When a little girl started sobbing in the MRI room Doug Dietz designed, he knew he had failed at his job. Although the machine worked, he’d failed to consider the impact that the sterile beige room with its stark yellow warning messages and bone-white machinery would have on a young child. What was initially a moment of great triumph morphed into no small amount of guilt as Doug came to grips with the consequences of failing to empathize with his end users.
Empathy is a critical skill for any leader to possess, and it’s important to keep empathy in mind when solving a problem for a client. To practice this important methodology, I interviewed Marc Fayad, a fellow freshman Scott Scholar, about his experience as a student during COVID. Through this interview, I learned about Marc’s wants and needs, as well as more about who he is as a person. When asked about his experience at the very beginning of the pandemic, Marc tended to give brighter, more optimistic answers. He expressed enthusiasm at the idea of an extended spring break initially, but as the weeks became months, he described the pain he felt at being separated from his friends. This was exacerbated by the fact that he attended a boarding school, which meant that he was no longer living with his friends in the dorms every day. Still, he and his friends managed to avert the crushing loneliness by meeting up outside (six feet apart!) as well as playing Minecraft together. Through this, I learned that Marc is a resilient person who needs quite a bit of social interaction. After the COVID summer, when classes resumed, the status quo at his school changed. His administration had disallowed the “day students” (those who went to Mount Michael, but didn’t board there) from hanging out at the boarding students’ dorms. He remarked that this “split the grade” and “forced [the day and boarding students] to be separated.” Even as the situation improved, things still felt “out of whack” and unnatural. Despite Marc’s optimism, resilience, and easy-going nature, the pandemic still affected him. After the interview, I felt I had a better overview of who Marc was as a person. Learning about the life experiences of others can and should be used in the real world as well. This year, I’m leading a team partnered with Corral Tech, a startup that’s designing shock collars for cows. If we were to conduct empathy interviews on the employees and end users affiliated with Corral, the team could gain valuable insight into the needs and wants of partners and end users alike. After witnessing the tiny girl sobbing in the bleak MRI room, Doug Dietz went back to the drawing board and approached the problem of MRI scanners with empathy. After being around kids and taking a look into their developmental stages and inner lives, he was able to create fun, whimsical MRI rooms that made kids and parents feel at ease without compromising the functionality of the machine. Such is the value of empathy, and proof that approaching a problem by focusing on the end user works.
0 Comments
When I picture the word “Resolute”, I see a knight standing feet shoulder-width apart, head bowed, hands resting on the pommel of a longsword. This image evokes strength, peace, and equilibrium, as well as a calm sense of determination. Even though impossible odds or dragons with fiery breath and sharp teeth may stand in the way, the knight will face down challenges with the kind of steady determination that only comes from finding inner peace and a sense of balance in life. This is why I’ve chosen “Resolute” as my One Word. In order to create my ideal self, I need to channel the quiet strength of that knight. I want to use that inner power to stand firm against stressors in my life. I want to have my feet firmly planted on the ground so I can prevent myself from giving in to the chaos around me- or creating my own. Finally, I want the power to shed the past and look calmly into the future from steady footing. That’s the end goal- to conquer challenges and weather storms using a wellspring of strength from within.
On the surface “It Might Get Loud”, a documentary about guitars, rock, and musical inspiration may not seem like a likely source of lessons in leadership. It opens with Jack White (of White Stripes fame) stretching a string over a Coke bottle and shredding out notes on his “electric guitar.” But under the surface, “It Might Get Loud” provides valuable lessons in leadership to the discerning viewer. The three guitarists (Jimmy Page, the Edge, and Jack White) each have a unique approach to playing guitar, and a unique style that raised each of them to stardom. But despite having success in every sense of the word, all three of them remain humble and approach the meeting hoping to learn from each other. Humility and a desire to learn are two qualities that leaders can use to bring a team or organization together. By learning from those around them, leaders can incorporate the best qualities of their team into their vision for the future. Each of these three men also knows what it means to matter. They have passion and direction, and an obsession with music. Their desire to create art drives them to create meaning from their lives and leave a tangible impact on the world. To me, this embodies the essence of mattering- living your life so loudly and unapologetically while leaving a positive impact on your community, country, and perhaps even the world.
