Volunteering as an Alternative Spring Break Advisor / Chaperone (Guest Post by Jamie Shook)

March 23, 2011

In March, I had the unique opportunity to serve as a graduate student chaperone for an Alternative Spring Break trip to Detroit, Michigan, with students at the University of South Carolina. I heard the trip would require construction work, and I had an image of myself in my worn undergraduate t-shirts with a hammer and nails laughing in the sunshine over spring break with students, and gathering in the evening for significant group reflection that inspired laughter and tears. The day our group left for Detroit, I loaded my oversized suitcase along with nine students and a professional staff member into a 15 passenger van and proceeded to Michigan. 

Here are some highlights from my trip with some advice related to participating as an alternative spring break advisor / chaperone:

Go for it!  The volunteer opportunity came as an email six months ago on a listserv asking for professional and graduate student help. I informally replied to the contact person my interest.  At the time, I was not able to predict how busy my spring would be with my graduate assistantship, academic coaching, and summer internships interviews.  As the trip neared, so did my eager anticipation (and perhaps my anxiety) for the trip. There were certainly moments prior to the trip where I thought, “Shouldn’t I be using that week to relax? Catch up on work? Sleep?” But my advice to you, if I had any for this, is to go for it!

You may think you have control, but you have no idea. Volunteer opportunities are always a tricky thing. You have to be beyond flexible (nearly fluid) to have a successful experience.  urther, as a chaperone you may think in a moment of complete naiveté that you have some form of control beyond what the students have. This may be true as far as holding the pre-paid gas card, but completely alien from the truth in many other ways. The student leader who coordinated and planned the service trip revealed details of the trip coordination as the trip moved forward. My advice: Ensure students are safe and (relatively) happy and watch the group dynamic and student leadership in the making. Support the student leader as needed, but be happy to give up the reigns, and watch the learning process of your students.

Community building is essential. It takes more than a bus ride. As a chaperone, you sometimes only have the trip to help develop community within the group. Our group did not meet regularly prior to the trip but would have benefited greatly from such opportunity. Recognize the value community building brings to your service trip, make it a priority, and schedule time to create group community prior to the trip. This further allows you, as a chaperone, to gain an understanding of the needs of individuals in the group and benefits you during the trip as group dynamic issue comes into play.

There will probably be group dynamic issues. Recognize this and roll with it. Support your student leader in understanding their role in group conflict and the outstanding opportunity for growth that comes from it. As the chaperone, ensure that all rules are being followed, and show impartiality during the conflict. Help students, individually or in the group, process the conflict afterward, and discuss what they have gained from this particular experience.

Not everyone in your group will be thrilled about the service opportunity. You may run into an issue where a student is not happy to be working on homes, interacting with children, or assisting the aging community. As a chaperone, encourage the students that are enjoying the service experience, and work with individuals who are not. Intentional discussions to express mutual expectations prior to the trip are key to avoiding this issue, but in the moment you can help the student recognize the strengths they bring to this particular project and the skills they are gaining. Help the student make connections between their service projects this week and their multiple roles back at their home institution and local community.

Students will form meaningful moments with their peers, sometimes (gasp) without your help. You will be amazed and how your students interact. It was inspiring for me to play cards in the evening and watch as the group of students encouraged and supported each other. As much as I would love to take credit for the deepened relationships among the group, I can’t. Meaningful moments can be created without intentionality. While it is important to create moments for reflection and team building, recognize the value of unplanned moments of meaning. 

Student learning is essential, but take time to think about your own learning, too. I can guarantee you will learn as a chaperone on an Alternative Spring Break trip with 24/7 student contact. Recognize the importance of student learning, but also think of your own growth during the trip. Encourage others to break barriers, but do the same yourself.

Journal during the trip. During formalized reflection, give your own personal thoughts from the trip. This will encourage students to reflect and think about the affect their current work has on their current and future roles as students and professionals.

