Reflective Blog 2:
1. Pick an entrepreneur or business owner who you have met during this summer seminar.
2. What leadership skills did you see this individual display? Use the styles descriptions from class and summarized in the attached notes.
3. What characteristics in that person would you aspire to have as a leader?
4. Did this person make an impression on you?
5. How did they inspire you?
6. How does this connect with the characteristics of a good leader?
7. How does this change the type of leaders you inspire to be?
As an entrepreneur who we meet during our time here in Chicago I will choose Jolanta Hardej the CEO fromFarmedHere.
FarmedHere produces indoor growing fresh and healthyherbal in the urban area of Chicago. They want to reduce energy use, travel time and cost. Through this they guaranty access to their products at any season.Furthermore by producing so near to town FarmedHerecreates local city jobs.
In my opinion Jolanta Hardej uses an Participative Leadership (Democratic) style. At FarmedHere JolantaHardej listens to every employee. She wants to change things and because of that she is glad when group members sharing some input to make her company even better. Sometimes it sound quite wired but listening to your employees will create that their contributions will led to a much higher quality in performance.
The employees at FarmedHere feel engaged in the process of creating something new. The employees fromJolanta Hardej can enjoy working in a great atmosphere which helps them to be more motivated and creative.
Furthermore, I think that the way how Jolanta Hardej got back in business is inspiring. In the finance crises in 2008 she nearly lost everything. To get back in a total new business and being successful strengths somebody character. Those situation in life have got a huge efforts of your own way of entrepreneur style.
This way of life and how Jolanta Hardej deals with that situation made an amazing impression on me. She represents a powerful woman. It is such a great effort to start again from zero. It was really inspiring to see with which effort and enthusiasm she presented her business idea. In my opinion you need that kind of enthusiasm and optimism to be successful. You need to believe in what you do when you are going to lose this kind of inspiration nobody will have it. That is the most dangerous thing that can happen because than yourbusiness will fail in long-term.
How does this connect with the characteristics of a good leader? Well when you have had struggle in life and then you got a chance to make it better and then you see that your idea works out, I believe that Jolanta Hardej wants to bring this feeling into her whole business. She motivates her employees and wants to show them that they actually taking part at a huge development in the sector their work in. The idea of indoor farming wasn’t new at all but the way how Jolanta Hardej takes advances in the lighting technology and farm methods it creates a whole new understanding of indoor farming.
Coming back to me and my suggestions of being a good leader Jolanta Hardej inspired me in many ways. How she came back to business just because she believed that her idea would work out and then actually reaching the target seems for me one of the most incredible things in life. I learned that you have to believe in the idea and the business you are in. If you trust in yourself and your competences you will be successful. I always will keep that in mind, especial in such moments when I might think that I am going to fail.
Merle Holtermann
MC, it's great that you pointed out the role of optimism and inclusion in your blog. People do want to feel they are part of something meaningful. Your optimism will be important in your career. And even though failure can be a scary thing, did you notice how many entrepreneurs included it as a significant and necessary part of the journey that got them to where they are?
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