Meeting Summary: Session Two

Good morning all,

I hope you had a chance to go home and relax a bit after our meeting.  Once again I am amazed at the speed at which you are coming together as a group.  Thank you all for your willingness to be a part of this process.  Marie we missed you but will see you next week and pray that William recovers quickly.  Last night we recapped the homework and discovered there are many different models, types, styles of leadership.  Nobody embodies all of them and the effectiveness of the style often times directly relates to the leadership context.  For example the autocratic leadership style works well in an emergency crisis but would not serve well working with a very specialized, high-functioning team; the hands-off approach would be a much better style for that team.  The main point in the exercise was for all of us to realize that our leadership potential can manifest itself in many different styles.  Some of the styles we may never embody, but that doesn't mean we are not a leader.  The second part of the homework was to consider the difference between managers and leaders and the final conclusion we came to was that leadership requires people.  One cannot lead time, materials, resources or finances but they can manage them.  An important note to consider about managers is that being a manager is not a rung on the ladder to becoming a leader like some of the Internet literature would suggest.  A manager can be a leader in their own right.

The second part of the session involved looking at the personality preferences of the Myers Briggs Personality Inventory and taking the Kiersey Temperament Sorter.  We discovered as a group that while on the surface we seem quite diverse, at a personality level we had very little diversity with most of the group being ISTJ.  Part of this weeks homework is to take an online version of the Myers Briggs.  Follow this link: http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp .  There are 72 yes/no questions and you will get your results the moment you click submit.  Once you have taken the text please reply to this post with a comment that has your name, your letter breakdown and the number that goes with each letter.  For example I would post: Faron Owen ENTJ, 100/25/50/33.  The second piece for homework was to consider spiritual formation and discipleship.  Come next week prepared to define these concepts, discuss their importance, their relationship to leadership and to character.  We have plenty of drinks left over so we don't need those, but Brandy has dessert.  Thanks again to Michael and Cindy for drinks and desserts last night.

Your brother in Christ,

Faron