 1956 and Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom in 1970. The relationship between power and purpose drives leadership in Burns’ eyes. He shifted away from talking about leaders to talking about leadership. This made people see the topic in more philosophical way. Burns had the idea that leadership was an added action that was separate from management and helped define leaders from great managers.

I chose this video because I feel it fits with what Burns believes about managers and leaders. Coaches can be managers at times but great coaches are those that act as leaders and this specific coach does just that. He inspires on player to keep going which translates to the whole team. The use of power and purpose it displayed perfectly in this video and captures Burns whole concept. 

 

Hot in Cleveland

I love the show Hot in Cleveland, mostly because I am a fan of Betty White. The recent episode had a few demonstrations of leadership that when well with this assignment. It was clear and easy for me to see the examples and types of leadership theories being displayed. The episode I recently watched had the ladies back in their hometown of LA all trying to accomplish different goals like selling a house, tracking down Robert Redford and trying to sabotage an enemy.  

http://www.tvland.com/shows/hot-in-cleveland/full-episodes/i-love-lucci-pt--1

Melanie returns to LA to sell her house because she is divorced and her kids are all grown up. She demonstrates the LMX theory of leadership with the potential buyers of her house. She is trying to convey the importance of everything in the house to this couple to build a trusting relationship with them and show them the positive impact the house would have on their lives. I would say she is in Phase 2- Acquaintance with couple. She is sharing positive experiences of her life and how they can be replayed in theirs.

Elka is the hilarious old lady determined to find Robert Redford with the hopes he will fall in love with her instantly. She utilizes the Path-Goal theory of leadership. Her goal is to get to Robert Redford and she convinces any person she encounters to give up information about his current location. She leads the people into thinking she wants to be friends and cares about their relationship by tricking them with compliments and her dimples.

Victoria is definitely task oriented. She is a has-been movie star trying to restart her career and fame. She was called back to LA to make an appearance on an old TV show with her biggest enemy Susan Lucci. Susan changed the scene last minute so she took the spot light from Victoria and all Victoria is determined to do is mess it up so it has to go back to the original plan. She sabotages Susan so she can't do the scene and tries to convince the producers she is more than capable of doing it alone.

Leaders and Situations

The whole point of this class is to show that there is not one single thing that defines a person as a leader but rather multiple ideas and attributes that manifest to make someone a leader. There are two men who argue that a leader will rise based on the situation they are placed in, Fred Fiedler and Kenneth Blanchard. They have created similar concepts about leadership involving the situation a leader is placed in but have two complete different views.

Fiedler has the Fiedler Contingency Model believing leaders are either task-oriented or relationship-oriented and no in between. He feels people do not change their style and depending on the situation that arises calls for either type of leader. He created a scale called the Least Preferred Coworker to help determine which type of leadership style an individual has based on how high or low he or she rated his or her least preferred coworker. Science and research have proven this to be a none effective way of recognizing a person's leadership views.

An example of Fiedler's Model in my life would be at my ranch when my trainer's new dogs attacked her livestock creating a stressful, chaotic and horrific situation. Myself and everyone present turned to her task-oriented leadership style to know what to do to handle the attack. She grew up on a ranch her whole life and none of us have been in this type of ordeal and had no clue. In conclusion many lives were lost that day but it was the only solution and if she had been relationship oriented I believe a terrible incident like that would have occurred again.

The Blanchard Situational Leadership Model takes a very different spin on this situation/leadership concept. He almost says the opposite of Fiedler. Blanchard thinks based on the situation the leader will change his or her leadership style to accommodate the situation presented. Another factor taken into consideration for the type of leadership displayed would be the ability and willingness of the followers. Depending on them would determine the most effective type of leadership whether it is directing, coaching, supporting or delegating. All of these are based on high to low task and high to low relationship.

I consider myself a more task-oriented leader but I have had situations where I needed to learn to change my style based on the person I was leading. I have done it many times in group projects depending on the level of involvement I have had with group members or in training a new person at my numerous jobs. But one being able to do this really relates back to the training of my horse. She was and still is a stubborn son of a gun and we would butt heads every day. She had a bad attitude and I'd get frustrated and be stubborn right back. I had to learn to understand her lack of ability and willingness to be trained because she was abandoned and trusted no one. I had to switch my leadership style to a coaching style involving direction and support. I ultimately had to be a combination of both task and relationship oriented leader for my horse.