Reflecting on Leadership for Change

There is an answer for every question. There always someone who has been through what you are going through and doing what you want to do. If you need help or questions answered, find that person and see how they made it to the point you want to get to. Imitate that person, then find a way to leave your own footprints for others to follow!

After reading my blogs, I honestly felt fascinated with myself and my achievements/accomplishments. The most fascinating part, in my opinion about this whole blogging exercise, was finding out about my childhood. I don't think I ever would have done that if it weren't for this class and this assignment. I believe, it some weird way it improved the relationship between myself, my family, and my friends. Granted that it was in the beginning of the semester, but those first few assignments opened lines of communication that were somewhat closed before and allowed me to speak more freely with my friends and family about what is going on with me. It also allowed me to ask more questions and be involved with what was going on with them. With the help of this class, I think I have become more assertive in my decision making and actually following through with my plans. Well, at least to the best of my ability. I think I've also become more resourceful. As far as going out and finding information I need, and if not finding someone who knows the person who has the information I need.I think I've become a better resource for people who have questions, or need answers as well. I think that's pretty cool. 

The one thing that has stuck with me throughout the entire class/ semester is something that I picked up from the movie during the first class. From "The Last Lecture", I learned that sometimes people put brick walls up in front of you, to see how bad you want something; and also, we as humans have a tendency to put up brick wall in front of ourselves. However, with the assistance of this class, I have learned to not only recognize a brick wall, but to bust through it when many people choose to go around it; Or, when a higher percentage of people choose to let that impede their forward progress. I hope that doesn't make me sound arrogant.I just learned to start thinking, how can I obtain _____, with out having _____. I've adopted this thought process, and I have been so much more driven to do what I feel.  I guess you can say this is how my thinking changed. 

I have always been a leader. I have believed so in my mind for a long time. Through the conversations with my friends and family, they believe I have great leadership qualities as well. With this class, I have not only learned that is true, but I know, now, how to be a leader... where people trust me and want to trust my decision making ability. 

The three things I like about this class is that it helped me further develop my leadership potential. I don't believe that I am 100% there, but I know I can and will continue to improve on my innate leadership qualities. I like this class because it gave me an opportunity to address certain issues that I had/have with my self. It gave me the chance to focus on me with out having to worry about doing work for someone else or taking a test for someone else, or studying for someone else's interests like many college classes do. It may sound a little selfish, but everything (well, almost everything) I did in this class was for James J. Flagg. To sum it up, the class put me more in tune with myself and I love that! Lastly, the thing I liked, was that the class allowed me to connect with different people from different background that were kind of in the same boat I was in. What can I say, I'm just a sucker for meeting new people. I can honestly say I enjoyed every interaction with every person that I spoke with in this class, regardless of how brief or extensive the interaction was. 

Honestly, the three things I would say to improve the class are so trivial, that I don't believe it would improve the quality of the class. The first thing, is maybe offer the class during the day, or multiple days, because three hours of class, at the end of the day is a long time (trivial). The class is what you make of it but being around people who are pessimistic thinkers or who have negative attitudes is kind of irritating so, I would suggest limiting the class to people who want to get more out of the class besides and easy "A" (trivial). Lastly, maybe innovating new ways to get people to think or talk about their goal, besides just sitting in a group and stating your goal, touchtone, plan of action, etc. I believe that sitting down every week, talking about my goal/dream in repetition forced me to constantly think about my goal/ dream. By me constantly thinking about it, I was finding that I was becoming more and more proactive in making my dream, of becoming a pharmacist to get into the health field so I can influence health policy AND opening up my own non-profit organization to help other veterans, a reality. (Trivial: notice the capital T) 

I believe that I got the more out of this class than all of but a few other students. Not only that, but I got to see Alvin Ailey! So thank you Dr. Rock for the tickets, and especially for putting the class together. You have,  at the very least, one satisfied student. Thank you! Shout out to Ben for reading my blogs every week. I'll keep you guys posted on how everything turns out!

