ADEMOLA OLUTOSIN ONASHILEMBA Class Assignments on Aston Blair Inc. Case & Change Signature

MBA Class AssignmentsSpring 2015Business School, SeinjokiBusiness AdministrationInternational Business

TABLE OF CONTENTS

table of contents21ASTON BLAIR INC. CASE31.1Introductory Background information on Aston Blair company & case31.2The problems facing Bacon at the end of the case41.3Evolution of the problems 91.4Actions to be taken and the reasons for the actions112CHANGE SIGNATURE102.1Introduction: Leadership framework102.2 Change signature 11 2.2.1 My Past Self language13 2.2.2 My Developed Self 15 2..2.3 My Underdeveloped Self 16 2..2.4 My Future Self17 2..2.5 Integration19

References 21

1. ASTON BLAIR INC. CASE1.1 The introductory background information on the Aston-Blair Company & caseAccording to (Aston-Blair Case, 1993: M-6, 11), this case study in question Aston-Blair Inc. focuses on a particular company which is the 3rd biggest in its industry in the US and its major specialization is on the manufacturing of precious metal alloys and other specialized alloy for commercial and industrial purposes.The establishments efforts and feats had been notably felt in the USA for its massive contributions in the metal industry whereby the circulation of its products like precious metal accessories have always reached the buyers and dealers nationwide uninterruptedly. In return, this has added positively to the growth and profitability bottom-line of the company over years. However, unprecedently the firm expressed a downturn approach in its profitability level by recording losses in the 1st quarter of 1991 also with the expectation of subsequent massive losses in the 2nd quarter in the same year; this was as a result of economic meltdown and a decline in price of gold in the early 1990s.Therefore, Wynn Aston, the CEO and chairman of the board strongly felt that poor forecasting tends to be one of the underlying factors responsible for companys below-par performance and consequently, had a rapport with Peter Casey, the Vice President( Marketing) and Chris Trott, the Vice President (Corporate Planning) to investigate the companys procedures for forecasting sales which he believed could in turn cause an improved turnaround in inventory control, financial planning and production scheduling.Subsequently, Trott and Casey assembled a task force to investigate the forecasting problem. They did mandate that the task force should focus its finding on the Marketing Division, because this is where the final forecasts for product demand are created. They allocated members to this task force and decided that Michael Bacon, who is a MBA student, should lead the task force (Aston-Blair Case, 1993: M-6, 12).As it is stated in (Aston-Blair Case, 1993: M-6, 14) the task force team are 8 in numbers and the team comprises of following people whose names, ages and designated positions are stated below accordingly: Michael Bacon (28) chairman task force: Market planning analyst and assistant to the vice president of corporate planning. Vicki Reiss (27) Financial planning analyst; representative of Corporate Planning Robert Holt (54) corporate development specialist; rep. of Corporate Planning. Peter Ratliff (47), Product manager (Nonferrous Products Market Group); representative of Marketing Division. Charles Paulson (43) Product manager (precious Metals, Commercial Applications Market Group); representative of Marketing Division. David Kolinsky (48) Product Manager (Precious Metals, Industrial Applications Market Group); representative of Marketing Division. Emile Bodin (58) Specialist assistant to the vice president of sales; representative of Sales Division Randy Meir (28) Economic Analyst; representative of the Economic Analysis and Economic Forecasting Group.

