LEADERSHIP IN ESA

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"ESA's unique program provides members with training, education and support they need to promote successful public service projects, while developing personal and professional skills in management, public relations and leadership. Always ahead of its time, it has blazed new trails in volunteerism and has become a primer leadership organization." - ESA Headquarters

Learning the basics of Leadership is a regular part of our participation in ESA. At all levels of ESA, we continuously place members in positions of leadership. Leadership training is offered to our members at all levels of the organization with "certified leadership training offered by ESA Headquarters on a yearly basis. State and District meetings offer workshops and opportunities to perfect our leadership skills and training. Being a member of Epsilon Sigma Alpha Internation builds skills that promote a person's professional life. It pays to belong to ESA!

"EAT THAT FROG"

Marsha Barnes - 2011-2012 KSC President: Have you ever put something off? Something you knew you needed todo? Do you have a tendency to Procrastinate? I do. I read a book recently that I identified with and thought that you might too. The name of the book is “Eat That Frog”, by Brian Tracy.

Mark Twain once said that if the first thing you do each morning is to eat a live frog, you can go through the day with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing that is going to happen to you all day long. (Kind of like - “eat your vegetables first”.)

Your “frog” is your biggest, most important task, the one you are most likely to procrastinate on if you don’t do something about it. It is also the one task that can have the greatest positive impact on your life and results are important. If you have to eat two frogs, eat the ugliest one first. This is another way of saying that if you have two important tasks before you, start with the biggest, hardest, and most important task first. I find I have to resist the temptation to start the easier task. But, if you have to eat a live frog, it does not pay to sit and look at if for a very long time!

Think back on a time when you FINALLY completed one of those projects that you kept putting off. How did you feel when it was done? The rest of the day went better didn’t it? We are designed mentally and emotionally in such a way that task completion gives us a positive feeling. Whenever we complete a task of any size or importance, we feel a surge of energy, enthusiasm, and self-esteem. The more important the completed task, the happier, more confident, and more powerful you feel about yourself and your world.

Following is a list of things Tracy put together as a reference to use in trying to do better in not procrastinating:

1. Set the table: Decide exactly what you want. Clarity is essential. Write out your goals and objectives before you begin.


2. Plan every day in advance: Think on paper. Every minute you spend in planning can save you five or ten minutes in execution.


3. Apply the 80/20 Rule to everything: Twenty percent of your activities will account for 80 percent of your results. Always concentrate your efforts on that top 20 percent.


4. Consider the consequences: Your most important tasks and priorities are those that can have the most serious consequences, positive or negative, on your life or work. Focus on those above all else.


5. Practice creative procrastination: Since you can’t do everything, you must learn to deliberately put off those tasks that are of low value so that you have enough time to do the few things that really count.


6. Use the ABCDE Method continually: Before you begin work on a list of tasks, take a few moments to organize them by value and priority so you can have enough time to do the few things that really count.


7. Focus on key result areas: Identify and determine those results that you absolutely, positively have to get to do your job well, and work on them all day long.


8. The Law of Three: Identify the three things you do in your work that account for 90 percent of your contribution, and focus on getting them done before anything else. You will then have more time for your family and personal time.


9. Prepare thoroughly before you begin: Have everything you need at hand before you start. Assemble all the papers, information, tools, work materials, and numbers you might require so that you can get started and keep going.


10. Take it one oil barrel at a time: You can accomplish the biggest and most complicated job if you just complete it one step at a time.


11. Upgrade your key skills: The more knowledgeable and skilled you become at your key tasks, the faster you start them and the sooner you get them done.


12. Leverage your special talents: Determine exactly what it is that you are very good at doing, or could be very good at, and throw your whole heart into doing those specific things very, very well.


13. Identify your key constraints: Determine the bottlenecks or choke points, internal or external, that set the speed at which you achieve your most important goals, and focus on alleviating them.


14. Put the pressure on yourself: Imagine that you have to leave town for a month, and work as if you had to get all your major tasks completed before you left.


15. Maximize your personal power: Identify your periods of highest mental and physical energy each day, and structure your most important and demanding task around those times. Get lots of rest so you can perform at your best.


16. Motivate yourself into action: Be your own cheerleader. Look for the good in every situation. Focus on the solution rather than the problem. Always be optimistic and constructive.


17. Get out of the technological time sinks: Use technology to improve the quality of your communications, but do not allow yourself to become a slave to it. Learn to occasionally turn things off and leave them off.


18. Slice and dice the task: Break large, complex tasks down into bite-sized pieces, and then do just one small part of the task to get started.


19. Create large chunks of time: Organize your days around large blocks of time where you can concentrate for extended periods on your most important tasks.