It’s an adventure, and it’s worth it. Alternative Spring Break trips are true adventures. Treat these trips as such, and recognize that adventures come with responsibilities. Prepare for the adventure accordingly. Alternative Spring Break trips require hard work and preparation, but they are worth it.

Jaime Shook is a graduate student in the Higher Education Student Affairs program at the University of South Carolina (USC).  She serves as a graduate assistant for University 101, the first-year seminar course, and as an academic skills coach for the Academic Centers for Excellence (ACE) at the University. 

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Guest Post for TheSABloggers.org (10 Secrets to Managing an “Inherited Staff”)

January 26, 2011

This week I created a post for The Student Affairs Collaborative blog entitled “10 Secrets to Managing an Inherited Staff.” As many of us in leadership positions have changed positions a number of times in our career, supervising an “inherited staff” can be either a rewarding or especially challenging experience. However, there are a few secrets that you can use in order to gain the respect and trust of your new staff and have an easier job transition. Please take a look at the article, and feel free to post comments and questions.

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Posted by studentlifeguru

Seek Understanding Before Taking Action (team training using video clips)

January 18, 2011

 

A funny AT&T commercial shows some white-collar employees socializing during an office taco party (click HERE to see a YouTube video of it). During the party, an employee who thought he didn’t get an invite makes some negative comments and criticisms (e.g., “You invited Eric? I thought he gave you the creeps?”) to his colleagues. He ultimately receives a text message shortly after seeing that he was indeed invited to the party. A classic example of “enter foot-in-mouth.”

Even though this was a funny cell phone commercial, I thought there was a great leadership lesson within it: seek understanding before taking action. As was the case in the commercial, many times we can respond quickly to a situation with a knee-jerk reaction without actually having all of the proper information surrounding the issue. These knee-jerk reactions can cause team member conflicts, the unnecessary waste of money and / or resources, and potentially creating dangerous conditions in some instances (particularly if health & life safety issues are a part of your team’s work). As leaders and supervisors, we can be in a hurry to solve a problem or quickly move in to prevent further problems, but we can fail to slow down to examine the situation as carefully as we should before responding.

Tips for success:

1. Fully communicate expectations, instructions, and consequences among everyone on the team. Don’t assume that all of your team members know what it is that they are supposed to be doing, by what time, and with what expected / intended result(s). Team meetings and supervisory one-on-one’s can clear up a lot of issues ahead of time. Make sure that everyone has the same understanding.

2. Train your staff members and teammates how to fully assess problemmatic situations. Not every situation can be approached in the same manner. Team members should be able to assess and diagnose a situation based upon asking some simple questions: What facts do I know? What could this be an example of? And, what more do I need to know (or should ask) in order to make a better informed decision? Answering these simple questions often can take a few minutes and can bypass a lot of heartache overall.

3. Role play and / or work through case studies relevant to your organization. Following up on #2, developing an assessment & diagnostic culture in your organization can be easily accomplished through the inclusion of role playing and / or  practicing case studies. Not only is this an opportunity for everyone to work together in a team format, but helps you to think more analytically on how your team can solve problems. Use examples from the past and make them into case studies using the questions suggested above as discussion points (i.e., What facts do I know? What could this be an example of? And, what more do I need to know (or should ask) in order to make a better informed decision?)

4. Share various video examples of communication mishaps during staff meetings to spark discussion. There are many examples of organization miscommunication in sports, movies, and television shows. Take time to find these types of examples and show them during training sessions or staff meetings. Work-related reality shows are rife with examples of miscommunication leading to conflict and unintended expenses and losses. Another great example (in addition to the taco party commercial video) of “seek understanding before taking action” I’ve seen occurs on the HBO detective drama ”The Wire.” Click HERE to see the YouTube video (***WARNING – there is some profane language in this video clip.***)

What are some examples of video clips from TV shows or movies that you can suggest related to this topic?