1. 2 The problems facing Bacon at the end of the caseTherefore, Bacons involvement in the task force exposes him to encounter some weaknesses which hindered the success of the task force, and this section of this write-up tends to highlight accordingly what the challenges are.This is very crucial to understand that teams are quite different from individuals. The issues Bacon faced came as a result of him being the leader of a team. Teams are group of people who tend to invest a tremendous amount of time and effort exploring, shaping, and agreeing on a purpose that belongs to them both collectively and individually (Katzenbach & Smith, 2005). According to (Schermerhorn etal, 1998) a team is seen to be a small work group of people with complementary skills, who work together to achieve a common purpose for which they hold themselves collectively accountable. Whereas, work team is said to generate positive synergy through coordinated efforts (Robbins, 2003).There is no team that has no problem at any point in time. Even a football team cannot be a champion all the time. You win some and you lose some, but when the team is being faced with incessant losses, then that allows the football club management to ask questions about the competence and capability of the team coach. Things may seem to be rosy at the initial stage of forming a team, but along the line there may be some challenges. The ability of the team leader to stand above all odds and organize the team despite the team problems to accomplish the desired results and common goals despites is actually the reason the case Bacons problems in the case is important to analysis.Having critically, carefully and thoroughly read through the case over and over again, it was found out those challenges Bacon was faced with as the task force leader are:(i) Lack of proper team structure & proper work design: Since Trott & Casey who happened to be major stakeholders in Aston-Blair company had concluded that the main area for the task force team to examine should be the Marketing Division. Therefore, it could have been of valuable input to have included at least one of the Market Managers in the task force team. Only the Product Managers were included in the task force which was not a good decision as many of the problems raised during the final presentation on the August 4 would have been seen earlier during the task force initial meetings and could have been ironed put to a barest minimum.More importantly, during the setting up of the task force relevant and vital questions like, How? Why? What? Who? were not asked at all by either Trott, Casey & Bacon. And that seems to be the genesis of Bacons problems as the task force head. For any team to effectively succeed in a project, relevant questions as these must be asked accordingly: What are the issues? Why is a task force needed? What should be the size of the team? Who should be participating? Who should lead? What are the skill sets needed? How should the approach of the task force be? When should the deadline be kept? How much decision-making power the team shall have? (Heerkens, 2002).And Bacon never sold the idea to the Marketing Managers to both Trott & Casey at the initial stage. There was no proper structure from the beginning on what to do by who? And that is why team lacks balance in the area of structure and Bacon should have carried both Trott & Casey along so as for that platform to have been created at the beginning of forming the task force team. According to (Robbins, 2003) team structure enables team members to agree on who to do what and ensure that all members contribute equally in sharing the workload. Team design in (Ancona, etal, 2009) is seen to be the way in which teams are put together, including their composition, the nature of their task, and their structure. Also, Bacon failed to create a proper Work design for the task force team. According to (Robbins, 2003) a team effectiveness Model must have a Work Design which includes: Autonomy, Skill Variety, Task identity and Task significance. Bacon should have solicited from Trott & Casey for a Team Autonomy & power as that would have assisted the team to be independent enough in getting any needed information in any division or department whatsoever. One could see that some stakeholders were laid back and not open enough in giving vital information to the task force as at when due and needed. Moreso, he failed to study the Sales forecasting issue enough on his own as that could have made him insist on making including at least one of the Marketing Managers. He also did not check the skill sets of each member of the team to see how he could blend them together to achieve the team goal. Roles allocations should be based on skill sets and preference (Robbins, 2003).Bacon should also have considered the size of the team. It is not the high number of people that matters but the key and knowledgeable persons whose inputs are valuable towards achieving the aim of the team. (ii) Non-presence of team norms: According to (Schermerhorn etal, 1998) a group or team norms are said to be the ideas or beliefs about the behaviours team members are expected to display. These are the rules or standards of behaviours that apply team members. Putting norms in place in a team or organization encourages information sharing (Ancona, etal, 2009).Did Bacon as the task force head ever at the beginning or at any point in time set standard rules for the team to follow? No! There was no explicitly documented. There is an English adage that says in a country that there is no law, there is no sin. Everyone could do as he pleases-. No wonder, Bodin could confide in Bacon and Reiss to hiding vital information away from the whole team which could have been shared and allowed the task force team worked on it together to achieve a common goal. Meirs absence on a crucial meeting which made him missed some vital information on the systematic biases in the Sales Divisions input into the forecasting could have been avoided if there were regulated norms for the task force team. Also, obeying the constituted authority would have also been put to bear if the team had a norms to follow. For example, Bacon was not given absolute respect irrespective of his little- weighted status (position) in the organization but for being the task force head, he could have been shown some level of respect by the team members. The non-availability of the team norms made nonsense of the internal team processes and this allowed for confusion and team conflict most of the time when the team met to discuss on the project. (Ancona, etal, 2009) saw internal team processes as the ways in which team members interact with each other to accomplish the task and to keep themselves together as a team.