Have you ever heard the term SEO? If not, it stands for Search Engine Optimization, and it is one of the most important features or strategies one can use at their disposal when looking to enhance their business prowess. In short, SEO is the process by which you continually make improvements towards your website that will enhance your exposure and exposure quality and allow you to gradually gain more relevance towards the algorithms Google, Bing, Yahoo!, and other search providers use. This algorithm helps and shows how websites are ranked and displayed to relevance for what you have searched up. For example, if you search the word, “Phone” it will show a massive list of webpages in order of relevance dictated by the search engines algorithm; your goal with SEO is to not only get more traffic, but also greater traffic quality towards your webpage. Relevance also comes in handy as the search algorithm prioritizes products and webpages that either relate to your search or when the product has been reviewed either negatively or positively. A good comparison to SEO before diving deeper and getting more in-depth is Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. If you do not know what the Hierarchy of Needs is, it is essentially the human requirements that are the most important and are ones you need to fulfil first as they are the most basic; then after moving onto advanced type of needs. The pyramid below was found online, and I think it does wonders in illustrating what SEO is and the overall structure of how it works.
The above pyramid might seem confusing at first, but the more you understand and see how the topics intertwine and connect to the hierarchy of needs, the more you will start to understand SEO and all the little components that go into it. I will not be focusing on this pyramid specifically, but it does give you a detailed look into what I will be talking about, and helps enhancing the learning experience.
When first approaching SEO, you need to understand that the process takes time; it is not something that happens when you need it. It happens organically and will continue to develop along as you continue to put work towards it. It would be best if you take the time needed to execute your SEO strategy effectively as using SEO effectively also enables one of its most significant benefits: the ability to measure your results and analytical data.
Make sure you fully develop your strategy and know what is needed.
Research keywords relating towards your product or webpage.
Create content that works.
Attract relevant links.
Resolve any technical issues with your site.
SEO is not a process that stays static; as search engines and the algorithms used regularly change, so does your SEO. An excellent example of how SEO has changed in the current world would be that search engines do not only show webpage links or SERPs (search engine results page) when searching a product; they also tend to show pictures or videos that relate now too. Knowing about SEO and all the processes involved can be difficult for beginners. That is why I recommend taking your time and go at your own pace. Above we spoke a bit about SEO and what it is, but after learning the bare minimum involved, we can get more extensive and see the foundation of SEO and the magic of it all.
The first foundation piece of SEO I want to talk about is keywords. A keyword is a search that is entered into a search engine like Google. Researching keywords may feel exhausting at first, but you will soon understand how important they are as a marketer. The basics you should start to focus on are:
Your keyword-research plan.
Research methods.
Learning to do an evaluation.
Which tools to use.
How to evaluate keywords overtime.
First, with the keyword research plan, your main goal is to ensure you can see the frequency, relevance, and competition of each keyword used; use websites like Moz Keyword Explorer, Wordstream and Ahrefs Keywords. Knowing what frequency, relevance and, competition are is essential as they help you understand what keyword is appropriate for your website and can garner the most potential traffic for the lowest levels of competition. Although the word “Phone” might be searched the most, it may also have much more competition and less relevance to what you are selling; using a word more relevant even though the volume of searches is lower will, in the long run, be more beneficial. The use of specific wording helps find more potential customers. Once you have understood your plan, you will need to know how keywords are used. A good tip is to try and put yourself in the shoes of your customers and start brainstorming. What is the intent of your customer? And what products and services do you offer? Thinking about this from your customer base’s perspective is critical to successfully developing a good list of keywords. Once you have a list and want to expand, start using websites like Google Trends,Answer the Public and Moz to conduct more keyword research that will help you analyze and collect the data needed. After you have a full list ready, you need to understand search volume and how it affects SEO. Using the example above again, “Phone” may be searched often but may also have a long list of competition; you will want to start drifting away from these types of searches and use long-tail keywords instead. A long-tail keyword is a less competitive word that fits your business objectives, like “Phone with good speakers.” Lastly, categorize and identify the themes and topics to group your keywords accordingly. Once you feel like you have completed most of the steps and you have successfully thought of a keyword or two, start to organize them in spreadsheets so you can map which keywords are specifically targeting which page of your website. This will not only help with organization, but will also allow you to keep track of all your relevant keywords and the pages associated to them. Now as I said SEO is an ongoing effort, you will need to adapt and change your views and keywords as time goes on, it is a cycle, that will continuously change. Remember that a keyword is only relevant to you when it is driving your business forward, to stay successful you need to change just as the industry and engines do too.
