Dodge this ball/and a hit list.

Ok, so there are some days when the idea of having to dodge dozens of rubber balls is not very appealing, especially when six guys think it’s "let’s peg Krisi day." So, how can I take something that I don't enjoy and become productive with it? Honestly, it’s about holding the mentality that in every sport, their is more to the game than the players on the field, in my case, it’s the cheer section. For example, in the book "Leading self-directed Work Teams," Fisher talks about new member’s team model and how to explain the game to them. In my case, I needed a new outlook on the sport, which began with the "consumer advocate" who is striving to "better meet the needs of the customer" or in my case, the player who lacks the ability to throw far...at all. So Sam played this role by adding a ball to the game called the "Death Ball" which only required a simple graze of the opponent to get them out of the game, in my case, the only way that I could possibly have a chance. Sam, who was leading this sport, also played the role of "trainer" which is also on this model. The trainers job is to "train others in job/skill areas" and to "continually shares knowledge with others." This helped me to discover what would work best for me in the game.

This trainer role also was evident when we played the intense card game of mafia. For our group, David explained each role and helped that we all understood strategy and strived to work as a team to catch the mafia, even when he was the mafia! Which honestly is an excellent way to play the game. This is an excellent place to practice team leadership because it is necessary for each town’s person to help discover who the mafia is, but it must be done together. Another part of the model is the "problem solver" who "understands and utilizes problem-solving techniques to regularly identify and solve problems." This was essential for our game because without strategy there is no way that the team can work together. Just like working on a project in the business world, if you don't have strategy than you go into it unorganized and their is a higher chance for failure.

OK...jump over this, run around this, spin on this, backwards over here...

In class this week we had an interesting day of relay races and nerve pinching. So you might ask, what the heck is nerve pinching supposed to mean? Well, it was pretty obvious that most everyone was really getting personal with there choices of players, and lack of ability to get along. But despite all the head butting that was going on, there was a good amount of leadership and planning that helped to make the overall day run pretty smoothly.

The Seven Bases of Power

There are seven bases of power that are talked about in "Managing Teams," this is where "leadersinsipre their team members to do what they want them to do, through some kind of motivation," these include Postion Power, personal power, Excerpt power, Resource Power, Reward power, Coercive Power, and conection power. In position power the power belongs to the leader simply because they hold the job...sometimes this is not appropriate for the situation we had in leadership, its hard to have someone lead simply based on their title because they have not proven thier capabilities or ability to be trusted by their Team. That is where Personal Power comes in, when the leader "earns the respect of the team members because he spends time listening to them and works to meet their needs." This didn't really apply to our activity, but Dr. Patterson actually showed this in his flexibility with the time and how it would be spent on each activity. This is an important type of leadership in ministry because although it is good to be firm and confident in your decisions, it is also good to be flexible with people as life gets in the way.

Expert Power can be valuble in a sitution where knowledge is what brings success. With our obsticle course, it was good to have Brit on our team because of her knowledge of rec staff, just like when we had the late night with handbells, and how important it was to have people who were good with music. Resource power can compliment Expert power if it is not abused, by giving something that the team may need, they have proven their capability for provision. Reward power would be the type that Dr. Patterson holds for his students, he has the ability to offer scholarships and incentives for students to be involved in their school, ministry, and community.