Watching “It Might Get Loud” inspired me. The sheer love these men had for their craft buoyed me up and inspired a late-night whirlwind of creativity. It also made me think about whether my life is mattering. I believe that it is. Although I haven’t made my name or left a huge mark on the world, I have made a positive impact on my community and family. In high school, I was a leader in many clubs and activities, and worked actively to make them better. I also took underclassmen under my wing and encouraged them to be true to themselves and follow their passions. Finally, and most importantly, I’ve been a role model to my younger siblings by being there for them when they need help and assisting them in any way I can. To me, this gives my life meaning and purpose more than any achievement or leadership role. By leaving one positive impact on someone, I touch a million lives. Maybe I’ll never be an award winning guitarist, but if I can be responsible for making even one person’s life better, I will matter. No matter what. When I was five, I started taking classical piano lessons with a tutor my mother found. It was important to her that her kids had a musical education, and so she signed me up for lessons the second I could reliably read and write. Looking back on it, I’m grateful for everything I learned in that class. Of course, hindsight is twenty-twenty. Little five-year-old me hated piano and everything to do with it. Oh, I’d slog through practice lines and arrangements and music theory, but my heart wasn’t in it. After five more years of lessons, I quit. Eight years after I told my tutor I wouldn’t be taking lessons anymore, quitting piano is up there on my list of regrets. I wish I’d stuck it out, practiced more, found passion for what I was doing. However, quitting piano actually taught me more about who I am as a person and leader by being a powerful example of what not to do.
In his TED Talk “The Transformative Power of Classical Music,” Benjamin Zander delivers a convincing argument as to why classical music remains relevant in the modern day. He posits that such music can transform lives and unlock complicated emotions, all of which is true. He also sprinkles in some of the lessons in leadership he learned as the conductor of an orchestra and ambassador from the world of classical music. Although his speech wasn’t directly about leadership, he had many valuable lessons that he shared with the audience. Through one such lesson, I realized that my problem with piano was that my eyes weren’t sparkling. If I was truly passionate about piano, I would have given it my all. In the end, I just wasn’t dedicated enough to what I was doing. The passion I could have had simply wasn’t there. If I truly want to dedicate myself to something, I’d need to find the inner strength to go the extra step. As a leader, it’s my duty to make sure that everyone I work with believes fully in the power of what we can accomplish together. If a leader doesn’t bring everyone a high level of excitement and motivation, then that leader isn’t doing their job. He likened a leader without full belief in what they were doing to Martin Luther King…if he said “I have a dream! At least I think so…” Confidence is crucial to being an effective leader. As Mr. Zander pointed out, “a conductor of an orchestra doesn’t make a sound. His power comes from making other people feel powerful.” This is exactly what a leader should do- use the skills and strengths of others to guide them toward an ultimate goal all without making a sound. Of course, that’s not literal. In fact, the most effective leaders know how to communicate with their team in a way that makes everyone feel seen and heard. The point still stands, however. Leaders aren’t the biggest, or the strongest, or the loudest people. They aren’t even the people with the most power. Leaders are the ones who can channel everyone else’s strength into something that equals more than the sum of the team’s parts. By lifting everyone up, leaders propel their company, organization, or team to the next level of quality and functionality. Realizing that leaders don’t need to be powerful is what separates responsible leaders from those who abuse a position or title. “Leaders” who force others to conform to their ways of thinking squash the possibility of inventing new ideas or approaches. In his TED Talk, Benjamin Zander opened with an anecdote about two people who were sent to a foreign country to see if there was a market for shoes. Upon seeing that the locals didn’t wear shoes, they came to two very different conclusions: one was dismayed and declared selling shoes impossible, while the other saw a “glorious opportunity” and an untapped market for footwear. Now imagine that only the man without optimism was allowed to be heard. The company who sent the scouts would have completely missed a golden opportunity to sell footwear in a new area. The company just gained a whole new market simply by listening to one other opinion. If every single person in a twenty person team had their ideas taken seriously, twenty new approaches or insights could be applied to the problem at hand. This could be expanded to twenty teams of twenty. That’s four hundred new perspectives- a whole ocean of potential solutions. Listening to everyone isn’t only good for the bottom line, however. It also allows the people underneath the bosses and middle managers to exercise their personal power and feel seen and heard, which in turn increases morale. Allowing everyone to express their thoughts and encouraging the expansion of their personal power strengthens everyone from managers to employees. Benjamin Zander was right about the transformative power of classical music. His passion for the art was so infectious that I could feel it through my computer screen as I watched the TED talk. Looking back, I wish I had continued piano, both because of my personal love of music and because of the lessons in leadership that playing piano and other forms of classical music can teach. From empowering others to finding passion that builds up the rest of the team, classical music can truly transform each and every soul that it touches. |
Sophia BirchWalter Scott Jr. Scott Scholar ArchivesCategories |