I’m listening to a Radio 4 programme on Leadership, which has some interesting input from various people. It’s quite frightening to hear, though, the trainer from the ‘London Management Centre’ on his belief on what a good leader is and how easily all the skills that go to make up a leader can be modelled (in a day?). Hmm. I detect some NLP there. On the other hand, I came across a new book on the Psychology of Leadership at Blackwell’s in Oxford a few days ago, and the authors have taken a different tack, from a Social Identity Theory perspective, and this seems to me to be a more valuable approach. One to get.
Back to the task…
There is something about a PhD (well, my PhD) that leaves a person with a nagging sensation that they are not getting on with it. This is not just the ability to find an almost endless supply of distraction activities (which, if you are a part-time PhD candidate, will include the day job!). You want the PhD to be a clear and rational progression of becoming organised and clever on a given subject matter. What you find instead is a disorganised bird’s nest (actually, a Magpie’s nest) of shiny, bright ideas, odd tangents, loose threads and intellectual development. Right now, for example, I’m getting on with this reflection task, sort of, but I’m also aware that my supervisors are going to expect me to clean up the nest in time for Spring, and to get the loose ends tied into a single thread.
To close off the thought on identity started yesterday, it has occurred to me that “similar” and “different” are the same thing, or at least each requiring the other to have meaning. This is always brought into sharp relief whenever we kick off a new intake on the MBA – 60 people gather in a room, each with their own stories, reasons for being there, and jangling nerves about things such as whether they will fit in and whether they are doing the right thing. Where do the nerves come from if not from the identity dynamic?
The next biography exercise goes back to the McAdams book and is a more detailed narration of eight key events (“a specific happening, a critical incident, a specific episode in your past set in a particular time and place”).
1. A peak experience – the high point in your life to date
2. A nadir experience – a low point, the worst moment of your life
3. A turning point – an event, or episode where you experienced, either at the time or at a later point, a significant change in your understanding of yourself. In retrospect, you see this as a pivotal point in your life.
4. Your earliest memory – One of the earliest memories you have of an event in a complete setting, with characters, feelings and thoughts
5. An important childhood memory – Any memory from your childhood, positive or negative, which stands out for you now
6. An important adolescent memory – Any memory from your teenage years which seems important to you today.
7. An important adult memory – An important memory any time after the age of 21, positive or negative
8. Other important memory – One other formative memory that stands out for you from you past, recent or distant, positive or negative.
I’ll start tomorrow with the first of these, with the context of doing the PhD in mind as the lock for which these keys are intended.
Chris Dalton's Personal Development Blog 
Learning so much from you. leaving yourself open to critic shows your good character. I’m writing an PD assignment and lack the ability to self reflect, feel like a defective machine. or maybe that the problem, my perspective on things. always trying to seek a solution. i believe i am a beautifully defective machine.