{"id":24556,"date":"2019-10-24T14:19:02","date_gmt":"2019-10-24T21:19:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=24556"},"modified":"2019-10-24T14:56:19","modified_gmt":"2019-10-24T21:56:19","slug":"dont-lose-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/dont-lose-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Don’t Lose Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Thinking about leadership and what kind of a leader I have been and am currently today, and what has been modeled to me is causing me to take pause. There seems to be a theme for the awareness of globalization and how it affects leadership \u2013 good and bad. This is true for our business. We deal with products globally and, Lord willing, we will most likely deal with the leaders of those global companies.<\/p>\n

But, at the crux of leadership conversations and books and articles that one reads, what is the heart of a leader? What makes an effective leader? Who are they surrounding themselves with (books and people)? For me, as a woman of color, before I can even think about answering those questions, I have been forced by society to think about how I am viewed (i.e. biracial Asian female) as soon as I enter into a room. Years ago, my father said, \u201cYou have two strikes against you. You\u2019re a woman and you\u2019re a minority, so you\u2019re going to have to work twice as hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSurveys of upper-level American managers find that almost half of women of color and close to one-third of white women cite a lack of influential mentors as a major barrier to advancement\u201d (380). I didn\u2019t choose this, but just as all of us have many intersections, mine are just different. As the majority shareholder of a certified, California state small business that sells to state institutions I am now lofted to a new position where my intersection of minority female brings potential extra points. It\u2019s ironic, yes? But is it?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe global organizations themselves want both an extended family of relationships that can endure and a seat at the policy table for matters affecting their ability to do business in the future. So the institutional work of leaders extends outside the enterprise\u201d (580). This is where I find myself thriving. In a sea of policy and rhetoric, I care about the ripple effect our company can have for generations to come. Our primary customers are prisons. As an advocate of organic food and how it connects to the brain and gut, I immediately told my business partner that we need to figure out a way to inject this into policy change in Sacramento. God answered that prayer because just this year a drastic menu change went into place for all prisons to what is referred to as heart-healthy.<\/p>\n

Digging deeper, however, how can we have a greater effect on inmates who are transitioning back into society? These are the questions that we ask at our weekly staff meetings. Most inmates come from food desert neighborhoods. A documentary I watched recently highlighted a woman who lives in one of these neighborhoods. Every week she gets up early on Saturday and Sunday morning and drives to the produce mart in Los Angeles to purchase organic fruits and vegetables. She then drives back to her neighborhood, puts up a pop-up tent and sells that produce to her neighbors. Not only do I want to partner with her, but I also want to be her. She exemplifies the gospel on a variety of levels.<\/p>\n

I never want to sell out my heart. Perhaps I will never master \u201csystems thinking, initiative-taking, persuasion and diplomacy\u201d (605), but I hope that God will always show us how to have heart. I completely understand that businesses need accountants and rule followers, but we desperately need leaders who care about the ripple effect of their company from the smallest to largest details. Micromanagement never serves the \u201cgood\u201d of the company because at the root of micro<\/em> is fear (201).<\/p>\n

Years ago, I worked for the American Red Cross. I had moved from corporate America to a global nonprofit. There were times when I saw the best of this nonprofit and how its policy of offering a VISA card (loaded with a calculated amount) to a family who had just endured traumatic disaster so they could go purchase new items for a new home restored dignity. I also witnessed the unfortunate egos of some of the leaders, and in recent years the organization has come under scrutiny for their mismanagement of finances. The heart of Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross, has lost its way. She apparently had an incredible devotion to helping others. What began from her heart seems to have become mismanaged.<\/p>\n

I am reminded by her story and of many other female leaders as inspiration for me to not lose heart as I help guide our company. Again, I am quite aware that our company cannot move forward without some guidelines, but it is vitally important for us to continue thinking about who and how this affects others without becoming too paranoid.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nohria, Nitin, and Rakesh Khurana. Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice: a Harvard Business School Centennial Colloquium<\/em>. Harvard Business School Publishing, 2010.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thinking about leadership and what kind of a leader I have been and am currently today, and what has been modeled to me is causing me to take pause. There seems to be a theme for the awareness of globalization and how it affects leadership \u2013 good and bad. This is true for our business. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":128,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1602,1667,414,35,225],"class_list":["post-24556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dminlgp10","tag-heart","tag-khurana","tag-leadership","tag-nohira","cohort-lgp10"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/128"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24556"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24562,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24556\/revisions\/24562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}