Now that we tackled search engine optimization a bit and how to distinguish what keywords are and how they are used, we can begin to think about how search engines and the people using them view the pages they have searched. This can help us with a better understanding of content optimization and how it works. In short, content optimization is a business goal where you are making sure that the content you are producing or writing can reach the largest target audience; clarity, trust, and quality are essential for your content. When we talk about optimization, the first thing needed is structure and how that structure is understood. Your website needs to be organized and easily understood so people can understand and navigate your webpages. A bad example of structure would be your internal linking bring you to dead-end pages. Internal linking is the hyperlinks created on your domain that will bring you to another page on the same website. This can cause users to become confused and leave your website entirely. It would help if you made sure that your homepage and the pages linked throughout your website are easily readable and easy to understand. If people can logically understand your website, then the search engine will too. This in return will result in more rankings and higher visibility. This is only one part of optimization however, next we need to focus on the page elements themselves and the non-text components that are built into a webpage. For the optimization within the webpages you will want to make sure everything is concise and easily readable; shorter is best when it comes to keyword phrases in the source code.
First, let us look at optimizing the URL in the address bar. The goal here is to explain to your target audience what you are promoting. The >title< tag is the first thing that will be seen when viewed on the search engine results page, so optimizing it is crucial to SEO success. The title tag must be very descriptive and short enough not to get cut off on the results page. Try including the keyword phrase you are targeting here too, and when creating a URL, use hyphens (-) instead of under spaces (_) in the title as the search algorithms understand it better. Lastly, never rename existing URLs as they will interfere with your already existing SEO ranking. If you need some help here, try using the Moz Title Preview Tool to see some examples. Learning how to adjust meta tags in the source code can be critical to enhancing your SEO campaign even further.
After optimization of the title is finished, you can begin working on the <meta name=, which is the description under your title page. Optimizing the meta will not impact your SEO as much but is still worth doing as it will increase your click-through rate.
You want to keep reassuring the people who are visiting your website that this is what they are looking for with your keyword’s continuous use. The header is the next place I would recommend working on. The headline is the main visible text you see at the top of your page and where you want to be as effective as possible because it normally explains the content below. Here include your keyword, and try to engage the audience once again, assuring them that they viewed this page for the right reasons, including the keyword you have chosen and clarification about the page itself.
Now for the most extensive content on the page, usually the written segment and the images that appear. For the context, this is where you go wild but try at least to include your target phrase 1-3 times, although this is not mandatory. Communicating to your target audience here is critical as this is the most significant chunk of text that will be read. To optimize the images correctly as algorithms do not quite understand them fully yet, go into the source file once again under <img and leave a description of the image itself and the keyword used throughout your webpage. This helps immensely as it gives SEO another boost, but as said above, SEO is an ever-growing process, so do not be afraid to check-in on these steps and change some things now and then.
Since search engines have a hard time understanding not only images but audio files and videos, too, there are ways we can work around this to optimize our non-text elements on a webpage. When algorithms try to understand an image, they tend to use specific methods to grasp what it means; search engines will use image files, image captions, nearby text, alt text, and title attributes to help better understand what they are analyzing. The best way to add relevant data to your images, audio, or videos in the page source is using a website called Schema.Org. When you look at the page source, precisely the source of the picture, video, or audio file, you will see an embedded code; in most cases, this code is JSON-LD. This is where Schema comes in handy. With multiple presets for any given code, you are bound to improve your SEO quality and help the search engines understand your non-text content a lot better.
Okay, so now that you are becoming this semi-expert in SEO and have gathered understanding with search engines and how they view your web page, we can get a little more technical and understand all the micromanaging your pages, and the search engines do behind the scenes. These include indexing content, canonical URLs, redirects, microformats, and more, which we will discuss thoroughly in greater detail. When a person visiting your website first views your domain, they often get greeted with pictures, information, and ease of access to where they want to go, enabling them to understand it effortlessly. But, to a search engine, the same page you see is vastly different. Below is an example of what a search engine will see versus what we see.
Since websites are just giant HTML codes, it helps the search engine understand what our eyes can see: file locations, file layout, fonts, color and sizes, menus, linked data, and content placement. Although you do not need to be a tech-savvy expert, it is a good idea to understand how the search engine will view your webpage and the perspective of how the algorithm will understand your code. Remember, the cleaner and more error-free your code is, the more your webpage will be understood.
