Going out of town to the place where your older kid lives, doesn't make it easy to follow through. Much less when the hotel is a few blocks from her apartment (conscious coincidence). Am I complaining? No way! She picked me up from my hotel, I asked her if she wanted sushi or steak and I let her choose whichever restaurant she's noticed, but could never afford. I told her to choose well.
Filet Mignon topped with crab meat and accompanied by Arista Pinot Noir. Well, Crystal reminded me that she was driving, so she only got 2 sips over the 3 hour period of our Perry's Steakhouse dinner. Nonetheless, the crisp, dry weather on the patio, next to the pianist made up for it. What a spectacular advantage to having an adult daughter! Crystal is fun. Sheer fun.
The rest of my time was spent with mornings and afternoons in small study sessions where I was evaluated on my leadership skills and given opportunities to reflect as a leader. I was among a group of school Principals, district specialists and instructional coordinators. I was the only one from Houston. It was interesting to learn about other school districts and other leadership styles. What actually shocked me the most was my own personal reaction to the results of my evaluation. There were 5 principle leadership behaviors I was inventoried on. The scale was 1-100, the optimal range being 70 and above. Even though most of my experienced study mates scored between 50-80, all of my scores were above 86. However, it took me about 2 hours to dig my head out of the dirt because of my 86, that particular behavior. What does that say about me? I was so bummed. Thinking I need to be perfect. I was disappointed in myself for that. What's the behavior? Inspiring others to share my vision. The truth is, in general aspects of my life, I am ok with people having their own vision, their own opinions, and even, should I dare say, their own political beliefs. But, apparently, in this leadership academy, I must convince others to think like me, bottom-line. I've been assigned this action now, and need to report my application on our November meeting. Let's see if I can pull this off. Or is an 86 good enough?
About that "ME time", I decided on day #2 and day #3 that it was totally ok. Finally got to try some new wine bars I had heard about. Proved to be great venues for some deep reflection, believe it or not.
By the way, those high leadership scores I got, came from watching others, lead me. I didn't figure out all of this stuff on my own. Even my most recent "bad" leadership models helped shape my approach. Actually, it was having a "bad" leader that encouraged my heart to pursue this. Doing this for all the teachers who have been "misled".
By the way, I scored a 99 on the "Encourage the Heart" behavior :) .
-- Posted from my iPhone
1 comment:
I almost forgot to comment here. I'm so glad I remembered because it doesn't surprise me at all that you scored so well on encouraging the heart! WHAT A GIFT YOU HAVE!!!
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