ISLE Workshop

"Two ways to get wisdom in the world: Mistakes and Mentors." – Delatorro McNeal

The Iowa State Leadership Experience yesterday was a really great opportunity for me to really grow. The keynote Delatorro McNeal had a really unique approach to leadership and had a lot of energy and passion. I really appreciated his enthusiasm and it helped not only me but also the whole group of attendees set their mood for the entire workshop.

The first breakout session I attended was Positive Conflict. Michelle Boettcher from the Judicial Department at ISU gave us a lot of information. She first had us figure out our own personal conflict style. This buys into one of the important qualities of a Peer Mentor, insight. Before this session I never really thought about the fact that, just like MBTI, there are distinct groups of attributes when approaching conflict. I found out that I was “Avoidant” which I would say is partially true. For the most part I try to avoid conflict but when it does come up I usually try to facilitate a win-win situation with compromise as my main tool. I had pretty even scores across four out of the five styles, with “Competing” being a distant fit for me. I would never say that I want to win every conflict or disagreement. This session was useful to being able to understand others and how I can help solve problems and differences of opinion if it comes up next year for my students.

The second session I attended was Diversifying Your Leadership Style. I was a little disappointed by this session since I was expecting Cameron and Aja to present more information on how to go about diversifying your style but it was mostly a quick presentation of the categories from Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership and then a group activity where we are given a situation and just have to figure out what we would do. I received a situation about a Halloween Dance and people had shown up wearing inappropriate costumes. We came up with politely asking them to change costumes or leave and then anticipating this complication if the event would be hosted again. It was a little ironic since I had faced a similar situation for my residence hall’s Masquerade Dance the previous year and the same event was being hosted last night for the second time and I had made plan on how to handle situations we had faced the year before.

Overall, ISLE was good and I hope to attend again next year!