MM Leadership Final Integrative Paper by Leader Justin Quilon

FINAL INTEGRATIVE PAPER

MM Leadership

Written by: Justin Quilon

I. INTRODUCTION

This Final Integrative Paper is very timely as I am already in my 30's and this made me think deeply what I want to do with my life. 

Our leadership class happened so fast. There's a lot to process and think of. There is a lot to reflect on. There were insights coming from various sources the blog, readings, Prof. Jorge, fellow leaders, activities, and a whole lot more. If we were treasure hunters, Ateneo just gave us a huge treasure chest to start with. The value of each person's insight, story, reflection and opinion is priceless because you are not always placed in a room with different leaders from all sorts of industries to discuss leadership topics.

The AGSB MM Leader Course has thought me a lot about leadership. A topic which I thought I already knew a lot about. This paper will showcase what I have learned from the course and will also serve as my personal STRAMA paper. 

At this point, I am very thankful to Prof Jorge and my classmates. It was a memorable and very impact full class filled will life lessons. Since, this is my first class I am glad I took it early because now I have friends whom I shared personal life stories with.

Let me start by sharing my learning agreement objectives which was achieved though out the course.

Learning Agreement Objectives:

1. To know myself further through reflections and activities  

2. To get to know my peers and learn from them, their life stories and their personal experiences

3. To be mentored and guided by our professor in knowing more about leadership

4. To understand and learn how we could be leaders in helping our country since we are already in a situation, may it bring out the situational leader in us

5. To get a grade that I deserve based on my participation and my contribution to the class

Prof Jorge always emphasized the importance of being an AUTHENTIC LEADER.

Let me quote Prof Jorge when he told us that "Being a leader is not just in what you say, not just in what you do, but in who you are".

I love helping others, may this paper serve as a guide for others who will be taking the Leadership course or even others who want to learn more about leadership.

II. Lessons from Leadership Sessions, Books, Blog Articles, Reports and Class Activities.

May this section be my leadership cook book that I can go back to when I need leadership wisdom and insights. Here are some of the topics and concepts that we discussed during the course.

Let me start with the Activities that we had.

Leadership Debate (Leaders are BORN, MADE or SITUATIONAL)

We were divided into 3 groups and debate whether a leader is born, made or situational. This was very interesting because all were true. All groups where able to present their sides. I was very lucky to be in the group representing leaders are situational. Deep in my heart and based from experience I am a situational leader. It is when a leader becomes a leader because of the events that happened in his life that he needs to eventually emerge as a leader; while the leader that was "made" is due to the process that they have gone through to become the leader. The group who won was the group who represented that leaders are born. We are all leaders or potential to be leaders as soon as we were born. 

Prof Jorge shared with us that the activities that we will be doing for this class will explain this concepts better. He also told us that all three are right. For leaders are born we can verify this through our enneagram and genogram. For leaders are made, we can verify this through our reflections and readings. For leaders are situational, we can verify this through our Defining moments which we will be doing in our Reflection number 1.

This activity was a great activity to start with as it opened our eyes to the concept that leaders are indeed BORN, MADE, and SITUATIONAL.

Bad Boss Plan a Crime

In this activity, the class was split into groups. Each group will plan a crime and present that crime in class. The groups presented the smuggling of jewels with a twist wherein the least expected person is the mastermind in the end, another group presented corruption in winning the bid for a project (I think this is really happening in real life), one (1) group presented putting up a cult to earn lots of followers and earn money from their followers. Our team presented a crime of murder of a CEO of a competitor company and the highlight was burning of his bones for a clean escape. 

This was another fun activity. Thanks to Prof Jorge for this. What I learned from our group is this. One (1) of our team members is fast in thinking of a concept and quick to deliver what he promised. He (Leader Richard) was able to send us a PowerPoint presentation of the crime in just 30 minutes. That for me is something; he is a true leader of ACTION. We are blessed to have him in our Team. Another member of our team showed leadership by improving the quality of our presentation (Leader Erika). We are so lucky to have another leader who is great in acting and fun-filled which made a presentation alive (Leader Gab). My role was the narrator, though I am an introvert, I just did my best to make the most out of our presentation to make it lively and fun. I became the voice of our presentation. All in all it was fun and the leaders came to life with this activity.

