Reflective

Last night I had a nice heart-to-heart with one of my school friends reflecting back on our MBA experience and about what we feel like we got out of the experience. We both agreed that while we learned some technical things in classes, the biggest lessons we learned from the experience were about soft skills and personal development.

The big thing that we hear over and over is that you cannot effectively manage others until you have an understanding of yourself. I really feel like the last two years I've developed a deeper sense of self-awareness and been able to change myself for the better with this new insight. I've realized that I have the ability to innately read the emotions of others, and the ability to take on other perspectives. This has helped me be a caring, trusted colleague/friend and is the root of my agreeable nature. I've also learned that, while I might feel insecure about how I present myself, others perceive me to be more competent, capable and even a little bit competitive than I realize. When I read that report and feedback, I was actually quick shocked because I never thought of myself as competitive!

As I continue in my development and enter the next phase of my career, I really want to work on speaking up. I've been given feedback from so many people that I need to take more ownership of my ideas in meetings (instead of quietly circulating them around afterwards). I'm not really sure where that insecurity stems from, but I need to work on my "blirtatiousness" and learn to just commit to 10-seconds of bravery and share my idea when it comes to me. I inherently edit the things I say, especially in professional settings, but I feel that learning to be more bold in meetings could really take me to the next level.

So here's to looking deeper inside and being okay with what we find!

Cheers,
Vi