(iii) Bad leadership skill (that is, poor management & planning): Bacon jointly decided the presentation date together with Trott & Casey without having a prior consultation with his team members. The other task forces members were not properly carried along. He ought to have held a meeting with his team members, discussed agenda, set up goals, and then decided on a preferable presentation date before giving a nod of approval about the fixed team presentation date.Poor management as Bacon did not ask Trott and Casey to attend the team meetings at least the first startup meeting. In fact, through that Trott and Casey would have been aware of the teams viewpoints regarding the presentation deadline. Both of them remained unaware of the task forces setting up of goals, operating guidelines, what resources they might need, Bodins inability to present his report on August 4th. (In the first meeting Bodin told Bacon that his report would possibly not be ready before the August 4 presentation).One could easily question the leadership quality of Bacon as a task force leader who does not defend his team when all chips are down. He was seen not to believe in Meirs ideas from the outset. He also never treated all the team members equally: Bacon spent most of his time with other team members except for Meir.(iv) Ineffective team collaboration: There was ineffective team member participation. There was no form of brainstorming by the task force during the initial meetings. According to (Schermerhorn etal, 1998) Brainstorming is seen as one of the ways to improve group decision making. (Robbins, 2003) puts it brainstorming to overcome pressures for conformity in the interacting team that retard the development of creative alternatives. This is done by utilizing an idea-generation process that specifically encourages any and all alternatives, while withholding any criticism of those alternatives. In the case it was found out that the Product Managers mostly remained silent and Bacon never encouraged them to participate. As a matter of fact, members did not get to introduce themselves to know each others relevant skill sets and experience at any point in the project. This is often times responsible for insufficient exchanges of information. Also, Bacon solely agreed to Holts suggestion without brainstorming with all the task force members in the first meeting whether the team should be divided into sub-groups or not.(v) Lack of transparency, weak communication & poor feedback mechanism: (Schermerhorn etal, 1998) stated that team work does not always occur naturally with Bacon together within a group; this is a goal that team members and their leader alike must work hard to achieve. Any behaviour that is seen as withdrawing and refusing to cooperate in a team is called disruptive behaviour and such could hamper the team process (Schermerhorn etal, 1998). Thus, Bodin and Reiss decided not to report any of Bodins findings at the presentation which is not the right thing to do. Lack of credibility and accountability on Bacons part due to this decision taken by him to have known about this happening and swept it under the carpet together with them seems to ask a certain question about his level of integrity, transparency and credibility to information sharing in a team process.One could also see that Bacon left Trott and Casey in the dark by not briefing them from time to time regarding the progress of the team. The team together with its head or only the task force head should have been giving adequate feedback to the Management team because for any project to succeed, top management supports matter a lot. And if there is was by chance any misconception of idea when briefing the stakeholders (top management) about the progress of the findings, a drastic measure would have been taken appropriately. The ideal situation should have been that Bacon before August 4 would have informed Trott and Casey beforehand how they have worked on the report so far. In that way both of them could actually defend the task force when the Market Managers became critical and impatient about the presentation findings.1.3 Evolution of the problemsHow did all these problem crop up? It would be imperative to take a critical look on the evolution of the problems so that one could later see which actions to be taken regarding the problems.Leadership problem was evolved as result of using most of rookies in a critical companys project. Bacon and some of his other MBA contemporaries never had much experience on projects and Bacons human relations skill is questionable because as leader. You must not let your emotion influence your decision. He allowed his past strained relationship to affect the current project as it affects the issue with Meir which caused individual rivalry. His inability to defend Meir when the Marketing Mangers raised criticisms concerning their findings. A leader must be able to stand by his team as what they did was supposed to be a collective effort towards a common goal. His inability to play the right politics to get the support of the Product Managers and some top stakeholders also caused an issue for him. Also, his inability of keeping the senior management informed caused the future opposition for them.The absence of norms for the team made all the task force members to be nonchalant in their attitudes towards the