1. The book compares leadership to the metaphors of an atom and a jazz band, among other things. What creative metaphor would you use to describe leadership, and why? Find an image that you can post in your blog to represent the metaphor you have chosen.
Leadership is like a map. A map has all sorts of points on it; whether they are cities, states, coordinates, places of interest, etc. Those points can represent all different types of people. Each place has specific characteristics and jobs, just like people have talents and characteristics. Imagine if this map had just points and no roads. You wouldn't know how to get from one place to another. Each point would not be able to work together to use their talents that they need to operate. Now imagine the roads being there. These different points would be directed to work together. In leadership, you need to create those roads to connect all of your different and unique people together for a common goal.
2. Which theories of leadership do you agree with more: the historical theories of the leader as director of the followers, or the contemporary emerging theories of shared leadership? Why?
I agree more with the theories of shared leadership. I have learned that in order to lead you have to be able to follow. It is very beneficial to have people who are following you to have opportunities to lead. There is a risk that these people will fail in those positions but it is up to you to encourage them and push them to keep going. This helps your followers to grow at a rapid rate and take ownership in the common goal that you have. It is also up to you to serve these people as well as leading them in the direction of your vision. There is a balance to this, as all things have a balance. You need to make sure that your vision is not moving in a direction that it is not supposed to do and that you are not losing a healthy respect of leadership from your followers.
3. Thinking about an organization you are currently or have participated in: how is it like a machine (predictable and orderly) and how is it like a weather system (uncontrollable, but with an underlying pattern)?
An organization that I have been a part of was more of like a weather system. Like ministry is, you are working with people and it gets messy. A way my pastor described it as is "controlling the chaos". But he also says to embrace it. You have to find a way to organize something unpredictable but also leave room for it to take advantage of it's greatest assets. It lets people get involved and make it their own as well as relate to people in a way that you alone can't. Being able to map out everything that is going to happen and keep it orderly has its advantages but so does the controlled chaos side.
