Coursera Assignment Examples Week 1_040814

8/20/2019 Coursera Assignment Examples Week 1_040814

1/9

Week 1 Assignment: Starting Total Leadership

This document provides examples of responses to the questions asked in the Week 1 Assignment:

Starting Total Leadership. These examples are provided as a guide to demonstrate what an

excellent response looks like. They were all composed by Wharton students (some of whom were

in our Executive MBA program, called “WEMBA”). They each gave permission for their responses

to be shared with future students.

1.A Alumni Reflections

This exercise helps you understand more of what our course is about, from the perspective of

people who have taken it. Please view at least two of the Reflections videos on the TLTV Network

page of our Total Leadership Web site. Then write a comment about each of these two video clips

(in a short paragraph for each) describing what you learned from listening to these alumni

speaking about their experience.

Please note that on the Reflections channel there are two kinds of videos: Reflections (from Basile

through Winters) and Q&A (starting with "Changes in Alignment?"). Please view two of the

Reflections videos, not the Q&A videos.

Example 1

Deika Morrison - Deika describes that as Wharton students we feel like getting to CEO is the

“end game,” but upon reaching this high perch we discover “there’s nothing there.” As an

achievement-oriented person, I am constantly seeking to overcome successively more

difficult challenges. I enjoy the feeling of accomplishment but must quickly find a new

“mountain to climb” or I feel stagnant. What Deika describes is consistent with my

experience, in that there may not be anything at the top of the mountain other than a

fleeting, selfish moment. She advises that Total Leadership helped her appreciate the

importance of the “means” of travelling through life rather than just the looking to the


2/9

“end.” I hope to gain a similar reorientation through the course, so that I can be more

settled in how I am living my life in each moment instead of racing to the finish line.

Kirk Brown - Based on his experience, Kirk relates his observation that ineffective leaders

weren’t clear in their personal visions. He describes the importance of understanding where

you’re headed before you can expect others to follow you. I feel that I hold a wi de variety of

interests, passions, and observations of activities that I’m good at and enjoy doing. My

experiences at Wharton have yielded a wealth of fresh insights, through countless courses

and interpersonal challenges. What I haven’t yet done is method ically establish order to

these thoughts and feelings, while at the same time considering my broader life priorities,

such as my family. Making sense of who I am and matching this understanding to

opportunities and choices in the external environment has often felt overwhelming. At the

same time, I can attest that living without a clear vision has been unbelievably taxing. Kirk

has helped me see that defining my vision now is vital to establishing stability and purpose

in my life while enabling me to begin exercising true leadership. My vision today doesn’t

have to be perfect; I need to start somewhere and I can always revise and update it

tomorrow.

Example 2

Deika Morrison Clip. A few comments from Deika that resonated with me include:

“There is no course that the requirement is you.”

“This course is has been transformational in all domains.”

Deika’s clip was inspirational and eye-opening with regard to the “transformational”

journey to come. It certainly feels more real now. I feel that I am just scratching at the

surface of some really powerful and life changing decisions and opportunities but not sure

how to dig in and go about establishing a solid plan of action (or framework) to proceed

forward. It feels very easy to continue putting off improvements in myself given how busy I


3/9

am …but this will only intensify over time. NOW is the time to invest in my commitment to

this class in order to achieve the desired outcomes. I am open to improvement.

Deika’s comments also reinforced my concern that I am not doing a good job

communicating with those who matter around me. NOW is the time to force myself to look

inward and better engage the key stakeholders around me.

Kirk Brown Clip - I was intrigued by the “tools, approaches and skill sets needed to ext ract

knowledge and deliverable from key stakeholders” that Kirk talked about vis-à-vis how to

influence those around us. This is an area where I feel that I can greatly improve. I was

also taken by his comment about the importance of vision and understanding where going

before trying to lead people. Through the course, he came to realize that a lot of the people

he didn’t respect don’t have a vision of where they’re going. I feel that I may be in a similar

position now with a co-worker and look forward to learning more about this in class.

The importance of stakeholder dialogues also resonated with me. As I am reflecting and

writing responses to the first set of exercises, I am realizing more and more that my

communications with some (if not all) of the key stakeholders in my life has just scratched

the surface and there is likely serious room for improvement here that could have powerful

consequences. For example, I am not sure that I have ever asked or been told by the

partners’ at my firm what their expectations are of me? I know very clearly what I expect of

myself and communicate this to them but sense that there could be a major misalignment

here. I look forward to learning more.

Finally, Kirk’s comment about “continuing to experiment” also hit home. Right now, I feel

somewhat restless. I am at Wharton to create change and opportunity. The last eight

years professionally have felt somewhat stagnant, and I feel a strong desire to be further

challenged and achieve more. I am agitating for a new direction and need to further reflect

here and better clarify this feeling.


