Fourth and Fifth day- Leadership and Change

Fourth day of the summit was about leadership and change. Again there was the stunning Binna Kandola and Stuart Duff talking about engaging people in change. We had an overview of the change curve and the various stages of change. The practical exercise involved this time around four people per group. It was challenging and exciting to identify the stages of change of the given examples as they were somehow similar. But we made it all right.

To me, the most exciting part was to implement it on myself. I can happily say that the change curve taught me more about my current situation and the change I am going through. Now I clearly understand what I require to go to the higher stage. It is about giving us a logical explanation of what a change means.

The lecture covered the part of engaging people in change emotionally, strategically and influentially. It also covered the types of leadership:
- Unconscious/ Incomplete (Direct leadership)
- Conscious/ Incomplete (Coaching and mentoring)
- Conscious/ Complete (Support)
- Unconscious/ Complete (Delegate)

As a reflection of this session, I went looking for a mentor. And here I go with my group leader Shaeb Alnajjar. I chose Shaeb because I was amazed and inspired by the way he accepted the change in his life and went on towards his successful future. He was a good listener, paid attention to my story and provided me with wise and smart pieces of advice.

Then we come to the fifth day of the summit. It was a continuation of the last session about change in addition to action planning and sustainability. In the beginning, Binna and Stuart spoke about influence and persuasion. What works when you have been influenced? Why do they influence you? What people say and how do they behave?

We had an interesting exercise and this time my partner was Dr.Umair from Jordan. He played the role of the persuader and was able to convince me with his reasons though I was trying to be more reluctant. On the second part of the exercise I was supposed to be the persuader but I turned up to the pursuer. Dr. Umair was so influential and the example of the exercise just worked very well for his advantage.

I learnt that the importance of influence by words is only 7%, body language 55% and the tone is 38%. Thus I have to pay more attention to my body language when persuading someone.

I also learnt that leadership skills can be born and built in a person. Leadership authorities can be extended to others and a leader should know when to step back and allow others to take a major role on leading. There is no perfect leader, rather, there is a leader who is always keen to learn, try and review and get feedback. It is good to have roll models, yet not to be copying them or under their shadow.
It was the last day with Binna and Stuart. Frankly, I felt bad. I really admired their knowledge, humility and humbleness. They have not made any gaps or barriers with us and it was a great pleasure to be in their lectures.

Then we had the sustainability lecture with Will Day. I liked his name so much. He presented so many frustrating and shocking facts; nevertheless he was impressive with his way of presenting. He said “Prediction is very difficult especially about the future” and he is right.

Will Day raised some serious and challenging questions: what needs to change? What are the priorities? What are the obstacles? How might they be addressed? And the most tricky question was: what does success look like?