Julie Womble-Part III

I have read this book for a few of my classes, and every time I read a chaper or a section again, I learn lots of new things and refresh on the old. This section focuses on groups, roles, organizations, and communities. It is important to recognize your role, and others roles in a group so that you can maximize on everyones strengths and not have people working on things that may be their weaknesses. People may and will have more than one role, and then it is good to get different perspectives on that role. If you have too many that are in one role, you will have an unbalanced group and could end up having lots of conflict, or may not work as effectively. Some examples of roles are: information seeker, opinion seeker, opinion giver, summarizer, clarifier, gatekeeper, encourager, mediator, follower. These are all very important to roles and to the process of leadership. Conflict is healthy and can be good for a group in order to get the most out of the group. It can increase motivation and energy, it can clarify issues and positions, it can build internal cohesiveness, can lead to creativity, create self awareness, and can lead to new ideas. If too much or not productive it can distract from the achievement of the goal, cause defensiveness and rigidity, cause distractions of reality, become a negatively reinforcing cycle, can lead to more issues, and efforts to resolve sometimes do not happen. Good leaders dont shy away from conflict or ignore it. They take it on and try to grow from it. Groups need to work together and colloborate their ideas and come to a consensus, which means that everyone has to sacrifice... it doesnt just mean that majority rules.