task and also how they could relate with the outside would. There were no rules set regarding the project. If there boundary management rule concerning external persons for instance, a lot of issue could have been avoided. The Boundary management according to (Acona, etal, 2009) shows the way in which teams define their boundaries, identify key external constituencies, and interact with those outsiders. Bacon as the head of the task force team should have solicited for these rules from the outset.Key top management decision also caused some of the problems that Bacon and his team encountered as they quickly came to conclusion that the Marketing Managers were not needed in the project. From the outset, Trott and Casey did not see any reason why the Marketing Managers should be included instead they opted for the Product Managers (who directly report to the Marketing Managers) as they saw them to have been resistant to similar change in procedures in the past. In the ideal sense of doing things if not all the Marketing Mangers, some of them should have been included in the team. Evidently put as what ensued between the Marketing Managers and Holt during the presentation: during the fierce argument, one of the market managers, Robert replied Holt that frankly, I am amazed that this kind of nonsense could come from you? Youve been around here enough to know our businesses better than to come up with this nonsense. Therefore, if the top management decision had been to have included the Marketing Managers, the ugly situation that happened could have been avoided.The team lacks cohesiveness and it was had to trust one another and that even affected the communication network between the task force members. This was a result of not checking properly the team diversity before forming the team. If a diversity in a team is not properly managed. It could cause lack of trust and transparency in the relationship among the team members and that is what happened that Meir felt that his direct superior (Dr. Cornelius) was meant to have been made the head of the team. Also, Bodin not sharing vital information because of his own direct superior (Jed Burns)s influence on the issue.1.4 Actions to be taken and reasons for the actions.One could say that Bacon and his task force team had failed to impress the top management regarding the Sales forecasting project and going by the last statement on the case which was said by Reiss after what transpired between Bacon, Cornelius and Reiss and was directed to Bacon that youve got a problem man, which youd better fix in a hurry. This shows that Bacon needs to re-strategize as the head of the team so as not to be called a total failure. The statement raised a pointer to Bacon that the ball is in his court as the task force head. Therefore, he could actually take these follow actions: Firstly, it would be advisable that Bacon should have an urgent private meeting with Trott and Casey as the key stakeholders regarding the actualization of the Sales forecasting project. He should brief them that the meeting can be postponed to a later date instead of reconvening by 3pm as the team still needs to finally discuss and fine turn some of their findings for an improved presentation.Secondly, Bacon could also solicit for Trott and Casey to be involved in the task force next meeting as this would give the task force members sense of belonging and getting top management support which is a sense of motivation in the team. This motivation will help them to forge ahead and get their team defended from any criticism whatsoever. With the involvement of these two top management persons, the team could attract some certain power, credibility and in the long run could make the Marketing Managers accept the findings and recommendations. According to (Acona, etal, 2009) getting buy-in is seen to persuade others that supporting your initiative will serve their interests.Thirdly, the task force team could have a concrete integrative bargaining session with the Marketing Managers which would help them get some vital facts from the Marketing Division and develop a model or strategy to get the forecasting task done. Integrative bargaining tends to seek for settlement that can create a win-win situation (Huczynski & Buchanan, 2007)Fourthly, team members should spend more time together which allows for improvement in the team relationship and communication network. Doing this would build and improve the climate of trust in the team and therefore leads to cooperation and kicks out individual rivalry among the team members. Bacon should access channels of communication so as to be having frequent contact with the team members even when they are not physically together. He could devise the use of social media like Twitter, Facebook & Skype. He can also send mails and set deadlines for deliverables accordingly.Fifthly, Bacon should improve on his Leadership & Human Relation skills. He should try to get everybody on board to work together as a team. He should be too close to a particular team at the expense of the other sub-group. He should possibly try to work things out with those he had already had strained relationships with in the past. He should learn how to make firm and sound decisions without being pushed here and there by the team members. He should carry all the team members along and incessantly giving the top management feedback about the running of the project. He should allow for brainstorming sessions regarding the projects. He should also create a flexible and short norm (rules) for the team to follow. If Bacon takes into cognizance all points raised under this improving leadership skills, then there would be cohesiveness in his team. Come to think of it: What makes a leader? According to (Acona, etal, 2009) one key asset all our leaders share, whether young or old, is their adaptive capacity. The ability to process new experiences, to find their meaning and to integrate them into one's life, is the signature skill of leaders and, indeed, of anyone who finds ways to live fully and well.