20. Develop a sense of urgency: Make a habit of moving fast on your key tasks. Become known as a person who does things quickly and well.


21. Single handle every task: Set clear priorities, start immediately on your most important task, and then work without stopping until the job is 100 percent complete. This is the real key to high performance and maximum personal productivity.

What is Leadership?
by Kim Kummer - 2010-2011 State President

Webster’s defines leadership as: To conduct along the way: guide; To live: pursue; To tend toward practice of a given result . Those definitions describe the attitudes and desires of the ESA members that are fortunate enough to attend the Annual

Leadership Training Seminar each winter. Let’s look closer at the definitions.

1. FUN: More gets done when we are having FUN. FUN keeps people together and keeps them coming back for more.
2. TALENT: Focus on the TALENTS of your members. We all have a TALENT – utilize your member’s TALENTS. This makes them feel useful and needed – they have a reason to attend and participate. Use and demonstrate the TALENTS of your membership at each meeting even if you have to create a “Spotlight”.
3. FUNCTION: Do the business that makes the organization FUNCTION. Evaluate your agenda by taking each item and asking yourself, “Can we function without this item?” if you can, eliminate or save it for another time. The reading of minutes and treasurer’s reports – these can be emailed ahead a time – they are not required for a meeting to function; if there is an issue, discuss it, but look for the elements of the meeting that are needed to function. Discuss the upcoming bake sale and how much FUN you will have and the TALENTS of the wonderful cookie baker in your group.
4. INSPIRATION: Whether you bring in a St. Jude Children’s patient; a story of a client helped, a scholarship recipient, a person who has received some of the benefits of your work through a state or local project, help your membership to see what “good” their work creates.
5. FRIENDSHIP: Provide time for members to get to know one another through friendship exercises or social time, planned as a part of the meeting. Most people come to meetings because they will get to see other people they like. If there is not time to be together for fun & friendship, the chances of people coming are greatly reduced. Plan “FRIENDSHIP times”. Friendship is the glue that keeps ESA together.

When organizing a good meeting consider the following:

• Limit formal business to 2 to 2 ½ hours for state meetings; 30 minutes to 1 hour for chapter / district and committee meetings.
• Provide more opportunity for the membership to participate in the agenda program
• Provide new challenges, new ways to participate for the general membership
• Maximize the opportunities for recognition of individual and chapter achievements
• Provide “brainstorming” and planning time for future projects & sharing of recent successful projects
• Provide materials/information that individual participants will find useful in everyday life!
• Make “FUN” additions to the program to create enthusiasm and continuing interest
• Personal touches to involve presidential themes, etc.

Not all of the points will apply to each type of meeting – pick and choose what works for you and those attending the meeting. Most importantly remember the 5 main points of motivational meetings:
FUN, TALENTS, FUNCTION, INSPIRATION & FRIENDSHIP.

To Live: pursue. To tend toward practice of a given result {practice that led to success.}The first thing I thought of was our Opening Ritual when I read these two definitions.

“Members of Epsilon Sigma Alpha, we meet again to pledge ourselves to anew to the vows of ritual which we accepted in the golden glow of a candle-lighted room. Let us be ever mindful of the responsibilities we pledged to ESA, keep faith with ourselves and all members, be tolerant and sincere and ever worthy to wear the badge that symbolized virtue, honor, truthfulness, friendliness and attractiveness.”

What did we pledge to do? OUR PLEDGE:

• Be compassionate
• Be useful
• Give the best that is of your home and your work
• Be tireless in your pursuit of knowledge and the world
• Search out opportunities for association
• Develop the best capacities of each member
• Encourage leadership
• Stimulate personal growth

Do your plans for the coming year reflect our pledge?

• Time for listening at your meetings – Be compassionate
• Projects planned – Be useful
• Time for you – Give the best that is you to your home and your work
• Share new information – Be tireless in your pursuit of knowledge and the world
• Fun – Search out opportunities for association
• Go beyond self - Develop the best capacities of each member
• Seek out new talent - Encourage leadership
• Challenge yourself - Stimulate personal growth

To tend toward practice of a given result . Plan motivational meetings, it may take time to change what has always been done; that is okay and to be expected. Practice Practice Practice and soon it will become familiar. Strive to live up to the ESA pledge every day – this practice will lead to success not only personally but also professionally. When others notice your success & leadership use this stepping block to introduce them to ESA.