Search engine indexing is the process of an engine indexing all of the stored data, making sure it’s easily available, accurate and ready to be retrieved when needed. This is important because it is how an engine will follow links to index your content. A search crawler will click links just like you would, going from page to page, but instead of clicking a few links, the crawler will click every link they can find. The best way to make sure your content is easily available and readable is to create XML sitemaps. A site map is a list of your websites URLs; it acts as one big roadmap helping a search engine for what content is available and where to find it. Use websites like sitemaps.org to help inform engines on your website changes. However, sometimes you may want specific rules on certain web pages, like not wanting your page to be ranked; these can all be edited to your desire. Within the source code, you can edit files through a robot.txt or by creating an index meta tag. Each of these will help guide you towards what you want or need for your webpage analytics.
So because search engines index your content, this means they rely on the URLs you have created. Often a webpage or various webpages will have slightly varied URLs for the same content made. The main reason this happens is because of the URL parameters. Sometimes, these parameters control what occurs on the web page but can also have nothing to do with the web page if they are not efficiently used. You need to make sure your parameters on each webpage is correctly associated with what is on the page so that the crawler can index your content appropriately. You do not want to compete against yourself if you have identical content on two different pages due to misused parameters; crawlers will always prefer less complicated websites. To help the search crawler identify your page easier, make sure to use the REL canonical meta tag; this will give clear instructions to the search engine. It helps by providing instructions telling the algorithm that no matter what URL is used in the address bar, the URL placed in the canonical meta tag is the correct one. I recommend using the Google search console to help make it a bit easier to see your parameters. Another issue that may be caused within your parameters is if a URL is moved to another location. These movements may either be temporary or permanent. Luckily there is a solution to both. For brief movements, you will want to use a 302 or a temporary redirect. For a permanent move, use a 301 or a permanent redirect. The code will take everything it knew about the old URL and reapply, helping the search engine know that the old URL is no longer needed.
Before we move on, let’s quickly talk about microformats, Schema.org and, web formats. Using specific microdata you have from your website will enhance what type of content is on your pages. Schema helps the algorithms understand and identify each particular piece of content and all the attributes of the content. Using this quick process can bring in more users as your content will be more defined. Below are two photos to quickly help you understand the difference. The first photo is without using microdata; the second is with microdata.
Next, this is just a tiny piece of advice on how webservers you used can play a big part in web data. First, make sure the provider you are using is fast and reliable. Second, make sure the hardware and internet connectivity works well. Webservers host your pages, so you will want to make sure you are using the correct one for the users that most likely will visit your webpage. For example, I live in Edmonton; I would want a server as close as possible because most of my traffic would be for the citizens living here. Remember, though, the further away someone is from your webserver, the longer it will take them to visit your page.
(THIS BLOG IS A WORK-IN-PROGRESS AND WILL BE UPDATED EVERYDAY)
“Learning about yourself and about leadership, however, are not the same as leading. Deciding to be an exemplary leader is not the same as being one. Leading is doing. You need to make leading a daily habit. You need to do something every day to learn more about leading, and you need to put those lessons into practice every day” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 310). This quote from The Leadership Challenge by Kouzes and Posner perfectly sets the tone for my philosophy paper, and I placed it as I believe it has some crucial messages that may educate any individual who desires to become a leader, including myself. Leading is a daily ritual of sorts. It is the phenomenon of continuous acts of expanse with knowledge pertaining to leadership. Leaders often believe they have already achieved greatness because of the title they earned or because they already are in their head, but the actual truth of a great leader comes from the practices and habits learned over years of hard work and dedication. This is precisely what I have been doing these past three months in my leadership course—studying the art of leading. I have taken in knowledge, practices and have studied the differences between someone who claims to be a leader and one who is effective at leading; over the semester, I believe I have found the exact criteria needed to be an exemplary leader. Throughout this paper, I will discuss an effective leader, how I am becoming one myself, the ideals and philosophies of leadership, important lessons from my past, and more.
To some, leadership is just a word; to others, it brings a sense of meaningfulness, a set of standards they follow to better themselves. Can you truly become an effective leader if you believe the term leader is just another word, a title, nothing more? For me, an effective leader will always have pre-determined traits, extensive knowledge, and past experiences that provide and show the reasoning behind why they handle themselves as such a dependable leader. They have become this role model, and although in their mind, they may deny this, most times they are; to guide and lead others to unity with a common cause. Before exploring and diving into more detail about what effective leadership means to me, we should go over some of the key traits I believe a leader should possess before even considering becoming one. Most of these traits should already be a prerequisite if you are a decent person or hope to get a job in the business field. Loyalty, empathy, honesty, determination, respect, selflessness, integrity, and passion; are the traits that I believe every person should carry within when they become a leader. These traits may differ from person to person, and of course, there are many more not included here, but it gives you the general idea of the prerequisites for being an effective role model and leader. Now that we have discussed the traits, we can better understand leadership characteristics, which now allows me to dive deeper into what effective leadership means to me personally.
