Today we had the privilege of visiting the corporate headquarters of the Center for Creative Leadership. This company is a non-profit organization that focuses on top-tier executive education. They obviously have a single concentration on leadership development and train individuals to become the leaders that they aspire to be. This company focuses on people who are mostly already in a position to lead and who want to sharpen or develop new skills. The companies mission is to educate and expand; they hope to spread their schooling globally and put everyone in a position to lead. Today we heard about one of their five steps towards advancement. One of these being global expansion, they have the vision of specified leadership in countries that need it most. They are trying to alter their new programs so that they can be more affordable and practical for their new audiences. With the new vision their customer base has expanded tremendously. They were previously focusing on top-tier leadership at a high cost for education. But over the next few years they will expand their clientele to that of poorer areas. They will provide customers in low income areas with leadership training with the focus to help improve communities financial situations. The CCL customers value the high end education and facilities that they will learn in. The CCL is among the top ten in its category for the past forty years. The customers will pay a little extra for the better education that they will be receiving. Their plan remains to provide top notch education for professional leaders. However they are constantly looking to innovate and expand. Today during the presentation we were given a hand out that elaborated on CCL’s plan for the future. Their next five “Big Ideas” are as follows; the merging fields of leadership and science, expand the leadership equation, nurturing networks, power up nonprofit partners and elevate coaching impact. They clearly have put a lot of thought into their plan for the future and will continue to innovate and improve.
Our speaker today went over the three main points to developing leadership that the Center uses. The first is self assessment or self evaluation. They stressed that nobody can speak for you, you know yourself the best. It is healthy to frequently step back and assess the way you are doing things or your choice of action. Other people can suggest things but until you assess them for yourself you will never know if they are right for your personally. The second point is challenge. The instructor brought up an interesting thought that we should truly feel challenged in school. The classroom is one of the greatest places to challenge ourselves. She really felt that if you weren’t truly feeling challenged in school then you were doing something wrong. It is healthy to be challenged in a good way. It builds you as a person and is the only way for you to improve your intelligence and success. The final point support. You simply can’t do everything yourself. This can mean instructors, resources and talent. People get to where they are by the ones of things that aided them. It is nice to be independent but you cant always rely on personal skill or tools.
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