2. CHANGE SIGNATURE 2.1 Introduction: Leadership frameworkTo set the ball rolling, one could see that the leadership framework is the combination of leadership capabilities and leaders change signature. The leadership capabilities according to (Ancona etal, 2009) tell more on how leaders act in tough times or under threats to gain credibility. In their book, they focused more on on the distributive nature of leadership as it spreads across all levels in today's flat, networked, and flexible organizations. (Ancona etal, 2009) The leadership capabilities are structured into 4 parts which are:Visioning: creating a compelling image of the future, that is what could be.Sense making: creates a map of what is. Inventing: creating new ways of working together.Relating: creating interpersonal relationship that yields desired results. Therefore, the four capabilities focus on what leaders do while the change signature focuses on who the leader is. Thus, the leaders change signature is what makes the leadership capabilities of a leader meaningful because it is the characteristic way that he or she makes things happen. 2.2 CHANGE SIGNATURE

2.2.1 MY PAST SELF: This represents my core values and skills built over the years or in my formative years. Therefore, answering the following questions would throw more light on what my past self is as touching change signature.What values did my family stress? And did I adopt or fight against such values? The value that my parent stressed during my formative years are spiritual values like you must be God-fearing, trustworthy, be a person of integrity and also be diligent in any task given one to do. Therefore, my spirited effort of being a hardworking person had made me craved for being resilient in any tough situation I found myself. I have this never say die attitude. I wrote Secondary school exams 5 times before I could gain admission into the higher institution as I never gave up. Ordinarily, someone else in this same situation might have given up totally.Who were my heroes? And what values did I take from them? My heroes are no longer alive. They are Late Dr. Nelson Mandela and late Chief Obafemi Awolowo. I strongly learnt through them how to be resilient in tough times. Also, their inclinations towards good governance are what I have endeared to my heart so passionately.How did I in my own capacity gain recognition and self-esteem? Before I came to Finland to study there was a vacant position in my local church for a football coach that would not be paid salary but just take up the football team, and train them to win matches. Because I love football and have passion for leadership, I was motivated to grab the job offer and I did not only win matches for the team but I won Laurels and I even used my own personal funds to buy the team jerseys and other kits. When I came to Finland, I did receive several calls that many lives had been positively impacted through the church football team that championed.What skills did I begin to develop in my formative years? What are my leadership experiences in school, at home with my friends? And how did I lead? During my formative years as a young tertiary student ( an undergraduate), I was always giving motivational speeches in public events in the schools and churches. Also, I was helping my mother to run the family business (a grocery shop) which I did for several years. I led by always giving constant feedback to my mother about the sales forecasting and the plans of our competitors: These were tender age initiatives of mine had made me become the focused man I am at the present time. The grocery shop is still in existing today while many of its competitors had quit because of lack corporate governance.What values, skills and patterns of leading are parts of my past self? Over the years I have had this value of resilient effort towards surviving in harsh conditions or surviving in a volatile environment. My interpersonal communication skill and public speaking skill were also being developed from my past life.2.2.2 MY DEVELOPED SELF: This represents the kind of leader I would want to be in the future by mirroring the leaders in the business world, government, my community or my family that I admire. What best described the values and skills that I have honed? Being a spirited, well- focused, trustworthy, excellence striving individual with good interpersonal communication skill, self-motivated with little or no supervision, good listening, analytical minded and problem-solving reasoning are the values and skills I have honed.What have conflicts-between work and family, between team and the rest of organization, between personal values and company demands- shown me about what is really important to me? I am this type of person that does not like my office work (task) to conflict with family matters because I believe that if the work ends family will always remain and abide with you forever. I try to work by set deadlines so as to avoid unnecessary pressure at home. Therefore, for the conflict between my personal values and company demands. It depends if my honesty, trustworthy nature and integrity will be rubbished in the bid of company demand, then I would have to make a solid consideration towards standing by these good values I had built over the years. On a final note, the conflict between the team and the rest of organization is critical because I will always want to give the best to my team because without my success in the team, the top management and others in the organization would not recognize me.Am I best known as an analytic person, a problem solver, a visionary or a people person? I have always been a problem-solving person all my life as I am very proactive in nature and that could be seen in a case of how I helped my former local church football team in Nigeria out of lack of leadership and structure for the football team. This equally had made me