Life Styles – Leadership and Organizational
Life Styles Inventory – Leadership and Organizational Behavior Professor Carr Nov 5th, 2011 My primary personal thinking styles as shown in my circumplex are: Affiliative, Achievement, and Self-Actualizing. For all 3 of these, I placed in the 90th percentile. My backup style is perfectionist in which I scored at the 69th percentile. Both work and in life, I feel I am strong when it comes to commitment and to making and keeping satisfying relationships. This would explain my high score in the affiliative style.
I would say that I tend to maintain positive relationships with atleast 90-95% of those whom I work with and also those outside of work. Although the description is quite accurate in that teamwork and cooperation are important to me, I feel that there are times that I just need to pull away from people in order to get my work accomplished. In working in the quality assurance and testing department, my high score in achievement hits the mark. I tend to be very high-quality oriented or highly challenging projects/tasks. I don’t take no for an answer and I don’t quit til I find an answer.
I never put a cap of what I can do nor what I can achieve. I am usually very competitive and generally need to be the BEST in everything. One important aspect of the achievement style is that I understand the benefits of giving and asking for honest feedback. Everyone needs an unbiased on their performance a few times a year. Its crucial that we are open to receiving both positive and negative feedback. It is just as important to help others and to provide timely feedback as well. In addition to achievement, perfectionist also makes sense due to my background.
It is extremely important that when I sign off on something as tested and ready for production, there are no mistakes and that I’ve planned for every possible situation and tested it. Inside and outside of work, I feel I am self-sufficient. I realize that everyone has their own level of dependency, whether it be on their manager/team lead or their spouse/partner. I am open to varying styles and personalities. I rarely get stressed or overwhelmed nor do I tend to get derailed when negative situations arise. I completely agree with all the adjectives used to describe a self- actualizing person.
Within the aggressive/defensive styles portion of the circiumplex, I rec’d a high score in perfectionist. . Identify your limiting style: Identify and illustrate one style you think might be working against you to reduce your overall effectiveness. Name the style you have chosen, make a few remarks about why you are choosing this style as limiting your professional effectiveness in organizations. Select one behavior associated with this style that you think you would like to change and the difference it will make. Be sure to support your interpretation with examples, etc.
LSI Style Interpretations: Go to the LSI1 Results page, find your circumplex profile, and click on the circumplex “slice” of one of the styles. The site will bring you to a customized interpretation of the style you clicked on. Click on each of the 12 “slices” to see all of the customized style description pages. What impact do your personal styles have on your management style? Explore and assess the impact of your personal styles on your effectiveness as a manager in terms of the four functions of management: a. Planning; b. Organizing; c. Leading; and d. Controlling. Conclusion
Critically evaluate and explain on how you developed the personal styles that were revealed in your LSI. What role, for example, did family relationships, school, organizational memberships, culture, etc. have in shaping your personal style? Think about your LSI results and your responses to the above questions. Summarize any concluding comments. Close your paper with a statement of at least one question or goal you hope your work in GM591 will help you to address and comment with a few sentences to describe the value of this exercise to your personal and professional development.
Please note: The LSI Self-Development Guide is integrated into the LSI1 Participant account, and is available after you complete the LSI Survey and have access to your results. In-depth and personalized style descriptions can be found by clicking on the style “slices” of the circumplex. For example, if you would like to learn more about the Humanistic-Encouraging style (Style 1), you simply click on the circumplex “slice” for that style. The same goes for the other 11 styles.
You can find the Challenge of Change and the Self-Improvement Plan information by using two of the additional links that become available in you LSI online account after the survey is complete. These links are “The Challenge of Change” and “Your Self-Improvement Plan. ” Good luck with the exercise! A higher Achievement (11 o’clock position) score signals a healthy concern for task accomplishment, and therefore balances well with the more people-oriented characteristics of Affiliative. Having higher scores for both styles represents an effective approach to life, with equal concerns for tasks and people.
Your Perfectionistic (10 o’clock position) score can be affected by your Achievement score. Achievers are successful in part because they are careful to set personal goals that are realistic and attainable. Perfectionists are motivated by a need to produce flawless results in an effort to be “perfect,” and typically set themselves up for failure by establishing unrealistic goals that are impossible to accomplish. [pic]While the perfectionist’s drive is strongly associated with the development of stress symptoms, the achiever is, for the most part, insulated from the damaging effects of stress.