Having a vision is one of the main elements behind successful leadership, and to me, it is the true meaning of an effective leader. As Kouzes and Posner stated there is five practices of exemplary leadership, and for me I believe I would fit into the inspiring a shared vision section. Leaders with a vision build this foundation that will encompass the business but also need to be wary when providing that vision as they need to make it provoking enough so that others can and will want to follow. Using their years of knowledge to inspire, so that together a vision can be created that will guarantee success. Having a vision is about motivation and inspiration; you need others to see the end result, or it will be much harder to have any foundation. Vision is one of the most powerful tools that can be used. Having a vision is not just a statement but rather a goal that team members and staff can get behind with a common cause. Leaders need to provide a clear and powerful enough vision so the team can understand the goals and attach themselves to it without hesitation. The vision must also align with the company’s goals and the employees; it needs to share the organization’s values and be simplistic enough for everyone to understand. Choosing a vision is not always an easy decision, and because of this, it may take a toll or become challenging for new leaders, but over time it will come naturally. I believe, as a visionary, you need to respect all team members and guide them, showing why you are doing what you are about to do; they need to realize that your interest is also theirs. You can not only think about yourself with these decisions, as it will impact not only you but also those who believe in you. A vision is nothing without an end goal and a meaning; it is your job as a leader to take these challenges and turn them into a bright future. “In every personal-best leadership case, leaders talked about ideals. They expressed a desire to make dramatic changes in the business-as-usual environment. They reached for something grand, something magnificent, something never done before. Visions are about hopes, dreams, and aspirations. They are about a strong desire to achieve something beyond good, something great and extraordinary. They are ambitious. They are expressions of optimism” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 119).
For the last ten years, I myself have had many leadership opportunities; before starting my leadership course, I actually thought that I was a decent leader, but now I realize, looking back, I did not even know what leadership was. I had qualities and traits that made me believe I was decent; I often provided positivity, creativeness, honesty, respect, enthusiasm, initiative, and a few more, but still felt I lacked in a bunch of areas too. I believe me being in a leadership role mostly started when I coached some soccer in my earlier days, but I would say I got most of my experience working. I used to work for a company called Global Experience Specialists, or in short GES. My job was essentially to set up tradeshows all around Edmonton. This could be at Northlands, Rexall, West Edmonton Mall, Shaw Conference, or any place else that needed a booth or two. At each new location, I usually would get a new group of temp workers to boss around; this is where most of my experience in leading came from. I do not think I did much to motivate them; I just told them what to do and left it at that. I usually felt my job was not there to inspire, as I would get a new group in a few days, so it felt pointless. Nevertheless, I was wrong. Sometimes the work method would be inadequate or take too much time. Maybe if I empathized more with their values and shared my vision with them, treating them like actual team members, I would have never had to resolve any issues. Yes, I respected them and tried to show initiative, but it was not authentic leadership, or what I believe to be true leadership now. That is in the past, though, and I have learned from experience, as I am still learning to this day. As I said earlier, I believe a true vision is the best way to be an effective leader, and from my own experience, I will need to practice it more among a few other qualities that I will explain and go into with further detail.
When you think of yourself as a leader and how you became one, you often do not question how you got there, it usually has been a long road of hard work and dedication, and you are already where you wanted to be, so why does it matter how you achieved the goal. I say this because I never really recollect any of the vital lessons I was taught growing up with leadership. I never truly thought about these experiences and identified any importance in them. Most of these lessons I forgot about I did take with me subconsciously so there was still value with them. Thinking about past experiences is always a weird subject for me. Often I do not know what to say or feel as there may be some form of judgment. Although, in leadership, any decision can also be a benefit, as it is learning from experience. Earlier, I wrote about some key traits that should be a prerequisite as a leader, and yes, I believe all the ones I listed should be prominent in any leadership role, especially how vision is the most critical trait to becoming an effective leader, but there is also more I have discovered while reminiscing and taking the time to delve deep inside myself and my past. In the last paragraph, I provided an example of how I took the initiative and some of my leadership qualities, but now I will discuss some of the lessons I have learned throughout my life that I was taught from following instead of being in charge as a leader, and show why these may have influenced what I consider the archetype of a leader to be. Three examples come to mind, two positives, one negative—each different.
