Leadership

I don't believe choosing one word to describe my leadership style does it justice. I believe I have a proven history of being a dynamic leader, and adapting to the environment to take on the necessary role to keep the team together and moving forward. If I were to choose one word though, I would say I'm a democratic leader.

As a democratic leader, I am huge on communication. I value everyone's input and try to understand what challenges individuals face and what tools they need going forward to help them effectively contribute to the team effort. I'm an advocate of specialization, so finding out what motivates people and what people are good at and like to do is key. Human behavior is very complex. Everyone on my team has a story. They have their strengths and they have their weaknesses. It's my analytical nature that drives me to find out each person's story, and use that to produce results.

Criticisms of the democratic leadership style are mainly in regards to dealing with situations which require quick decision making. Leaders are often times faced with challenges where they can't rely on input from their team. They are forced to make a decision on the fly. This criticism is valid if you are not a dynamic leader. I can think back to my leadership experiences where I've taken on so many different roles. When I was a supervisor at Spinelli Cinemas, I was never just a supervisor. I was at one point or another a counselor, boss, mechanic, verbal punching bag, accountant, and a janitor. No matter what I had to do or what challenge was thrown at me, I always kept the team directed and focused.

Two things I always keep in mind regarding leadership and life in general:

1) Never ask someone to do something that you will not do yourself.

2) It's not about the experience, It's about what you take away from it. Learning from every experience is extremely important.