Prado Farms Team Building 

The team building was well thought of. Congratulations to the team building committee members for a job well done. We had three (3) games which for me were memorable.

Marshmallow Tower Game

The first game was the marshmallow tower building game. I learned two lessons from this game. First, spend some time to plan and make a strategy. The planning stage is very important because after the first 10 minutes the restriction would be no one can speak anymore, so we have to make the most of the first 10 minutes in planning what each of us will be doing and how we will be able to execute our plan. the next lesson I learned was rules are rules. The whole team learned this the hard way. As even though our tower was solid as a rock and the other team's tower melted after 30 seconds they still won the game. This is because the rule was the building should be able to stand for 30 seconds after the time runs out. We have to accept this rule the hard way. It was a tough lost for our team but we were able to accept it.

Takeshi's Water Gun Challenge

The second game was like the Takeshi's water gun challenge. The objective was to hit the tissue on top of the opponent's head until there's a hole in the tissue. In this game, we tried to use our strength which is our speed but unfortunately we lost because 1 of my teammate's tissue was punctured and my headband fell and got punctured as well by an opponent.  The main lesson in this game as mentioned by Prof Jorge is that it is not cheating when you tilt your head backwards so that the tissue won't get hit. It is called strategy since it was not stated in the rules. In life, we have to think outside the box to come up with the best strategy to solve a problem. Brilliant leaders think of strategies especially when they are in war and have to think quickly. We are in a fast paced world we have to be innovative and always be ready to make changes for us to catch up or be ahead of the pact. 

Coin Collection Game

This game was different. It is not your typical game. In this game we have to talk to each person in Prado Farm and know them, make them laugh and ask for the coin. For an introvert like me this is challenging. This game showed us the Leaders we could go to when it comes to reaching out to people. We are blessed to have Leader Gab and Leader Con in our team. Their talent shine in this game. It shined brightly that the other team did not even had a chance to collect even half of what we have. In this game, I saw the strength of our team mate and the never say die attitude. Even though we are losing by a big margin, our team mates still pushed through and did their best, used their talent to win this game. In this game, we won by a very big margin. In life, we have to remember that as long as we are alive we should "Never Give Up".

CALL TO ARMS Speech

This was an activity where each Leader has to present their advocacy. This is another memorable activity as we showcased what we are for and how can we influence others to be involved and engaged with our advocacy. I presented the 3 Pillars of a MISSION. The three pillars are as follows:

1st Pillar - Service

Not just any kind of service, it should be joyful service. We are not just complying but we are committing to serve happily.

2nd Pillar - Sacrifice

When you are sacrificing, there should be something valuable to you that is given and not just the left overs. When you sacrifice you should be able to feel the pain. We sacrificed our time, talent and treasure.

Time - We went home very late and did not file for over time.

Talent - We gave our creative ideas, and used our skills in decorating the place to make sure that the kids will have fun 

Treasure - Each of us shared money from our own pockets to buy the things that we need

3rd Pillar - Selfless love

It is always better to give than to receive. We have to give fully and selflessly when we are in a mission.

It is in giving ourselves that we receive the most.

John 17:18

"As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world."

HEROIC LEADERSHIP

Let's move on to the Leadership Book "HEROIC LEADERSHIP by Chris Lowney". The book was a tough read because it is filled with leadership concepts.

We focused on the 4 Pillars of Heroic Leadership. They are the secrets of Jesuit leadership. These core principles were discussed all throughout the sessions. The book discussed the Ignatian way of leadership which is not a set of rules but rather an integrated way of living. 

4 Pillars of Leadership:

Self-awareness - it is in understanding one's self, strengths, weakness, values, and influences. Before we lead others, we should first know ourselves. Self-awareness is a continuous process.  It is continuously discovering one's self and changing as well. 