Inclusivity and diversity issues are scenarios that affect every workplace, either small or large, and in most cases tend to be negative. The negative cases you hear about are rather heartbreaking, as they may affect that person for their entire life. For my first example, I will start with the negative experience, explaining what happened and what I learned from it. After this experience occurred it helped me understand inclusivity and diversity dynamics within a workplace better, it also taught me how to value an employee too. This occurrence also led me to believe leaders need to share the values of their employees, and not treat them as just another person to control. “Shared values are the foundation for building productive and genuine working relationships” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 60). To start, When I was younger, I had a rather ugly experience; I used to work at a McDonalds, now this place seemed great. It was close to my high school, close to home, and the money was excellent for a teenager with no responsibilities at least. For the first month or so, it seemed perfect. After working there for a bit, the staff eventually hired a person who was in his early thirties and immigrated from another country. The man, who we will call Seb, had only been in Canada for roughly two years before hired. Seb’s issue mostly took place whenever he was working with a particular manager who we will call Mike. Now Seb was not the best worker, sometimes he was slow or would mess up orders, but it was not entirely his fault, his English was not the best, and I could see that he was trying most times, even if he did mess up on occasion. Now when Seb and Mike worked together, there would often be some heat generated between the two, mostly with Mike, as Seb was very shy, quiet, and easy to boss around. If you said something to him, he usually would not argue it, and do what he is told, even if it seemed cruel or distasteful. Now Mike was usually a great guy, towards me at least, he was the one who hired me, and taught me everything I needed to know within the first couple of weeks, but I could kind of see his true colors whenever he worked with Seb. At first, Seb and Mike were okay, normally Mike would say some racial jokes, but light-heartedly, you could not tell if they were malicious intent, but the more Seb would annoy Mike or mess up either his work, the more frustrated and menacing Mike would get. This gradually escalated over three months. Eventually, Mike started threatening Seb, making fun of his English almost every day, talking behind his back, and giving him the worst jobs, like cleaning the toilets. I eventually went to Seb and told him to speak with Mike’s superior; Seb declined as he did not want to get into trouble himself. Although I told him he did nothing wrong, he was too afraid to get fired. Luckily, or not so luckily, Mike confronted Seb for the last time during a work period where all three of us were on shift. Mike started using racial slurs towards Seb, insisting he would fire him if he did not fix his English. Seb still did not do anything, so I took matters into my own hands. Even though I liked Mike, I went to the McDonald’s district manager and reported him anonymously. The next day, he was fired. Mike did not know who caused him to get fired, but at first he thought it was Seb, and almost attacked him, but I told Mike that it was me, and after some vulgar words and a tantrum, he left. That was the last I ever saw of Mike. To this day, Seb should have said something earlier, as it is very disheartening to hear situations like this. As a visionary leader, you must listen and include all others into your vision, no matter race, sex, or beliefs. I believe if leaders empathized more with the person being attacked, fewer situations like this would happen. I know for me personally that I would include everyone in my vision, hoping that no one feels left out or excluded. Even though this conflict seemed difficult at first, and I did not think of it for a long time until now, I believe it affected my leadership ethic, in a way that was not visible to me before; it helped me maintain proper empathy for inclusivity. As a visionary leader, I take diversity issues seriously, and would not hesitate to help a fellow employee. Inclusivity is great, you get different views and different aspects of life helping you and your business to achieve the overall vision, creating trust and bonds between people which will only generate more success. “The most effective leadership situations are those in which each member of the team trusts the others. When trust is the norm, decisions are made efficiently and swiftly, innovation is higher, and profitability increases” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 198).
