Life Styles Inventory

My LSI Styles Complex My “primary” personal thinking style as shown in my circumplex is The Humanistic-Encouraging Style. This style means that I am “accepting of myself, and accept others for who they are without question or criticism” (Human 2010). Humanistic-Encouraging individuals believe they can “assist others in fulfilling their potential by providing a supportive climate that inspires self-improvement” (Human 2010). I believe that this very accurate summation of myself. This can easily be seen at my previous job as a waiter.

I was often asked to train new employees because I was considered sensitive to people's needs, and was willing to devote energy to counseling and coaching others. I also consider this style accurate about my myself because during my time as a Kohls retail shift manager, I tried to inspire my coworkers to think, grow and take responsibility for themselves by demonstrating belief in what my coworkers could accomplish. I always tried to believe when a subordinate told me that they could accomplish setting up a display in a certain amount of hours. My “backup” personal thinking style is The Competitive Style.

I believe my backup style of being competitive is what pushes me to be all I can be. Competition is my motivation to succeed. I think I have developed this style by the environment I grew up in. As a child, my friends and I had races to see who could run the fastest, hop scotch competitions, and contests for the best cheerleading routines. Sports also played a major part in my competitiveness. I was motivated to do my very best in everything I did and winning a game always got you a trophy and/or a pizza party afterwards. In the workforce, competition is also used.

At my previous job, prizes were given for the individual that took the most phone calls, received the lowest average handle time, etc. The benefits of my healthy competition in the workplace help me produce greater results and better quality of work. I believe my greatest limiting style is being oppositional. Being oppositional, my intention is not to be an adversary. My purpose is to look for problems and prepare for the worst to avoid unpleasant surprises. This style usually appears in meetings when changes that are going to occur in the business are discussed.

I am the individual who brings up the “what ifs”. By doing this, I am looked upon as pessimistic and unable to envision positive possibilities. My reason behind this behavior is to plan for trouble and find ways to prevent it. It is my way of being proactive, rather than reactive. I uncovered that I have a management style that tends to be structured while at the same time having confidence in my subordinates. My combination of humanistic and competitive styles has affected my planning in a very unusual way.

While I strive to set clear, specific, short-term goals and do everything I can to work towards them, I also have faith that my subordinates will accomplish their tasks successfully so that we can succeed as a team. Having these skills assist with planning performance goals and delegating/organizing tasks. I like to organize projects so that the team can get them done as quickly as possible with everyone doing their fair share without much micromanagement. My leadership style tends to lead more towards inspirational and leading by example.

If a certain project is due soon, I don’t necessarily require my subordinates to stay late but instead stay late and work hard myself, hopefully inspiring others to do the same. The blend of humanistic and competitive styles has led me to be a bit more controlling than I would like to be. Although I do have faith in my subordinates and try to lead by example, my competitive nature leads me to take charge of small logistical aspects myself without delegating. My understanding of immediate organizational needs assists with monitoring performance and prepares me to take corrective action as needed.

Many factors have gone into shaping my personal styles. Growing up in a large Asian-Indian family, I have always been pushed by my parents to succeed in school. With many older cousins, I was consistently being compared to how they performed in various subjects. I was pushed to take on leadership roles in many different clubs and organizations as they would “look good” on college applications. I learned early on, however, that leading by example and having faith in others helps gets projects accomplished much more successfully than bullying people around.

For example, in high school, I was appointed chairperson of a school-wide international fair. I was in charge of organizing all the various multicultural clubs and societies and putting on a variety food and dance show. Although my competetaive drive was there pushing me to put on the best show I could, I realized that there was only so much I could do myself and make others do by forcing them. Instead I assigned tasks to others clubs and had faith that they would get the job done. I believe that by watching how I did not procrastinate or avoid doing my jobs, other members were inspired to do the same.

Taking the LSI survey has definitely shed some light on my thinking styles. There are definitely some changes that I could make in order to become a more successful manager with a high performing team. I have learned that while it is important to be interested in people, to care about others, and to encourage them to improve, it is also just as important to provide direction and set goals. As discussed in class, leading others truly sets a manager apart from their peers. After viewing my results, the learning styles I would like to improve on is overcoming being so competitive and oppositional.

I understand that being competitive can increase productivity and improve the quality of my work, but I must also understand that my employees may see me as an insensitive manager who is only interested in results and not their wellbeing. I plan to encourage cooperation and sharing of information and resources between my subordinates in a healthy way. To overcome being oppositional, I plan on working on identifying positive possibilities in future work situations and consider the impact my pessimism has on my quality of life.

Creative energy in healthy competition and being optimistic will result in cooperative teamwork that will make everyone in the organization exultant. I believe the value of taking the LSI survey is that it put me in touch with my strengths I neglected and forgot I had. It also explains my weaknesses and what I need to do to become a better manager. It definitely increased my sense of self-awareness and I have an idea of my self-worth. It reminded me about the things that really matter to me and my subordinates.

Knowing that the better I know about myself, the better my chances are of having satisfied subordinates and better my chances of moving up the ladder in my organization. To this end I believe my work in GM591 will be beneficial. I believe that in order to be a successful manager, one my analyze everything they can about different management styles. A manager must also be able to identify with his subordinates and understand what motivates them and what makes them satisfied. References Human Synergistics, Inc. (2010). Life Styles Inventory. Retrieved September 11, 2010, from https://www. survey-server2. com/lsiuniversity-sso/part_menu. asp

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