"Leaders thrive by understanding who they are and what they value, by becoming aware of unhealthy blind spots or weaknesses that can derail them, and by cultivating the habit of continuous self-reflection and learning."

Ingenuity - constantly innovating and adapting to new ideas and change. It is also being ready to respond to new opportunities presented to us. 

"Leaders make themselves and others comfortable in a changing world. They eagerly explore new ideas, approaches, and cultures rather than shrink defensively from what lurks around life's next corner. Anchored by nonnegotiable principles and values, they cultivate the "indifference" that allows them to adapt confidently."

Love - respect, value, and genuinely care for other people's well-being. It is best to lead with love than with fear. it is empowering others and engaging them to commit to the vision and make it a reality.

"Leaders face the world with a confident, healthy sense of themselves as endowed with talent, dignity, and the potential to lead. They find exactly these same attributes in others and passionately commit to honoring and unlocking the potential they find in themselves and in others. They create environments bound and energized by loyalty, affection, and mutual support."

Heroism - it is aiming high. I always hear the word "magis" from Prof Jorge. It is a Latin word that means "more" or "better".  It is in moving and making things happen that leaders are heroic. It is in doing ordinary tasks with great love that. Leaders don't wait but make the most of the opportunities handed to them.

"Leaders imagine an inspiring future and strive to shape it rather than passively watching the future happen around them. Heroes extract gold from the opportunities at hand rather than waiting for golden opportunities to be handed to them."

All the pillars are for the Greater Glory of God. The book helped us to discover ourselves through self-awareness, do things with love, be ready to adapt to change and have passion to always give it our best to achieve "magis" results.

Reflection Papers

Reflection Paper 1 - Defining Moments

All of us have defining moments in our lives. As my mentor has shared with me "Experience is the good teacher but Reflected Experience is the best teacher". For the Situational Leader, these defining moments helps him grow in his leadership. This Reflection Paper helped me remember the things that I have done in past that has made me a stronger and more resilient person. The past decisions that I have chosen defined my current state in life. My defining moments were a series of lessons put together to help me understand my purpose in life and my direction. I thank God for giving me these experiences which I will remember all my life. 

Reflection Paper 2 - External (Family, Environment, School, Work) & Internal  (Values, Strengths and Weakness) Influences

Our second reflection paper, helped my understand myself better. It also deepened my understanding about myself by making me aware of the environmental factors that influenced me. I learned that the environment where I am in significantly affects me. I also learned that i should be more in control of myself regardless of the environment where I am in.

This reflection paper also opened my eyes on the things that I am good at. It also made me realize that I have weaknesses that I focus on instead of just improving my strengths. I learned that I have weaknesses that I am still struggling to improve until now. I enjoyed this reflection paper because it made me understand myself deeper. It made me understand the decisions I made in my defining moments. 

Reflection Paper 3 - My Passion

I was very happy in writing this reflection paper. I always ask myself this question, "What is my passion?".  In this reflection paper, I shared three (3) passions.

Love of Sharing and Teaching - Based from my genogram and my experience when I was an instructor in Don Bosco, I felt happy and fulfilled when I was teaching students and sharing my experience. This I'll never get tired of doing. 

Live a Life of Learning - "Learning never stops", I am an eternal student.

Leave a Legacy by Building Leaders - I have an acronym for myself. I. E. M. ( Inspire Educate and M otivate) I know that I will be doing this all my life. 

Here's what I realized while doing this reflection. I realized that what I love to do evolved and became clearer as I get older. Even if my first dream "to be a priest" did not happen. It just evolved into something else but still aligned with Teaching, Sharing and Helping Others.  

Joseph Campbell "A Hero's Journey"

Joseph Campbell, an American mythological researcher, wrote a famous book entitled The Hero with a Thousand Faces. In his lifelong research Campbell discovered many common patterns running through hero myths and stories from around the world. Years of research lead Campbell to discover several basic stages that almost every hero-quest goes through (no matter what culture the myth is a part of). He calls this common structure "the monomyth."