Now that the negative experience is out of the way, I will talk about my positive ones and how they positively affected me as a leader. You could say the negative experience gave me a more positive outlook, but it came from a villainous leader and an adverse scenario; these two both came from positives and leaders who were more aligned with a hero persona. As I said above, my negative experience helped me learn how to handle diversity and inclusivity issues while allowing me to see how important trust is within any work dynamic. The two positives helped me better understand why I valued the specific characteristics and traits needed for what I believe to be an effective leader. At first, it was hard for me to think of scenarios where I was a follower and explain why specific characteristics and visionary leaders resonated with me more, but after an astral projection one night while thinking, I believe I figured out why. These two situations that happened, although similar, took place years apart. The first one started when I was only eleven, maybe twelve and continues to this day. The second occurred just last year. When I was a kid, I often had difficulties talking to others; I was shy and way more introverted than I am now; I would consider myself even an extrovert today. Every day my mom had this goal to teach me something new or a different way to view the world and branch out of my shell. I believe this is one of the main reasons why I eventually, over time, became less shy and more confident. For the first leader from my positive experiences, it would go to my mom. She taught me valuable leadership lessons without me, even realizing it. Because of how she taught me to view the world and how to do what is right, she also taught me how to empathize with others, have determination to succeed, and how to communicate appropriately. These stories and lessons my mom taught provided me with lots of valuable information, as Kouzes and Posner said, “Through stories, leaders pass on lessons about shared values, define culture, and get others to work together” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 86). I believe communication may have had the most significant impact out of the three traits above, as it is one of the notable traits that indicate an excellent visionary leader. Communicating your vision with others and also allowing them to share theirs with you. Speaking about communication, it is only appropriate to provide a clear example of how my mom helped me increase my communication skills without me even realizing it. My mom helped me understand the value of listening, I did not question why she wanted to teach me these lessons or what was the reasoning behind the way she thought it could better me as an adult, but the more I think about the experiences she taught me while growing, the more I understand. Listening is part of communication, and I always listened to what she had to say. I followed and trusted her and eventually, over time, became more knowledgeable and confident because of the practices and values I learned. Without even knowing I would benefit from any of the lessons, I did them anyway. I am glad I did what she told me when I was younger and still to this day, as it helps me view the world differently and open my eyes to a lot more things. Maybe this is why I value a leader with a vision, and one that can empathize and listen to the dreams of others too. “The best leaders are great listeners. They listen carefully to what other people have to say and how they feel. They ask good (and often tough) questions, are open to ideas other than their own, and even lose arguments in support of the common good. Through intense listening, leaders get a sense of what people want, what they value, and what they dream about” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 108).
The second positive experience also includes elements of communication, but it also incorporates some other traits. Last year I had the opportunity to model for a fashion line, and I quickly jumped at the chance due to my obsession with clothing. The aesthetic of streetwear and the plenteous amount of options to choose from when deciding on a wardrobe always fascinated me, and gave enjoyment; I also just loved spending my money on clothes. So I had to jump at the opportunity the second I got offered. Before even getting to be in the fashion show, I had to do plenty of background work that caused mental and physical stress. I had to do a lot of research and learning on the environment and what I needed to do to achieve success so I could envision myself where I wanted to be. “Envisioning the future requires you to connect with your deepest feelings. You have to find something that is so important that you are willing to put in the time, suffer the inevitable setbacks, and make the necessary sacrifices” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 104). After a few weeks of testing my patience and resilience, I got the confirmation that I would be getting the official job. Now, this was not your type of monthly paid full-time salary job, it was a two-week gig, with hardly any pay. You were going for the experience and the other benefits that could come with it. Once I arrived for the first week, I was taught multiple lessons almost every day. I had to sit and listen for hours on end, studying other’s performance, and getting taught many different techniques on what I needed to do, and how the industry was run. The lessons I was taught were from multiple people, all in the leadership roles, each one influenced me differently, but in unique ways. As I said earlier my mom was the sole example for my first positive experience, this second one had me learning and listening through communication from a bunch of different people, and each of them I respected fully as they also were showing and providing the same hard work and dedication I did to get there, and that I was still continuously doing. While practicing I underwent long twelve to fourteen-hour days, I had the determination to succeed, so I kept at it. “As necessary as enhancing self-determination is, it’s insufficient. Without the knowledge, skills, information, and resources to do a job expertly, and without feeling competent to execute skillfully the choices required, people feel overwhelmed and disabled. Even if they have the resources and skills, there may be times when people do not have confidence that they are allowed to use them or that they will be backed up if things do not go as well as expected. There may be times when they just lack the self-confidence to do what they know they need to do” (Kouzes and Posner, 2017, p. 233). Kouzes and Posner speak of determination as enhancing one’s self, and the prerequisites needed to succeed, I believe because of the leaders I met while getting taught lessons about and for the fashion industry I was able to learn efficiently. I had the resources already provided, which helped me immensely, giving me self-confidence, and eventually, the self-determination I knew I needed if I wanted to succeed.