4/9

Example 3

Rich Cisek - I think Rich’s comments are so common amongst so many of us with the same

way we live our lives and the types of people that are very driven to do something

different. One comment that struck out to me was how he had reflected on his life and his

professional accomplishments. Rich noted that despite all of the grand achievements that

he had made towards his organization and work circle, it didn’t mean much in the grand

scheme of things with his life. I feel the same way. I use my wife as a litmus test for

this. As a younger man, I had the unique opportunity (more like mandatory suggestion) to

attend the US Army’s elite Ranger school. A 62-day “fun filled” experience that is deemed

the Army’s “premier leadership school”. More like it was 62 days of hunger, sleep

deprivation, carrying heavy loads on our back, and leading others under the most extreme

conditions ending with 30 lbs of weight loss and a small piece of cloth on your shoulder that

cost $0.50 at the store. The day I graduated was one of the happiest days of my life. When

I explained this to my wife when we were dating, she shrugged her shoulders and asked

me, “So why did you do this if it was so terrible?”. I asked myself the same question and

what it actually equated to in my life. Since t hen, I’ve tried to live my life in parallel like Rich

talks about, pushing myself to the extreme and never accepting defeat or failure as a final

outcome.

Deika Morrison - Great perspectives- it’s not about the results. Deika’s comments are about

how I work and how I live life. It’s about the process of getting there that make the results

so much worth while. I wouldn’t have come to Wharton and much less the EMBA program

unless I wanted to experience a challenge, push myself to the limits, learn about myself, and

start a different path. I think Deika was trying to say that she just wasn’t comfortable or

understood herself. That’s what I want to get out of this. Like with my comments above on

Ranger school, the experience helped me learn about myself, my leadership style, and what

I didn’t want to become. I think the process is just as (if not more) important to this course

than the actual outcomes.


5/9

1.B Goals

As you are about to embark on your journey through our course, please describe, in a paragraph

or two, (a) what led you to sign up for it and (b) what you hope to gain from it. Take a few

moments to let your responses come to mind, then record your thoughts.

Example 1

One of the main reasons I came to business school and to Wharton specifically was for its

leadership programs as well as the immense opportunities to deepen my sense of self-

awareness, values and priorities. I have benefitted deeply from my experience to date with

the Ventures Program, both as a participant and Venture Fellow, as well as the Leadership

Development & Coaching Program (LDCP). I view Total Leadership as a way to take these

experiences to the next level and apply them directly to each facet of my life. The holistic

nature of TL is really incredible, as it will not only touch all parts of my life but also integrate

them in a beneficial way. Prior to getting started with TL, I didn’t fully consider the ways in

which I could realize synergies across various domains and this is one of the things I’m most

looking forward to in the class.

I hope to emerge from TL with a greater sense of purpose and the ability to continuously

achieve “four way wins” even as I undergo significant changes l ike starting a new career

path or beginning a significant relationship. I would like to be able to use TL principles to

improve productivity and satisfaction for myself and others in my life – e.g., to foster

greater morale and cohesiveness with teams and employees. Overall, I aim to become more

comfortable with seeing all aspects of my life as symbiotic elements that can and should

coexist in harmony and also intend to take steps to ensure that I am living my life in a way

that aligns with what is most important to me.

Example 2

After 16 months in the WEMBA program, I have observed that my formula for prioritizing

my time, energy, and commitment has had a concerning impact on important areas of my


6/9

life. I entered Wharton with a wealth of motivation to resolve an ongoing dilemma

regarding what I wanted to do in my career. Through the program’s intense demands and

my motivated approach to classes, I have gained the comprehensive learning experience I

had been seeking, building skills and relationships while deriving valuable new insights on

my career possibilities. During this period, I have been relentlessly motivated on a daily

basis to complete my schoolwork, in order to gain significant value from my classes but also

to generate free time to spend with my wife and 2-year old daughter. When I’m not in

Philadelphia, I am home for dinner in the evenings and I read my daughter bedtime stories

each night before putting her to bed. I feel actively involved as a father but at the same

time I am not nearly as emotionally available to my wife as I wish, and this bothers me.

Aside from school and my immediate family, I have completely pushed aside other vital

activities, such as keeping in touch with my parents, siblings, and friends, performing

necessary housework, and getting enough sleep. I have withdrawn from my previous

community service activities. My attention to schoolwork has often severely limited my

availability to even my wife and daughter, such as on a recent vacation with my side of the

family when I spent the majority of time at the library working on five concurrent, time-

consuming assignments while my wife and daughter were with my parents and siblings. I

have been performing considerable amounts of schoolwork at my job, which I feel guiltyabout at times. I rationalize it by ensuring that I am adequately fulfilling my work

responsibilities, by delegating development opportunities to my staff, and by recognizing

that my company is investing in my education so that I will deliver much greater

contributions in the future. Within my company, I have recently accepted a new job that will

begin in four months time and offers an appealing opportunity to impact the firm’s financial

strategy and planning processes. This will change the paradigm for me, as I will no longer

be able to complete homework on the job, and, knowing myself, I will seek to start my new position with a motivated and detail-oriented approach.