In this activity, our task was to analyze a movie and relate it to our own life story. We are all heroes in this world. Just like a hero we encounter a lot of challenges. In life we never fail, we only learn from our past mistakes and become a better version of ourselves. Just like in movies, we are in a journey. We have mentors which can be our friends and family members who will be helping us overcome the challenges. Once we overcome these challenges, we return and get our rewards just like in the movies.

I chose the movie "The Big Fish". It was a story of a story teller. It was very interesting because the protagonist made a choice to make his every experience exciting. He made a choice to use his imagination and see things differently. He put color in moments which was boring.

We are the director of our life. Our whole life is movie, it is up to us to choose the ending we want. 

ENNEAGRAM

Enneagram is a nine-sided figure used in a particular system of analysis to represent the spectrum of possible personality types. 

This test helped me understand myself further. In my test, I am a type 3 which is an achiever. I agree with the test result and the description of a type three truly describes me. The lesson I learned from this exercise is this. Even though a type 3 is focused on success, I still find myself not that fulfilled unless I use my success in helping others. Even if I win or become successful, it will not be as fruitful if I step on others, or take advantage of others just to reach my goal. It is not all about success. It is more about sharing and being sensitive to other's needs.

Here are some of my strengths and weaknesses which I became aware of after taking the Enneagram test:

Strengths:

• Hard working, competitive and are highly focused in the pursuit of their goals.
• know how to present themselves, practical, and driven
• good networkers who know how to rise through the ranks

Weaknesses:

• afraid of being or becoming "losers"
• sometimes find intimacy difficult
• difficult to really know

"Success is best experienced when shared "

GENOGRAM

Sometimes I ask myself, how come I was able to accomplish a certain task easily. Where did I get my love for teaching? Why am I looking forward to be an entrepreneur? I discovered the answer to these questions in my Genogram. I am now aware that in my family tree I have relatives who are teachers and entrepreneurs. This was a revelation for me. I also discovered that I have characteristics from my grandparents and uncles. 

My Genogram showed that we have teachers in both my mother and father side of the family. It is also surprising to see that my aunt and uncle from my mother side are entrepreneurs. They have a passion to serve and help other people through their business. My grandparents in both my mother and father side were also entrepreneurs. 

I am a combination of both teacher and entrepreneur. I know and I feel that I am gearing towards this direction. This time I understand where this passion is coming from. Thanks to Prof Jorge for making us create our Genogram.

AVP

My AVP is a reminder of what I have gone through. Though it may seem that it was just pictures and simple text, I really felt something deep inside my heart whenever I watch it. It is an unfinished story. It showed my past, present, and future. It also showed my turning point and inspiration. I am now at a significant stage of my life. I am excited to face the future ahead of me. I also included my dream board in my AVP to keep me focus on my priorities. 

My AVP has One (1) message which is to FLY. Flying for me means that I should ACT. We all have brilliant ideas and amazing dreams but if we don't ACT on it, it will remain just an idea or a dream. Of course, we want to live our dream. We want our ideas to be implemented. My AVP captured my ACT by showing a picture of me jumping the Macau tower. Though I am afraid or better yet terrified of heights, I still pushed through and conquered my fear by bungee jumping the highest commercial tower in the world. I am very proud of this ACT as it motivates me to achieve more and accomplish more.

By the way, all throughout the jump I was praying. It was my way of thanking God for the life He has given me. It is my way of showing God my FAITH in HIM.  

TRIAD of LEADERSHIP

Leaders must have these three (3) components: 

Purpose - VISION, MISSION, PASSION

Competence - SKILL, STRATEGY, MOTIVATION

Character - ETHICS, DISCIPLINE, INTEGRITY

In the middle of these three (3) components is having an Authentic Self though reflection, self-awareness, and spiritual experience

Emotional Intelligence - Daniel Goldman

Emotional Intelligence (E.I.) - maturity

                                         - to improve my E.I. I need to sincere desire and concentrated effort

5 Components:

1. Self-Awareness - ability to recognize your moods, emotions, drives

                           - self-assessment

2. Self-Regulation - ability to suspend judgment

                           - to think before acting

                           - don't panic

                           - adaptable to change

                           - integrity

3. Motivation - a passion to work for reasons beyond money and status

                   - drive to achieve

                   - optimism to organizational commitment

4. Empathy - ability to understand other people's emotional make up

                 - sensitivity to other's feelings

5. Social Skills - ability to manage and build relationships and networks

                     - effectiveness

Here's my key take away, to succeed in life we should not only depend on IQ (intelligence quotient) we should also focus on developing our EQ (emotional quotient). Most of the time EQ can make you succeed faster.