To evaluate my current leadership skills was not very difficult for me because I know myself pretty well. I already have spoken about many existing leadership skills I possess, like creativeness and enthusiasm, and some I believe an effective leader should have, but I will only evaluate the ones I learned with my three experiences to make things not too complicated. I will also briefly reflect how I am a visionary leader, as it is my main goal for effective leadership. The skills and traits I will be evaluating and assessing will be my inclusivity and diversity growth, how trust is crucial, communication skills, determination, and vision. Starting with inclusivity and diversity, I would say that I am fairly decent at that as a leader. I explained thoroughly about it above and gave some ideas about why and how I believed in it as a person. I think it is necessary to be diverse as a leader because of all the opportunities that come with it; it also makes you a better person, not just a better leader. Growth is an essential aspect of diversity, as you need to grow as an individual and allow yourself to view others’ perspectives. To identify my score for diversity and inclusivity, I would give myself a solid (6.5/10). I believe I am decent at it as a leader, but I often exclude others on occasion and may find myself targeting someone if their viewpoint differs from my own. I usually tend to be very inclusive, but there are scenarios where my personal judgment gets the better of me. When I discussed the situation with Seb, and Mike I believe I have a very high scoring regards to that type of diversity, or inclusivity, but when using it for other methods, I may not be as good, such as including others into my overall vision, which is how I landed on the 6.5. “When there is greater gender and racial and ethnic diversity in leadership, there is not one majority group to which everyone needs to conform. Each leader is more likely to maintain his or her individuality and be less likely to blindly follow the group if he or she disagrees. Moreover, diverse leaders look through at the world through their different cultural lenses which lead those types of groups to create better solutions” (Ladders Contributor, 2018).
“When your team trusts you as a leader, it increases commitment to team goals. Communication improves, and ideas flow more freely, increasing creativity and productivity. Perhaps most important, in the hands of a trusted leader, employees are more comfortable with change and more willing to embrace a new vision” (Behance, 2014). Speaking briefly about trust, I think that this quote demonstrates everything you need to say about it within a work environment. Communication and trust are similar in a bunch of areas, so I will not go too in-depth, but I believe trusting is just as important as any other leadership trait. Right now, I would say that my skills in trustworthiness are exceptional, as I feel it is best, to be honest in most situations. Lying may always have some benefits, but it is also risky, and has major repercussions. I believe overall being trustworthy on its own can single-handedly carry a leadership team. For my current ratings for trust, I would say I am an 8/10, but hopefully one day can be a 10, as I think it is very important to build a team around trust as it can turn an uncoordinated team into something exceptional.
Next, I will speak a bit about my communication skills. I would say my communication is definitely a strong point for me today; before, when I was younger, not so much, due to being an introvert, I probably would have even said back then I was a 5, maybe even a 4 on the rating scale. Because of all the experiences I have faced through life and the lessons I was taught, I could confidently say I am a (9/10) for communication. I often can communicate appropriately to others, but I feel that is only half of what communication offers; the other half is listening to the needs of others too, which I have also been able to develop decently well, which is how I landed on the 9. For an example of how I use my communication skills right now, I would say I use my leadership communication skills in my group projects in my current classes. Still, I have had a lot of experience with communication throughout my life in different ways. These experiences come from listening to others leading and leading others around when I am in the spotlight, and I shared some of those experiences in my examples above.
Moving onto determination, I mostly focused on this leadership trait when I explained the pursuit of my job as a model in the fashion industry, but it is also apparent in many other parts of my life. Trying to get the job and succeed, there was much adversity there I needed to face. Because me wanting it so bad, I was determined to get it regardless of all the mental fatigue. Determination, I believe, is vital in leadership as it is a quality that drives you to get what you want; it gives you the persistence to continuously aim for the top, which is what every leader should strive for. I would not say determination is my best trait because sometimes, if I feel overwhelmed, that determination will gradually fall off, but I am somewhere a little bit above better than average. If I were to rate myself, I would say I am roughly a (7/10). Determination has helped me out, though not only in my modeling aspirations but also in life in many scenarios, like hoping to build a better life for myself. I had self-determination within to go back to school and learn to better my future, and now I am here doing it, so I believe if I put my mind to it efficiently, like when I wanted to be in the fashion industry, I can overcome difficulties, and keep on persisting.
Lastly, for what I believe to be an effective leader, vision. Vision is essential to me because, without a vision, there is nothing guiding others towards what the end goal is. You want to accomplish your objectives as a leader, and the best way to have support from others is to provide a clear and powerful vision. Visionary leaders do not only incorporate their own vision, as they also listen to others. I thoroughly explained visionary leaders above, so I will not go into significant detail as I do not seem redundant. Still, overall, having a vision is the best practice to learn as a leadership quality, as it will improve your performance and the performance of those around you too. As a visionary leader, I would say it is my weakest trait being discussed, as I do not have much practice with it at the moment. I would say I am a (5/10), but I hope to eventually grasp what it means to be a true visionary eventually. I landed on this rating because I do understand the concepts of a visionary leader, so with more practice, I believe I could be adequate, but right now, without the proper practice and only the knowledge, I cannot seem to give myself any higher, as I believe that would be false.