OPTIONAL: Exercise # 5

Last night, Monday April 27th, I prepared to do my final blog assignment for this class. I had read the instructions for the assignment, and I began reading through my blogs when realized that I haven't done all six interviews. So I started freaking out, (well not really) because I remembered that I didn't post an interview because, at the time, I conducted my interview late and I was told I wouldn't receive credit for it. So I tossed the interview that I conducted with my friend Al, a pharmacy tech at Swedish Covenant Hospital, into a stack of papers about a foot high on my dresser. I spent a good 30-40 minutes looking for the paper I had written the interview down on. When I finally found it, I didn’t feel like blogging any more, so I went to bed. Anyway, I have the paper in front of me now and I’m ready to get my blog on!

 

As I said before this interview was with a good friend of mine, Al Merginio. He was actually my lab partner for two, maybe three chemistry classes that I took in Daley College. He’s now a pharmacy tech at Swedish Covenant. Since, I only volunteer at Swedish Covenant, this technically makes him my boss. (Even though it feel weird saying that, and he doesn’t really like when I refer to as Mr. Merginio… my bad Al! Lol!) I conducted his interview in the same fashion that I conducted my other five interviews. Enjoy!

 

JF: How long have you been working as a pharmacy tech?

AM: It’ll be two years in April.

 

JF: Last time I remember you were working as an optometry tech, why did you change positions?

AM: Before you left (referring to my military deployment) the owner of the Pearle Vision, where I worked was sold to another owner. Once she took over, she got rid of all of the old staff, and hired an entire new one.

 

JF: So how did you end up in pharmacy?

AM: I was out of work for a while and while I was planning my future, I saw an advertisement for a pharmacy tech class offered by Daley (College). I figured that a lot of the pre-requisites that I was taking for optometry school were similar to pharmacy school. So, I enrolled in the class. Passed the class, then I started looking for work.

 

JF: How did you get the job at Swedish Covenant?

AM: I was searching for work, and my fiancée, at the time had a friend who worked at the hospital and she got me Debbie’s number (Debbie McQuarters, director of volunteer services at Swedish Covenant Hospital). I called her about volunteering as a (pharmacy) tech and I got hired about a month later.

 

JF: That’s interesting because I am in pretty much the same situation now. How did you go from being a volunteer to actually getting hired to work in the hospital?

AM: Well, I was volunteering for about 2 months when one of the other techs had quit and another was going away to pharmacy school. Dr. Park (the assistant director of the hospital’s pharmacy) said that he had like my work ethic and told me he would like to hire me full time.

 

JF: Dr. Park is a great man! Congratulations! What do you like most about your job as a pharmacy tech?

AM: I like the idea of helping others and I know this is going to sound bad, but I like the money most.

 

 

JF: That’s completely understandable Now the tough question, what do you like least about being a pharmacy?

AM: Also the money. Mainly, because (you know) the techs do all the work, All the pharmacist do is check the work I’ve done, but they get paid the big money. Also, I don’t like the hours and how my schedule changes every two or three weeks.

 

JF: What do you mean by that?

AM: Well, the new schedule is printed every two weeks, but it always varies. I work six days a week. Half the days I work morning shift, and the other half I work the evenings. So it’s hard for me to get into a good routine sometimes. But like I said, the money makes it a little easier to manager.

 

JF:  Well. Why don’t you go to pharmacy school and get your Pharm. D so you can make the big money yourself?

AM: I was thinking about that, but I really want to get back into optometry. I’m taking classes now to get my certification to work as an optometrist.

 

 

JF: That is interesting to know. You know I’m very much interested in getting a full time position as a pharmacy tech and then maybe a pharmacist myself; do you have any advice for me?

AM:  Stay motivated, because if you aren’t motivated then you will lose interest, and you don’t want to be stuck doing something that you aren’t interested in. Focus on your schoolwork, and continue to dress professionally, you look like you belong here and people notice!

 

JF: Is there anything that you now know that you wish you would have known back then?

AM: Yes, the whole thing about being interested in what you’re doing. I wish I would have known what I was getting myself into when I started working in the pharmacy. Now I’m ready to get out, but I can’t go anywhere now, because I need the money.