What makes an Effective Executive - Peter Drucker

1. Ask what needs to be done

2. Ask what does the enterprise needs

3. Develop action plans

4. Take responsibility for the decisions

5. Take responsibility for the communication

6. Focus on the opportunities, not problems

7. Run productive meetings

8. Think and say we not I

Peter Drucker is one of my favorite authors. In this article, he shared a structured approach to become an effective executive which I agree. This eight (8) guidelines is easy to remember and simple to understand. I am using this same method in directing my team.

What Leaders Really Do - JP Kotter

Managers bring order & consistency - cope with complexity

Leadership copes with change

Management:

planning and budgeting

organizing and staffing

control and solves problems

Leadership:

setting direction

aligning people

provides motivation

As the author JP Kotter explained, what leaders really do is prepare organizations for change and help them cope as they struggle through it. 

Managers and Leaders work hand in hand, and you should be both or you should have both.

JP Kotter, another brilliant author that I admire, shed light in the difference of being a manager and a leader. The AHA came when he explained that we should be both. Based from my experience you really need to do both really well in order for your organization to succeed. If you lack Management or Leadership just make sure that you have a team member whom you can tap on when you need Leadership or Management skills.

The Work of Leadership

by Ronald Heifetz and Donald Laurie

"Followers want comfort, stability, & solutions from their leaders"

"Real Leaders ask hard questions and know people out of their comfort zones. They manage the resulting distress"                                      

Adaptive challenges - systemic problems with no easy answers

                             - solving them requires involvement of other people in your organization

Technical challenges - know solutions and processes to address the issue

Perils of Adaptive Change

Going beyond your authority at the heart of Danger is loss

* To change the way people see and do things is to challenge how they define themselves

1. Marginalization - you are special

- Top-down leadership institutions

- The leaders should keep their hands free since the handle a lot of constituents

2. Diversion - divert people, make people lose focus

- Promotion, new-glamorous responsibilities

3. Attack - attacking you directly is another tried and true method of neutralizing your message

- Verbal attack

- Attacks make take the form of misinterpretation

4. Seduction - you lose your sense of purpose

- desire to for the approval of your own faction, your own supporters

- The toughest part of the job is managing their disappointed expectations

Leadership then requires not only reverence for pains of change & recognition & manifestations of danger but also the skill to respond

We have two approaches in handling issues and there are times that we cannot solve issues via providing a technical or routine solution. There are times that we need to be adaptive and embrace change. We should learn to embrace new ways of doing things, new values and new relationships.

SSS: Summary of Significant Sessions of our Leadership Class:

Session 1:

In our first session, we introduced ourselves. I discovered that most of us are professionals still working in a company and are looking forward to improve ourselves and our leadership.

Prof Jorge emphasized that we need the "kapal ng muka" in being a leader.

We had a quick intro of the subject which was focused on discovering ourself.

Prof Jorge also introduced to us a diagram which has the following:

Goal (Vision)

Influence

People

In the middle, we have Self-Awareness gearing towards helping Others.  

We also had a debate which I already discussed in the earlier in this FIP.

Session 2:

In session two (2), we started the class with the song "Sayo Lamang". We always start the class with a song. This was something new for me. The songs chosen are tagalog and it makes it more dramatic and heartfelt when we listen to them. The song will be the start of our discussion as we share our reflection and insights.