 

2 Comments | Delegation, Leadership, Supervision, Teamwork, Training | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by studentlifeguru

Putting an End to “Slackers” (Guest Post by Dawn Lennon @businessfit)

January 9, 2011

We’re all supposed to pull our own weight. That’s how organizations are set up. Whether it’s for a paycheck or a grade, we’re supposed to do the work. Some do and some don’t. The “don’ts” create a problem for us. “Slackers’ are people who know they could be much more productive but make a conscious decision not to be,” writes by Adrienne Fox, in her HR Magazine article, “Taking Up Slack.” 

It’s frustrating when we see capable coworkers and fellow students not delivering. We’re quick to call them lazy and chalk it up to poor family values. It’s never as simple as that. “Slackers are made, not born…,” says Carol Dweck, professor of psychology at Stanford University in the Fox article. Her research found that: “People who grow up being rewarded solely for natural intelligence are more susceptible to slacker behavior because they give up when things get hard…And organizations that reward smarts and natural talent more than commitment breed ‘slackism.’”

 Are you smarter than a slacker?

 Slackers show up everywhere—as classmates, teammates, colleagues, instructors, and even bosses! 

 They “slack” because they are often unsure how to “win” at their work. They want to know how to advance, get interesting assignments with people they enjoy, and be rewarded. But when their expectations aren’t met, they decide to “fake it” rather than make a committed effort.

 Ducking work is only successful when no one can tell. Organizations often create perfect playing fields for slackers by:

  • Team assignments that reward group results rather than individual contributions
  • Performance goals without metrics or academic assignments without rigorous grading  
  • Vague job descriptions or unstated course participation standards
  • Lack of controls to ensure quality results, achieved deadlines, and ethics

Slackers can be crafty by:

  • making it look like they’re working long hours by scheduling documents to be emailed late at night
  • getting appointed to important sounding teams, appearing more important than they really are
  • making straight-forward assignments appear to be complex by the way they report on them

“Slackers become really good at manipulating their bosses or team members to keep up the impression that something takes longer than it should or invent barriers where none exist,” says Meagan Brock, HR specialist at the University of Oklahoma in Fox’s article.  I guess so!

Slackers can’t win if someone’s really watching.

Slacking is a consequence of weak oversight by a supervisor, advisor, or instructor. Employees and students under-perform when they believe it won’t be noticed or really matter.

So here’s how to foil slacking:

  • Pay attention to outcomes you see and don’t see; ask piercing questions and expect specific answers about work progress. Don’t accept excuses.
  • Make sure your expectations are clear by validating them with coworkers and/or students
  • Give clear direction and hold everyone accountable for their part
  • Require status reports on specific assignments  
  • Understand the technology being used, how, and to what effect
  • Ensure that access to needed resources and support is available
  • Require feedback on the contributions of team members
  • Use coaching to build awareness and reinforce expected behaviors

If a coworker or student doesn’t have to work hard to maintain employment and some reward, they are at risk to become a slacker. We owe it to them and our organizations not to let that happen.

Make hard work the measure

“The worst course of action is to do nothing, allowing slackers to fly under the radar,” Brock warns.

When your performance system rewards results achieved through hard work over the appearance of busyness, “slackerism” will decline.  This means we all need to be vigilant, recognizing that by helping to turn the slacker around we help ourselves and our organizations. It’s not the bells and whistles that matter in life and at work; it’s our grit and commitment to push ahead, tackle the difficult, and turn things around on schedule. That’s how we build the self-confidence and self-esteem we need to achieve the success we want.

Dawn Lennon has a Master’s degree from Lehigh University. She is the author of the book Business Fitness: The Power to Succeed—Your Way and the Business Fitness blog. She spent over 20 years in senior manager positions in consumer programs, HR, customer service, and change management at a Fortune 500 energy company. She is currently president of her career & small business coaching/consulting practice, Big Picture Consulting. You can follow her on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. 

2 Comments | Delegation, Leadership, Supervision | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by studentlifeguru

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