become a peoples person. I am easily attracted to people as friends and family members love to always be around me: I do talk a lot but I have developed listening skills lately.What leadership challenges have I accepted? My taking up an additional role in my local church in Nigeria to be a Sport Director as I had successfully helped to form and stabilize a football team. This calls for me to give constant and regular feedback to the pastor (my leader in this context) on upcoming and planned sporting events and soliciting for funds for such events. I was doing these as I was also a professional banker in Nigeria with tight schedule during week days and I needed to train the players over the weekend to be in good shape for any sudden football competitions. I had to select a team captain to be deputizing me whenever I was not around. It was a very big leadership challenge for me. Today, I am in Finland and the team captain who succeeded me as the team manager had in a short space of time has done very well. What have I learned about myself as a leader as a result of these challenges? Leadership should not be a one-man show: It should be distributive in nature. As a leader you need to have trust in your followers. Today, the football team captain I selected in the past had now become the team manager, and recorded some outstanding feats. If I had not delegated the responsibility to him then, the church might have not had a football coach/ manager today because of my absence. Therefore, I had learnt that leaders should always ensure to influence their followers to do whatever task given to them well because by so doing, they themselves are preparing for future leadership position.How would others describe my change signature? People would see my change signature as leader who is a mentor, honest, a well-focused, disciplined, goal-oriented, and problem-solving personality.2.2.3 MY UNDERDEVELOPED SELF: This represents the part of me that has somehow being ignored and neglected. Areas of myself that have been neglected and how I intend to begin develop them? I think I take constructive criticism too personal at times. And I could be rigid at times when I found myself in management position thinking that if I am too subtle that people could take advantage of me. Many at times, if I need to make decision, I am not decisive enough as I am always asking myself What would people say if I do this..? And this makes me even neglect or totally ignore some supposedly good decisions in the past. For improvement, I need to value and consider other peoples opinions and allow for constructive criticisms as this will not kill but help me to be better off. I also need to be decisive in my decision making most times. Leaders need to be decisive and spot on in their decision making processes.What kind of plan can I put together to move aspects of myself from the underdeveloped to the developed side of the diamond? Moving from the aspects of my underdeveloped self to the developed side of the diamond: First and foremost, instead of becoming overly rigid I will plan to be now flexible, tactful and diplomatic in my interpersonal relationship with people as being rigid does not necessary attract respect from ones team member or subordinates or followers. I will going forward operate an open-door policy where people are free to advise me and I will improve on my listening skills to be able to carefully listen to people in order to decipher those that are reasonable in their opinions and discard the unreasonable advice. And finally, I need to work enormously on my critical and analytical reasoning so as for me to make decisive and vital decisions as at when due as my being indecisive and not being spot on could mar ones bid of becoming a good leader.2.2.4 MY FUTURE SELF: This represents the kind of leader I would want to be in the future by mirroring the leaders in the business world, government, my community or my family that I admire. Firstly, my aspiration in life is to become a trust-worthy politician as serving people has always been my dream. I love giving account for whatever I do. Politicians are meant to be responsible to people and get accountable for their actions. They are entrusted with the tax-payers funds and need to judiciously manage it to better the lives of the people voted them in. But most African nations today are experience a revised trend in that situation because most leaders in Nigeria for example are not seeing stealing government money as corruption as this is enormously responsible for slow development of infrastructure in the region. Therefore, most of the old and dead African leaders where not like that they served and led with good hearts and people enjoyed the dividends of democracy during their times and the countries were free of corruption compared to what it is today.I would reckon with leaders late Chief Obafemi Awolowo and late Dr. Nelson Mandela. These two icons served as African leaders. The latter was the former and first black South African president who was resilient anti-apartheid convener. He was imprisoned for 27 years in the bid of his fighting for South African independence and advocating for the maltreatment of black Africans in South Africa. Mandelas government was seen to be free of corruption and he was well respected across the globe. And was fondly called Madiba. While the former is being tagged today as the best president Nigeria never had. Awo as he fondly called was a lawyer; he was one of those that fought for Nigerias independence in 1960. He was once for jailed for 10years and later released to help build the nations economy because of his incorruptible way and keen eye for excellence. He was ganged up against by his political opponents and he never became the president but his brilliance, good leadership virtues, trustworthiness, resilience, simplicity and most importantly, his incorruptible mannerism cannot be forgotten in the Nigeria of today.