Two Leaders (Mel and Richard) shared their leadership journey. From their sharing, I learned that in order to succeed we really, really, really need to get out of our comfort zone. We have to take chances. Learning never stops if we really want to get up the corporate ladder. I also learned that we need to look for mentors to guide us , take note on "to guide us" because we still have our authentic self to consider and mix with our mentor's guidance. 

Session 3:

We discussed being an Adaptive Leader. We discussed the Dangers of Leadership. We also had a discussion on the following topics:

What would you do as a leader?

a. same sex marriage

b. traffic

c. BBL

d. Air Pollution

e. If the world would end on September 28

These discussions made me read the newspaper the next day. As a leader, I need to get involved if not at least be aware of the issues of our country. Also as a leader, I need to take a stand and express my opinion even though other will not agree with me or even though I don't agree with other people's opinion.

In this session, Prof Jorge shared the acronym ABE which stands for always be explaining

We were also introduced to our group work which is to plan a crime. The learnings in this were explained earlier in this FIP.

Session 4:

In this session, Our Intro song was "Heal the world".

The song reminded us that in our world which is full of fear, we could heal it through love. 

We should be the God's glow and help make the world shine again.

As leaders we should make our world a better place. 

We reviewed the Triad of Leadership:

purpose - vision > business success > Job creation

character - integrity > goodness, empathy, compassion, ethical, punctual

ability - skills, HR, Finance, Marketing

We had the reports (HBR articles) which I already explained in the earlier in this FIP.

We performed the Group Work (Plan a crime activity)

We also discussed the 4 Pillars of Heroic Leadership, EQ by Daniel Goldman, leadership from within, dangers of leadership, Transcendental Leadership, magis and introduction to Enneagram.

Session 5:

We had the Special Reports, articles explained and shared by Leaders of the class. 

One of the Leader's shared her Marathon Journey which she used as an example to explain the article.

I learned the following lessons:

Marathon is a Commitment to yourself

It's a mind game if you can endure a marathon you can endure anything

Stop pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was

And rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life

There was also an article about the speech of Steve Jobs which consists of two stories:

1st Story - Connecting the Dots

• Adoptive parents
• Dropped uninteresting subjects and dropped in interesting ones
• Slept on the floors in friends' rooms; returned coke bottles for $.05
• PCs might not have the wonderful typography that they do, if he had not dropped in calligraphy class.
• Connect the dots(looking backward)

"Trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever."

2nd Story - Love and Loss

• Found what he love to do early in life
• Started apple in garage at age 20 with Steve Wozniak
• Released the Mac at age 30
• From 2 employees to $billion with 4000 employees;
• Got fired a year after
• What had been the focus of his life was gone, and it was so devastating.
• Decided to start over
• Joined Next
• Got married
• Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith.
• You've got to find what you love

"If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it."

3rd Story - Death

• Live as if it were your last
• Focus on what matters most
• Death is Life's change agent
• Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life

"Stay Hungry and Stay Foolish"

Another leader explained the Tipping Point of Leadership

What is a tipping point?
tip·ping point
noun

the point at which a series of small changes or incidents becomes significant enough to cause a larger, more important change.

In his report, he answered the question "Can you work under limited resources? "

The answer is a resounding YES.

We just have to get through the different hurdles just like what Bill Bratton did.

Cognitive Hurdle - made the police experience what is happening themselves

Cognitive - strategic mind set

Let the other leader what is really happening to influence them

Assess the Culture -> Change the Culture

- face to face to with the problem

- ride subway to work

- small patrol cars

- power of communications

Resource Hurdle

- Concentrate Resources

- Use data Properly

- Relocate Resources

Financial

Customers - Sales & Marketing

Internal - Operations

Learning and Growth - HR

Motivation Hurdle

- reform Incentives

- key influencer

- accountability

- compare data

- performance expectation

- framing - NLP (Mind-setting)

Polictical Hurdle

- young and idealistic

- importance of politics

- powerful negative key people

- look for the key influencer

- silence them by example and facts

- data and stats

- look for shortcuts

- Rudy Giulliani

- Powerful slogan

"Share the credit"

Session 7:

Our Intro Song was the "Man in the Mirror". It's speaks about self-awareness. If you want to make changes then make the changes yourself. Start the change with yourself, the Man in the Mirror.

