My Crucible Experience

During my career, I lived through a number of experiences that enriched me as a person, and as a leader. Webster’s New World dictionary describes an experience as “the act of living through an event or events; personal involvement in or observation of events as they occur”. Each individual deals with such experiences according to their personality, yet some of them create such profound effects, that they transform the individual’s sense of identity or the way that a person perceives his environment. Now, those events are called crucible experiences and induce us to reflect on what we have encountered. Hence, exposure to such affairs within professional situations often defines future steps to take within an organization as an organizational level leader. I consider the Intermediate Level Education (ILE) at the Command and General Staff College (CGSC) such a crucible experience, as it will affect my ability to influence people, to implement change within an organization, and above all to develop a clear leadership philosophy.

Though some people will criticize me for writing this essay before the end of the course, and I’ll probably reflect even more on this period in Fort Leavenworth within two or three years, this experience already impacted intensely my life. After seven months, I observed sufficiently to summarize some initial teaching points. With this paper I limit myself to the influence ILE has on my professional development, and not the experiences I encountered during my travels or personal contacts. Above this, I consider it obvious that I learned to value the importance of persons and things I appreciate in my home country.

The presence in a different cultural environment away from trusted surroundings, encircled by ...

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...the Command and General Staff College. L100 Book of Readings (Fort Leavenworth, KS: USASGSC, August 2011), 125 to 136.

Gene Klann, Dr., “The Application of Power and Influence in Organizational Leadership”. Reproduced by and for the Command and General Staff College. L100 Book of Readings (Fort Leavenworth, KS: USASGSC, August 2011), 65 to 68.

Yvonne, Doll and Billy Miller, “Applying the Kotter Model: Making a Transformational Change in a Large Organization”. Reproduced by the Command and General Staff College. L100 Book of Readings (Fort Leavenworth, KS: USASGSC, August 2011), 97 to 103.

Gerald F. Sewell, LTC (US Army retired), “Self-Awareness and Leadership Philosophy: Why Leaders Need One and Why They Need to Write It Down”. Reproduced by the Command and General Staff College. L100 Book of Readings (Fort Leavenworth, KS: USASGSC, August 2011), 409 to 414