LDR 600 Week 8 Benchmark Professional Development Plan Assignment

LDR 600 Week 8 Benchmark Professional Development Plan Assignment

Leadership as a vocation requires a commitment to professional excellence and integrity, which can be achieved through establishing habits of self-reflection, life-long learning, and professional development. The purpose of this assignment is for you to reflect on where you currently are in your leadership capabilities; define where you want to go; and specify goals, plans, and a timeframe for achieving your professional objectives. Your professional development plan will be composed of three parts: Vision, Goals/Objectives, and Plans.

Vision:

The ability to create, communicate, and compel vision is critical to inspiring and effective leadership. While ultimately many leaders are responsible for developing visions to guide complex organizations, effective leadership begins on a much more personal level—a vision of yourself as a leader. Who are you and who do you want to become in your field or sphere of influence? Once you are clear about that, you can then confidently establish how you will help others and your organization achieve their visions.

Your leadership vision is based on a number of factors including your attitude, values, personal beliefs, guiding principles, and how you behave. It may also be influenced by theoretical, philosophical, or religious frameworks and the leadership traits, values, and behaviors of others. A leadership vision is also dynamic. No great leader ever “arrived.” Those who have adopted leadership as their vocation can spend a lifetime in self-reflection in order to continue to learn and more effectively motivate and inspire others.

Spend some time reflecting below on where you currently are in your leadership capabilities, what you have learned about leadership in the course, and how you want to develop and improve as you continue your leadership studies and move forward in your field. Review the document “Essential Leadership Competencies” for an overview of the scope of effective leadership capabilities.

Reflection:

Vision:

Then, in 300-500 words, briefly articulate your vision for yourself as a leader 3-5 years from now. Where do you want to be? What kind of leader do you want to become?

Goals/Objectives:

After you have stated your vision, create five to eight leadership goals/objectives you will strive to meet in the next 3-5 years. Try to

formulate at least one goal/objective related to the four major leadership competencies included in “Essential Leadership Competencies”: self-leadership, leading others, leading an organization, and leadership as a vocation. Include a brief justification for each goal/objective to explain how it will help you achieve the qualities of professional excellence and integrity required of excellent leaders.

Plan:

Specify activities you will engage in to achieve your goals/objectives. You may find it helpful to research professional development activities in your field or organization to determine what resources are available to you. Be specific about projects you will engage in either as student or as a professional and identify people in your life who can help you achieve your goals. Be sure to include a timeline of events.

Finally, include a method for evaluating your professional development plan at regular intervals. What milestones will you include in your plan to help ensure its success? How will you use methods of self-reflection to assess your progress as you move towards your goals?

Essential Leadership Competencies

Self-Leadership

1. Self-leadership provides an opportunity to achieve your objectives through your own thinking, feelings, and behaviors. Self-reflection is a necessary tool to improve the way you function as a leader. How do you plan to practice methods of self-reflection that contribute to the development of how you lead?

2. Recognition of characteristics of professional excellence plays a key role during interviews and performance evaluations. These characteristics must be visible to colleagues and stakeholders in order for you to benefit from them. Which characteristics of professional excellence do you currently have? Which characteristics of professional excellence do you want to have?

3. Emotional and social intelligence skills translate to communication skills. Leaders who are able to access their emotional center have an advantage over leaders who only rely on intellect. Emotional and social intelligence can be an area of significant personal growth.

4. Continued professional development delivers benefits to individuals, their profession, their community, and possibly the world at large. Most notably, continued professional development keeps you desirable in your current position and attractive to potential employers, if needed.

5. Organizational responses to change in the workplace are the result of individual leaders who are employed within the organization. As a leader, the ability to manage change is essential. How can you demonstrate flexibility and adaptability in response to changing or unknown circumstances?

Leading Others

1. An effective leader has followers and inspires them. This relationship is mutually beneficial. Leaders and followers support each other in order to achieve goals, vision, or objectives. How do you plan to inspire followership through the utilization of leadership and motivation theories?

2. Diversity can be a strength within a team and organization. First, diversity must be recognized and leveraged as a strength. Diversity provides fresh ideas and perspective fora team or organization. How will you analyze people’s strengths in order to leverage diversity to improve performance outcomes?

3. Communication and collaboration are increasingly important in a global and digital environment. Effective communication and collaboration among different stakeholders are prevalent in the workplace to meet business goals. What strategies for effectively leading teams and fostering collaboration among various stakeholders will you apply?

4. A great leader seeks to coach and guide in order to develop leadership qualities in others. Most leaders have had the opportunity to be coached by other great leaders. Coaching others enables people to improve their performance. What are some methods of coaching and providing guidance that help develop leadership qualities in others?

Leading an Organization

1. Analyzing organizational behavior can drive innovative change and encourage organizational growth, including improved outcomes. When new leadership is established, the leader often sets a vision. The leader must evaluate systematic interdependencies among individuals, team, and departments to inform their vision and apply innovation to improve organizational outcomes.

How can you develop and communicate a compelling vision to guide organizational development? How do you plan to analyze organizational behavior to determine systemic interdependencies among individuals, teams, and departments? How do you plan to integrate creativity and innovation to improve organizational outcomes through leadership?

