Decision Making

Two very important aspects of communication are decision making and changing. Decision making was shown in Wednesday's class through the Wilderness survival game. In this game we were to rank in order the items we felt were the most important to being able to survive if stuck in a desert. I have done a game similar to this before so I was somewhat familiar with the experiment. I felt that the decisions my group made were pretty cohesive. In leadership, you want to make sure the group comes to a general consensus as to the final decision. However, an area where my group lacked was finding the people who ended up scoring lower than the group as a whole. We did not ask if anyone had did something similar before or if anyone had any experience in the military or was an outdoor type of person. This would have been a good way to start the process. Our failure to do this is something that a lot of groups may fall victim to. In decision making, it is important to find out the people who have experience in a certain area. This will ultimately give your group a "specialist" in that area. Decision making in general ties into communication. The better the communication, the better the decision, which directly contributes to better leadership.

The second important of aspect of leadership is changing. Changing was shown in Wednesday's class through watching a video that talked about trim tabs and leadership. A trim tab is a small piece on a boat that changes the boat's direction. The main relation to a trim tab and leaders is that a small change can make a large impact. The movie went on to talk about how in life if you focus on what you can do and then make small changes along the way. This is a great point because it goes a long with what Kirk Weisler talked about and focusing on your strengths and making small improvements along the way. Being able to make small changes is crucial in leadership. One does not have to make a huge change in the way things are done to create a large impact. I believe that this is the best way to be an effective leader. Why waste money and time trying to make that one huge change in a company, government, or life when if you just make a small adjustment in multiple areas you can end up with a large impact. This was talked about in the video with the New York Police Department. They were concerned with the rising crime in NYC and instead of focusing on the whole city, they put more focus on the subways and it ultimately decreased the general crime rate by substantial amounts.

In leadership, it is best to make cohesive, educated decisions and to make small changes than large ones. Great leaders will be able to do both of these things and lead their group in a positive way.