Mcknight's Leadership Style

While watching the interview with Professor Jeanne Enders and Carolyn McKnight, one major thing I learned is that finding one’s leadership purpose can is a harrowing journey into figuring out one’s true self. As McKnight had stated in the video, to be an effective leader one needs to be authentic, but how does one be authentic? Is it from following one’s passion? Is it from doing what feels right to one’s self? I would say yes, but today it seems increasingly hard to follow one’s passion or path that feels right. This may be due to expectations brought on by parents, teachers, peers, societies standards or one’s own culture. Listening to McKnight’s breakdown on the steps that one should take to make themselves a great and effective leader,
They start with the foundation. What consists as a foundation for leadership? Well, one typically look to their parents and teachers and how they help shape and mold the person standing here today. With our parents, we see how they delegate tasks between themselves and our siblings, punish or reward behavior, and their general attitude to stresses that occur. Our teachers shape us into being effective people, besides teaching us our general studies, but teach us how to be motivated to complete tasks, organize and prioritize, and to work in teams with our peers. These people help build a foundation for us because they are the first authoritative figures we come in contact with. This is fantastic if these people you interact with early on are actually caring or themselves had caring people in their lives, but if they don’t and don’t know how to positively teach these foundational skills they can cause irreparable harm. Like with a house, if the foundation isn’t well placed the house will have problems. They can be fixed, but it takes a lot of work.

Keeping with the house building analogy, from the foundation one starts to build the framing of their house. This framework is the aspirations, passions, values, and goals of the person. This framework is a bit more customizable, overtime one may change up the layout of the home. The only thing within that framework that isn’t as moveable are ones views, which are an extension
We change to connect with people we lead and connect with ourselves better overtime. I know, as I’ve furthered my education, I have shifted and changed my own aspirations and goals. As I have narrowed down what I want to do after I have attained my degree my framework has changed to meld goals together, I’ve changed my aspirations and even included more passions to which I have come to find lead me to what I want to do. At first, as I started my degree path, all I wanted was degree that would look great on a résumé, I could get a job that would pay down my student loans, and I allow me to afford to live how I assumed an “adult” should. But, I have found that I don’t really want to work in the field that my degree is for, well, not directly anyways. I have found over the last couple of years that I can mold my educational experiences to be effective in ways outside of the traditional path. I have taken on leadership roles on campus that would not be the typical path for one in my major, but I have found that it gives me a differing view than some of my peers in my major as with my peers at