Problem
Scenario:
You are a new supervisor (you have been there 2 months) at a large organization that develops technology for the military. You have previous military service experience and just finished your Bachelor's Degree in Management from APUS.
You are doing well so far; your immediate boss is happy with the quotas being met and can see the changes in the behavior of some of the employees around you. However, there are three employees who work for you that are causing some issues. You must constantly remind them of due dates and their work is marginal.
You decided to counsel each of them in private of course. During the counseling sessions, you found that all three employees say that you think you're still in the military and expect too much too soon.
One said that you use positional power all the time, another said that they felt you are not receptive to their ideas on how to make the work environment more fun. The last one told you that should have stayed in the military since you like to order everyone around!
• How will you handle this situation?
• What is the difference between positional power and personal power?
• Give an example, from your personal life, of situations where you have used (or had used on you) both positional and personal power.
Future Leader Thoughts:
Chapter 1 of The Future Leader (Morgan, 2020) discusses the leadership gap and struggles of good leaders to develop their personnel. Please answer the following:
• In your current position (or a previous one) do you feel your leadership skills are being developed (or not)? What would you like to see more (or less) of?