While WEMBA will end next year, my wife and I are concerned that a new, revitalized

career will merely replace the time and energy requirements of Wharton. Given that my

approach to school has involved neglecting many important activities and relationships, I


7/9

must derive a new orientation. I want to be a present and engaged husband, father, son,

and friend but at the same time I desire a rewarding and productive career path. I am

drawn to the Total Leadership program as a means of learning to bridge the gap between

where I’ve been, as a focused but single-minded student, to where I hope to go, as an active

and engaged member in each key area of my life. I feel that there’s currently an ongoing

battle for “me” between home and school, and my new job poses a new potentially

competing priority. Instead of living with confusing tradeoffs, I am ready to engage in a

process of clarifying what is most important to me and questioning the ways I have been

spending my time and energy. With this new understanding, I want to devise new solutions

that enable me to set aside the potential tradeoffs in favor of a whole, sustainable view of

the future. I am particularly looking to break new, more emotionally deep ground with my

wife, so that I can feel more connected, clarify a shared vision, and adopt new, more

supportive behaviors that can be sustainably incorporated into my daily routine. Finally, I

want to look further ahead and clarify where I’m headed in my life, so that I can better

enjoy the journey and align my efforts in the right direction.

Example 3

I have alluded to some of my goals above, but to summarize it all, I want to use an

extended analogy to Tiger Woods' golf swing. His swing is grounded in basic fundamentals.

It is pure. Yet, every few years he re-tools his swing completely and gets even better. For

me, I believe that the tools I have now are adequate, and they have helped me achieve

many things. However, I realize the need to periodically and frequently re-tool my arsenal

to become even better and more effective. To do so, I seek solid coaching from the

professor and my peers.

Specifically, I want to add the following tools to my arsenal: i) the ability to effectively rally

people in support of my goals; ii) the ability to focus all of my energies and activities on the

cohesive life-time goal(s) I will have identified; and iii) to be able to better receive advice

and be more comfortable in experimenting with productive approaches to constantly

improve myself.


8/9

1.C Skills

This exercise helps you focus on the skills you most want to develop in our course. First, please

view the one-page skills assessment tool at the Total Leadership Web site, here. Then, please

choose the two or three skills from the list of 18 that you would most like to focus on as you go

through our course. In a sentence, please explain why each of these two or three skills is important

to you.

Example 1

Skill #1 – I make choices about how to spend my time and energy that match what I really

care about.

I end up spending a lot of time on relatively-less-important tasks. I can do a better job of

prioritizing and focusing on “progress, not perfection” to free up time for priorities in my

“self” and “home” arenas.

Skill #2 – I tell stories of the key events that have shaped my values in a way that makes me

closer to others.

I would like to gain this skill and use it purposefully as part of my leadership style. I don’t

consider myself to have a natural knack for story-telling, but I’m hoping I can improve

through practice.

Skill #3 – I communicate with people important to me about expectations we have of each

other, and I make sure these expectations are clear.

I could improve many relationships quite a bit by better understanding expectations. It has

never occurred to me to explore expectations in personal relationships, even though I know

from professional experience that satisfaction depends on expectations.

Skill #4 – I look for creative solutions to conflicts to help meet my goals in the different parts

of life rather than sacrificing one part for another.

http://www.totalleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/Total-Leadership-Skills-021614.pdfhttp://www.totalleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/Total-Leadership-Skills-021614.pdfhttp://www.totalleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/Total-Leadership-Skills-021614.pdfhttp://www.totalleadership.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/Total-Leadership-Skills-021614.pdf


9/9

In the past I have tended to take a rigid approach to prioritizing my commitments – work at

the expense of personal or family time, for example – and I would love to reframe my

commitments as “both/and” instead of “either/or.”

Example 2

I hold myself accountable for doing what is most important to me in my life (Being real). I

think my biggest issue in this space is that I get lost in the day-to-day deliverables in my life

and find myself constantly working on whatever is urgent at that time. I think part of the

problem is that I have not fully taken stock of what my priorities in life are, and having

defined this, I need to hold myself to those priorities on an ongoing basis.

I am able to create boundaries between the different parts of my life to help me meet

important needs and goals (Being whole). I do not think that I am effective in this space at

all; I frequently put other aspects of my life on hold to complete deliverables in other areas

that may not be as important. Being able to better integrate different areas of my life, or at

a minimum to hold myself as responsible for commitments to others or myself in non-work

areas would be a huge win for me.

Example 3

I seek creative solutions to conflicts to meet goals in different parts of life rather than

sacrificing one part for another - I frequently feel as though parts of my life come into direct

conflict with one another and I often prioritize one by completely ignoring another. The

most common is example is the conflict between my physical health (exercise, eating well)

and my social life, both because there does not always seem to be enough time to do both

and because going out (and drinking alcohol) causes me to feel physically unhealthy.

I use skills and contacts from different parts of my life to help meet goals in other parts of

my life - I feel that I have become a much better "leader" at work and school, where I have

been focused on developing my weaknesses (e.g., becoming a better listener and more

flexible/collaborative). It's disappointing to me that I often revert back to old bad habits

when interacting with family or friends.

Documents

Coursera Assignment Examples Week 1_040814