We discussed about Bong Osorio about the article in Philippine start on "Commonness" - 100) presidential candidates

We reviewed the Triad of Leadership.

We also discussed about how our campaign strategy if we want to run for presidency.

Here are some strategies:

Represent 1 important advocacy

Basic Needs (Class C, D, E)

Use Class A and B to get connections and funds for the campaign

Introduce yourself

Whistle stopping campaign - passion and purpose

3 years - 5 years before - "mamundok" / go to the province / eat sardines and be with the people

Session 10:

We had a discussion on Servant Leadership. Be Servant First then choice brings one to aspire to lead (Serve First Lead Later)

10 Principles (Concern for others):

1. Listening - listen and be receptive to what is being said. Body, mind and spirit are communicating - inner voice
2. Empathy - understand then empathize with others
3. Healing - healing one's self and others - compassion
4. Awareness - knowing one's self, being secured with one's self, one's you know yourself, you will know how to serve others
5. Persuasion - rather than pure positional authority, leaders convince others rather than coerce compliance
6. Conceptualization - dream great dreams, look at the bigger picture
7. Foresight - vision and innovation, learn from the past (Foresight = Forecast + Insight)
8. Stewardship - you own nothing, but you control everything, you are accountable for the outcomes
9. Commitment to Growth of people - personal, professional, spiritual growth of each and every individual within the organization
10. Build Community - seek to identify a means of building community to shape human lives

"A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves."

 - Lao Tzu

4 Points for Moral Leadership:

- Set noble goals

- Take active steps

- Pay a price yourself

- Ask others to pay a price as well

Session 11:

We had our call to Arms speech in which we were able to share our advocacies. There were common topics in our speeches. We want to be better in terms of our health. We want to inspire others to be their best selves. We want to give back to other people who need our help. We want to influence others to act in helping our country become better. 

Session 12:

This is our Team Building event were we showcased our leadership. We did get to know ourselves and other leaders better through this event. The details of our team building are explained earlier in this FIP.

Session 13:

Our last session was the showing of our AVPs and our class Christmas Dinner. It was a fun session as we were able to get to know each other better through our AVPs. We were able to share our stories, our families, our passion and advocacies to the class. We learned a lot from each other through the explanations given by each leader before playing their AVP. 

We capped the session with by having dinner and having a short early Christmas celebration while sharing stories and getting to know each other better. 

BONUS LESSONS from our very own MM LEADERS and Prof Jorge:

Great leaders give - Leader Maye and Leader Alex are givers. Leader Maye in session two (2) gave out snacks to the class. She also gave her best by being the best host during our Team Building. Leader Alex also gave us ice cream in our second session. He also handed out chocolates in class and during the team building. 

Great leaders share - Leader May is relentless in sharing her passion in running and also generous in sharing her running tips.

Great leaders showcase their talents/strengths - Leader Gab showcased his talent during the last team building game. He has a never say die attitude and shined bright like a diamond in the last game as he made Prado farms employees happy while collecting their tokens.

Great leaders are determined - the story of Leader Mel and Leader Anna who both worked abroad and are now working back in their native land proved their determination to be succeed.

Great leaders are prepared - Leader Con and Leader Rachel are both always ready to answer Prof Jorge's questions during our class discussions. It is a great effort to keep up during class discussions but these two are always ready and are always put to the test and succeed in answer Prof Jorge's questions.

Great leaders are inspiring - Leader Richard who shared with us that he is handling 500+ employees under his belt is truly inspiring. Leader Jermits, our class President who showed us accountability, responsibility, and leadership in handling class activities, events, and announcements, is also inspiring.

Great leaders are willing to face the challenge - Leader Erika, who took the challenge to go back to school and take her MBA for the benefit of their family, is willing to sacrifice and get out of her comfort zone for the sake of her family.

Great leaders are born leaders - Leader Leigh's Genogram, shows she that her leadership qualities came from her family.