Kim Kummer

2010 LEADERSHIP NOTES FROM MARSHA:

Naturally becoming a motivational leader is part of our tasks as we develop leadership skills. We are reminded that the #1 leadership skill is developing the ability to motivate people. The following items are reminders to take into consideration when motivating people:

1. In order to motivate other people you must be motivated yourself.
2. Have a clear idea of what needs to be done, have a goal. Identify what needs to be done in clear and concise terms.
3. Everyone needs to feel like they belong, to feel they are important. People need to feel that their participation will make a difference.
4. People won’t stay motivated forever. Leadership includes finding ways to inspire and keep the motivation going.
5. Show people that progress is occurring. If people feel like they are making progress they will continue to be motivated.
6. Consistent appreciation, recognition, and affirmation are essential parts of good leadership.
7. Find ways for members to participate consistently in projects.

Wendi’s Old Fashioned Hamburgers founder and owner Dave Thomas gives an example of a successful motivational leader. Dave Thomas was more than a behind the scenes owner and the factors he used to motivate were obviously successful tools. Some tools that can be used for motivating people are positive thinking, sense of humor, sense of responsibility, acceptance of others ideas and the 4 E’s:

Energy! Encouragement! Enthusiasm! & Empathy!

Kansas State Council
Marsha Barnes

Susan Winters - "How to Utilize Google"

A Kansas Leader that is a member of the Kansas State Council Speaker's Bureau, the IC Workshop Coordinator for 2009, and currently running for elective office on the International Council, Susan Winters, provides information on how to effectively utilize Google. Access these powerpoints to obtain this current information on how to utilize this technology to your best advantage.

Beyond Google Search Click smile for powerpoint on Google:  

How do utilize Google Forms Click smile for powerpoint on how to utilize Google Forms:  

Decision Making Defines Good Leadership

Every leader must be capable of making good decisions and making them in the proper time frame to make the best impact. Decision making does not happen in a vacuum – it is a process of preparation and planning. There is a degree of luck with this intertwined with the group history. Most good leaders do know in their “gut” what decisions should be made whether or not they make the decisions. Unfortunately, sometimes the tough decisions are avoided.

Making the tough decisions takes character as well as the courage to act. Decision making follows three preparation pathways:

• There is a period of preparation for the decision making process. A good leader recognizes and frames the issue so that the membership will understand. There will be a team mobilized to address the issue.
• The second period of processing decisions is when the leader knows instinctively that it’s time to make the decision. Good leaders do not endlessly weigh options – they know there is a time to make the call and move on. If this happens the membership will be able to make a firm commitment to that decision. This is vital to the success of that decision.
• The third phase of decision making is to execute the decision. This is where many leaders will stumble in the process. After making the decision a leader will stay in touch to make sure a decision is implemented correctly. This is also the phase where good leadership will make adjustments as new information becomes available.

A Word Game - ABCs OF LEADERSHIP: Click smile for Exercise 2:  

Change and How it happens for ESA

Recently, we are hearing a lot about change in ESA. We do need to make changes that will make us an organization that today’s new member will be attracted to and want to join. Change is not only inevitable, it is a process that needs goal setting and developing a new blueprint for the future that all can become involved and support. Devote the time necessary to present your ideas of change.

• Together analyze and assess every facet of your current methods and activities.
• Develop a mission statement
• Carve out a blueprint for the future of your council’s new activities.
• Set goals that will get your council to operate within your mission statement.
• Gradually transform those goals into habits.
• Be willing to modify the plan as needed.
• Make sure you have an accountability processor.

Effective change occurs when those who follow in leadership roles continue the new mission established in order for the change to complete its process. In order to effect positive and constructive change, a leader must lay the groundwork for it to continue after they have left office. The membership becomes your objective partners in successful change. Change does not have to mean we lose our traditions and rich heritage that we love so much.

Effective change requires a joint effort of your membership. In order to effect changes in your state you will need your board and the membership to understand and support the changes you plan to make. This requires thoughtful and purposeful planning on your part. Otherwise any small change you make will soon disappear and have no impact on your organization.

Make sure you have an accountability processor.

Change takes planning, preparation, and purpose and time: It is a work in progress. A good leader can present her ideas to her support base and achieve their participation in the change process. A good leader knows that she does not stand alone. According to J. C. Maxwell, “If it’s lonely at the top, you’re not doing something right.”

The secret to effecting the changes you want to make is thoughtful planning ahead of time with the motive to improve the future of the organization.

A Fun Exercise for your chapter - A Glazed Expression: Click smile for Exercise 3:  

2009 - Leadership Articles by Pat Josey and Kim Kummer

Article by Pat Josey from the 2009 Leadership. Click smile for: "ESA CHAMPIONS!"

Kim Kummer focuses on the use of technology and how it can help to drive effective communications
for our chapters from the 2009 Leadership. Click smile for: "Leadership in Technology - Part I!"  

Click smile for: "Leadership in Technology - Part II!"  

Contact the Kansas State Council:
E-mail: WEBMASTER

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