A Leadership Educator’s Tool: Using the Emotionally Intelligent Leadership Model for Critical Self-Reflection

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Short Description

This roundtable will explore the use of Shankman and Allen’s (2008) emotionally intelligent leadership model as a pedagogical tool for facilitating critical self-reflection during classroom discussions that focus on controversial current events, such as the mercurial U.S. presidential election, and developing and engaging multiperspectivity.

Detailed Abstract

This proposal is centered on the following question: How do we teach self-critical, reflective processes in times of increased turbulence, urgency, and individualism? For leadership courses that deal with cultural, social, historical, and political contexts, multiperspectivity is a central concept and skill that is critical for the development of self-critical and reflective processes. Courses that examine the aforementioned contexts may be embedded within a postmodern framework, and thus, require learners to be able to engage opposing viewpoints as a way to understand and practice course concepts in preparation for personal, professional, or communal leadership action. An intriguing element of such courses is the use of current events to allow learners to identify and work through multiple perspectives. When using current events to discuss and explore leadership concepts, there can be a missed opportunity to create and nurture a space where learners are guided through understanding how personal leadership philosophies and perspectives are heavily influenced by worldviews. For the leadership educator, the task is to guide learners to become comfortable with perspectives that interrogate or challenge one’s worldview.

Leadership courses do not happen in a vacuum. Classroom discussions about leadership trends, issues, challenges, and possibilities are heavily influenced by local and global events. A mercurial event such as the recent United States presidential election has brought social, cultural, and political issues into the classroom, creating an opportunity for leadership educators and learners to discuss the challenges and rewards of leadership while engaging multiple viewpoints. Rather than steering clear of controversial current events that illicit personal reactions, there is an opportunity for leadership educators to leverage these moments to guide students to learn how to critically reflect on their responses, worldviews, and sense making processes in order to respond to leadership opportunities.

Shankman and Allen’s (2008) emotionally intelligent leadership model provides an adaptable framework that can be used as a teaching tool to facilitate engaging and reflecting on multiperspectivity. The model presents three critical elements (conscious of self, other, and context) as tools to develop multiperspectivity before action. The emphasis on self, other, and context challenges individuals to meaningfully pivot from each lens to attempt to fully understand and appreciate the complexity of leadership situations. This ability to engage different perspectives is crucial for developing a leadership practice that is sensitive and responsive to complex people, places, things, and events. Developed for student development, this leadership model can be used as a teaching tool to facilitate conversations and discussions that can cultivate a practice of critical self-reflection in preparation for leadership action. Weaving consciousness of self, other, and context in class discussions in leadership courses is a useful way to help learners tackle difficult topics in a way that promotes learning and self reflection so that they can respond rather than react to leadership challenges.

Participants in this roundtable discussion will examine the following questions:

1. What role do controversial current events play in the leadership classroom?
2. How can leadership educators leverage controversial current events to help students think about self, other, and context?
3. How can leadership studies educators use the emotionally intelligent leadership model to prepare learners to decipher and respond to leadership opportunities and challenges?
4. In what ways can the emotionally intelligent leadership model transform both the learner and the educator in responding to leadership challenges in and out of the classroom?

Participant

• Nyasha M. GuramatunhuCooper, Kennesaw State University