Great leaders offer their life for others - Prof Jorge, a seasoned Leader is helping other leaders know themselves more and go deeper in understanding their life as he offer his time, talent and treasure to guide other leaders in their journey.

III. CONCLUSION

The Leadership class has been successful in opening our mind and our hearts to the Ignatian "Heroic" Leadership. Being authentic is very important if you want to be a successful leader. For me, this class has been a personal retreat wherein we need to reflect on our past, understand our roots and go deeper connecting the dots of the events that happened all throughout our life.

With that in mind, I would like to answer the question "where am I now?" with the failures I have made.

So far I have failed several relationships the magic number for me is 3.

I have failed in two businesses.

I have failed in a lot of job interviews.

I have to end it here because I might not have enough time if I write everything down in this paper and Prof Jorge might not be able to post my FIP.

With the relationship part, I learned my lessons in each relationship that ended. I became better and better in until I met my wife and we got married. Now I am leading my family. And as Prof Jorge always tells us, we need to continuously improve ourselves. We need to Re-invent ourselves as we get wiser and older. 

With the two business failures, I am still in the process of getting better at this. The lessons that I learned through these failures are priceless. This is the reason why I am taking up my MBA. My purpose for studying is to get better as an entrepreneur. I would like to build businesses that would help and serve a lot of people. I would like to be a part of nation building.

After several weeks of the Leadership class, I learned more about myself. I now understand where my strengths and weaknesses came from. I also learned that change is constant in every stage of my life. In all of my defining moments, change is always present. May it be change in mindset, change in perspective, or change in strategy; sometimes I even change my priorities and plans in life. When it comes to planning Prof Jorge taught us to have a daily EXAMEN and Planning early in the morning. This activity should be done first thing in the morning to help us and guide us as we go through the days of our lives. Every day we need to make changes big or small to get closer to our goals. 

Here is where I am now. I am married and focused in being the best husband and head of the family. I am currently working in an International Company leading a team who is ready to make great change to culture of the company and mindset of the employees. I am a dependable son to my mother and best role model to my siblings.  

My purpose is to use my passion for learning to be able share and inspire others to be God centered in serving each other and to be truly rich in all four areas of life: health, relationships, financially and spiritually.

My core values are as follows:

1. Passionate
2. Disciplined
3. God-centered
4. Loving
5. Helpful
6. Influential 

Here's an acronym of what I love to do: I.E.M. - Inspire, Educate, Motivate

My objectives are based from my reflection 3 and my current Dreamboard as shown in my AVP:

Reflection: 3 My Passion

Live a Life of Learning - I'll be committed to finishing my MBA. Also if God permits, I'll be learning from the next businesses that I will build while finishing my MBA.

Love of Sharing and Teaching - I'll be sharing my learning to my team, friends, and family. I'll also take part and volunteer as a speaker/teacher in various organizations.

Leave a Legacy by Building Leaders - I'll be starting with the members of my family and my team. I'll do my best to be a good role model to them and at the same time help them become better leaders.

My Dreamboard:

A happy family - I will be the best Leader, Lover, Provider and Protector of my family

Career and business that would serve others -  I'll be focused in serving my team making sure that they get the best benefits and they learn a lot and grow while they are still in our team. As for the business part, I'll be keen in selecting a business that I am passionate about and also in choosing the right partners and mentors.

A healthy mind, body, and spirit - I'll start of by training for my first 21k Run this coming February 2016.

At this point, I am sure that even though I am still a work in progress I can already say that I am ready. This class has made me a better leader. I'll be bringing with me the lessons I learned from my fellow leaders and most specially from Prof Jorge. 

Again, I thank Prof Jorge and my fellow Leaders for making this leadership journey fruitful and memorable. I am sure that all of us will be better authentic leaders. I also thank God for the opportunity to cross paths with everyone in this class. Let us all remember that everything that we do is for the greater glory of GOD.

If I were to summarize everything in 5 words, it would be:

"Embrace Change and Be Authentic"

  < great! having your own Leadership Mantra>