(http://obafemiawolowofoundation.org/awo_bio.php) (https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography)What aspects of Awo and Madibas leadership would I like to incorporate into my own? Their abilities of coping during tough times. And their undying passion to serve through good governance or management.If I think about the end of my career, what would I want people to say about me? I would like to see that during my tenure as a leader or manager that many lives were seen to have been impacted positively. And I would have equally loved to see my type of core values being left as footprint in any company I worked or under any government I served.If a head hunter called a colleague of mine and ask about what kind of leader he/she thinks I am, what do I wish they would say? What skills, abilities and values would I have to develop to get there? Perhaps, if colleagues of mine were asked to give their opinion about the kind of leader I am. I would rather they see me as a upright thinking, intelligent, disciplined, trusted, honest, down-to-earth, exemplary, problem solving and peoples person.Therefore, to get these done I need to get a leadership course done in Harvard on leadership and good governance. Improvement on my listening skills, negotiation and interpersonal communication skills will help me to attain that height within a short space of time.If I think about the things I would like to do, the kind of person I would like to be and what I need to do to be able to get there? After my tertiary studies, I would like to get a job in the government establishment where I could learn how distributive leadership is being channeled in this sector as I have worked all my life in the private sector as this will make me have a mix of both public and private perspectives of leadership or management. My intention for doing all these is because of my aspiration to hold political position in my country in the future and anyone that wants to be in government should know how parastatals are well run. I would have to contest in the future to represent my regional constituencies as a politician but before then, I would have to cater for the needs of the people in my region like helping them to get good borehole drinkable water, help in the renovation of dilapidated primary and college school buildings which the government had abandoned as this would make the people vote for me. All this footing of the bills is at my own expense. Also, I would like to gain my MBA qualification which I am presently doing and also earn some diplomas in Leadership courses in the USAs Harvard University. Also, I will want to get a course done too on public speaking for leaders. I want to be a honest, trustworthy, disciplined, focused and result-oriented manager or leader. For me to get to that place of leadership in Nigeria, I have to return back to Nigeria and work for a few years to understand more of public sector life as I had worked intermittently for 6years before coming to Finland to study.2.2.5 INTEGRATION: Integration in question is actually focusing on the aforementioned four areas of me and my personal credo; which are: My Past Self, My developed self, My Underdeveloped self and My future self and with a view to seeing how these four vital personality analyses can be well aligned together.A critical pondering on what is the most important to me now? In order to integrate the four previous personal (self) analyses done, the most important thing for me now is getting skill acquisition regarding Leadership & Politics as this help me learn some tenets of democracy and good governance .And I would also want to attend a Finish school where one is being taught on how to behave in a poised manner. For example, President, Prime ministers, Governors, Mayors and Captains of industries are meant to act in some organized ways a lay man on the street would not act. Lastly, I will then like to get myself acquainted with a political party in Nigeria where I know that is I could get recognition easily in my region with a view of contesting for leadership position(s) in the nearest future.What directional plans are to be created to achieving my life aspiration?My directional plans are stated as follows: Finish my MBA in SeAMK which is key in contesting for a government office in Nigeria. Save money to attend a school like Harvard in the USA and do some short courses on Leadership & good governance. Attend a Finish school to learn leadership mannerism & distinctive habitual styles. Join a political party in Nigeria where I know the leaders are not corrupt as that would guide my credo of working with trustworthy persons which has always been one of my personal values. Get a job in a Nigerian government parastatal where I can let people learn from me that stealing government is not a good virtue. Contest for a political position and aim to serve the people, my region and my country well enough so that I can be seen as visionary and exemplary leader.referencesAncona,D, Kochan,T, Mannen,J & Westney. 2009. Managing For the Future (Organozational Behaviour & Processes) South Western Cengage Learning (USA). 3rd Edition.Heerkens, G. 2002. Project Management. McGraw-Hill Professional.Huczynski, A & Buchanan, D. 2007.Organizational Behaviour (Instant Access to Online Learning) Pearson Education Intl. (Englland). 6th Edition.Katzenbach, J & D, Smith. 2005. The Discipline of Teams. Harvard Business Review, July-August (https://hbr.org/2005/07/the-discipline-of-teams) dated: 25.04.2015Robbins, S. 2003 .Organizational Behaviour. Pearson Education Intl. (NewJersey). Interntaional Edition.Schermerhon, J, Hunt , J & Osborn , R. 1998. Basic Organizational Behaviour. John Wiley& Sons Inc. 2nd Edition.

(http://obafemiawolowofoundation.org/awo_bio.php) dated :05.05.2015

(https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography) dated :05.05.2015