In recent paragraphs, I rated some of my leadership traits; now, I will create an action plan for the scores I did not do so well and evaluate them with the SMART framework. The SMART framework has five specific roles to follow, and I will analyze each trait by the specific letter within the SMART goal setting framework; we will call them SMART goals. For determination, communication, and trust, I feel my scores are already decently high, so I will only focus on the two I perceive to be my weakest links: vision and diversity. Vision is what I value the most, and have vocalized how I believe it is the best trait to have for effective leadership, so it should only be necessary that I try to improve. Above I said I would rate myself a (5/10) because I have not had enough experience with it, but if I create an action plan going step by step, I could eventually see it rising. First, for specific, I need to make sure my goals are tangible. Saying what I want to achieve here should be my first goal, and that is to have more practice using my vision to influence others to follow. I have studied and have pertained knowledge about visionary leaders, but I still have not been able to use it in a work environment yet. To achieve this goal, I will evaluate whether I can see myself improving. If I get the opportunities to use my vision, I could measure it by asking to see if others believe in the future I have provided and see themselves having their vision the same as mine. This goal is roughly attainable, it is a bit challenging to hit where I want to be because of how much hard work must go into practicing and creating an appropriate vision, but I believe I can still get where I need to be with hard work and determination. Achieving this goal is very relevant to me as it is the main reasoning behind what I believe to be an effective leader, which is valuable to me and worthwhile to achieve. To motivate me to achieve this goal, I would like to hit where I need to be within the next five years; hitting that goal may even only improve one or two points, but any improvement is better than none.
Now for my diversity and inclusivity SMART goals, I believe I landed on a higher score than my vision trait for several reasons, and the main one being I have had an experience related to diversity and inclusivity in the workplace. I landed on the (6.5/10) because I understand the dynamics of what is needed due to real-life experience, but I also have room where I need growth and can see myself improving in critical areas. So diversity and inclusivity are issues that do not only affect workplaces but affect you almost everywhere you look, online, at the mall, out at the park; issues like this always pop up regardless. It is just human nature. Some diversity issues such as racism are much nastier than an inclusivity issue at work, but each will still impact the individual targeted, so everyone needs to be aware. Following the SMART goal framework, for the first letter S, to achieve this goal, since I have already had experiences from it, just learning off of those. Using my past knowledge and my own personal values to help out in the scenarios. I had the issue with Seb and Mike, and I believe I did what I needed to do, even if it took me a little longer than it should have. I find those scenarios awkward, and it is probably the area where I could see myself needing a bit more growth. Inclusivity is where I would say I have more strength; often, I try to include everyone, no matter where they are from or their views and values. That is just who I am. In specific scenarios, I may be blinded and not see that I am doing wrong, but I know that I can improve, as I can see myself becoming better at it just by writing this paper. For how measurable this goal is, I would say I can defiantly see success in my future, a lot faster than the vision trait too. Whereas vision takes a lot of practice and knowledge, diversity and inclusivity are things that you can learn on your own that come from within, so if you try to create a cohesive and diverse work setting, you can easily measure and attain those goals. It is also attainable since I am already starting to expand my mindset with inclusivity and diversity; there may be some barriers when I try to stop the conflict, as I find those issues awkward, but I am personally an open-minded individual, so I welcome all. Diversity and inclusivity issues are among the one of, if not the most, that affect workplaces with negative experiences; I think even today, this is more relevant than ever. I think trying to improve in this aspect is very important, as it is right for my values, and can see it improving every experience I have within a team. Since I already see improvement in myself, I could say that I will gradually become better within the next two to three years, which I can see as a very realistic time frame, as I have and am still learning.
My personal practice will continue to develop long after this course is done, and because of this, my leadership style will grow as well. Each leader has their own way of exploring potential leadership techniques, so each leader will take unique paths. Which is why I cannot see a predetermined route for me, I know areas where I need to improve, and areas where I am already starting to excel at, if I continue down this path of growth eventually I will get where I want to be. This development of being unique does not make only some leaders adequate but instead explores different leadership methods for individual leadership styles. Not every leader is universally able; this is where broadening out comes into play. A leader will develop themselves over years of routine, some taking longer than others to achieve what they believe is an effective leader. So, as I continue to grow and learn from experience, I will become the leader whom I want to be, so this journey of becoming an effective leader has only just begun.
References
The Leadership Challenge Sixth Edition: How to Make Extraordinary Things Happen in Organizations: James M. Kouzes, Barry Posner, Brian Holsopple. (2017).
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