1. New and existing leadership requires the leader and the followers to be of the same mind. How can you foster a climate of learning and development within an organization?

2. Organizational responses to technological advances and economic shifts contribute to change in the workplace. What strategies can be utilized for implementing and managing change within an organization?

Leading as Vocation

1. Numerous historical and recent events provide examples of leaders that did and did not understand they had amoral obligation to lead with kindness, compassion, and justice for the good of followers and the community. The outcomes of these events may directly and indirectly affect you, your peers, the community, and society. What are some guidelines to ensure you lead with moral obligation for the good of followers and the community? How do you intend to lead with kindness, compassion, and justice?

2. Leaders who consider leadership their vocation consider it a service to others and for the common good. How do you intend to implement leadership as a service to others that promotes the common good and contributes to the benefits of communities and society at large?

Important information for writing discussion questions and participation

Welcome to class

Hello class and welcome to the class and I will be your instructor for this course. This is a -week course and requires a lot of time commitment, organization, and a high level of dedication. Please use the class syllabus to guide you through all the assignments required for the course. I have also attached the classroom policies to this announcement to know your expectations for this course. Please review this document carefully and ask me any questions if you do. You could email me at any time or send me a message via the “message” icon in halo if you need to contact me. I check my email regularly, so you should get a response within 24 hours. If you have not heard from me within 24 hours and need to contact me urgently, please send a follow up text to

I strongly encourage that you do not wait until the very last minute to complete your assignments. Your assignments in weeks 4 and 5 require early planning as you would need to present a teaching plan and interview a community health provider. I advise you look at the requirements for these assignments at the beginning of the course and plan accordingly. I have posted the YouTube link that explains all the class assignments in detail. It is required that you watch this 32-minute video as the assignments from week 3 through 5 require that you follow the instructions to the letter to succeed. Failure to complete these assignments according to instructions might lead to a zero. After watching the video, please schedule a one-on-one with me to discuss your topic for your project by the second week of class. Use this link to schedule a 15-minute session. Please, call me at the time of your appointment on my number. Please note that I will NOT call you.

Please, be advised I do NOT accept any assignments by email. If you are having technical issues with uploading an assignment, contact the technical department and inform me of the issue. If you have any issues that would prevent you from getting your assignments to me by the deadline, please inform me to request a possible extension. Note that working fulltime or overtime is no excuse for late assignments. There is a 5%-point deduction for every day your assignment is late. This only applies to approved extensions. Late assignments will not be accepted.

If you think you would be needing accommodations due to any reasons, please contact the appropriate department to request accommodations.

Plagiarism is highly prohibited. Please ensure you are citing your sources correctly using APA 7th edition. All assignments including discussion posts should be formatted in APA with the appropriate spacing, font, margin, and indents. Any papers not well formatted would be returned back to you, hence, I advise you review APA formatting style. I have attached a sample paper in APA format and will also post sample discussion responses in subsequent announcements.

Your initial discussion post should be a minimum of 200 words and response posts should be a minimum of 150 words. Be advised that I grade based on quality and not necessarily the number of words you post. A minimum of TWO references should be used for your initial post. For your response post, you do not need references as personal experiences would count as response posts. If you however cite anything from the literature for your response post, it is required that you cite your reference. You should include a minimum of THREE references for papers in this course. Please note that references should be no more than 5 years old except recommended as a resource for the class. Furthermore, for each discussion board question, you need ONE initial substantive response and TWO substantive responses to either your classmates or your instructor for a total of THREE responses. There are TWO discussion questions each week, hence, you need a total minimum of SIX discussion posts for each week. I usually post a discussion question each week. You could also respond to these as it would count towards your required SIX discussion posts for the week.

I understand this is a lot of information to cover in 5 weeks, however, the Bible says in Philippians 4:13 that we can do all things through Christ that strengthens us. Even in times like this, we are encouraged by God’s word that we have that ability in us to succeed with His strength. I pray that each and every one of you receives strength for this course and life generally as we navigate through this pandemic that is shaking our world today. Relax and enjoy the course!

Hi Class,

Please read through the following information on writing a Discussion question response and participation posts.

Contact me if you have any questions.

Important information on Writing a Discussion Question

• Your response needs to be a minimum of 150 words (not including your list of references)
• There needs to be at least TWO references with ONE being a peer reviewed professional journal article.
• Include in-text citations in your response
• Do not include quotes—instead summarize and paraphrase the information
• Follow APA-7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

Participation –replies to your classmates or instructor

• A minimum of 6 responses per week, on at least 3 days of the week.
• Each response needs at least ONE reference with citations—best if it is a peer reviewed journal article
• Each response needs to be at least 75 words in length (does not include your list of references)
• Responses need to be substantive by bringing information to the discussion or further enhance the discussion. Responses of “I agree” or “great post” does not count for the word count.
• Follow APA 7th edition
• Points will be deducted if the above is not followed

• Remember to use and follow APA-7th edition for all weekly assignments, discussion questions, and participation points.
• Here are some helpful links
• The is a great resource