Reflect on the
following questions in a well-written post on your Reflection Blog.
Complete Rotter’s Locus of Control Scale Test. Based on your results, is
your locus of control external or internal? Reflect on how your locus of
control affects your leadership behavior and your responses to others’
leadership styles or is this a bunch of poppycock?
The locus of control of people is determined by the degree to which one
behavior influence what actually take place in their life. Many individuals may believe that they
control what happens to them, perhaps this is because they believe that they
make their decisions and are the masters of their fate taking accountability
and ownership for what goes on in their life.
This is similar to the result pyramid theory that suggest that our
experience fosters our beliefs, our belief, in turn, drives us to take action,
and our action produce the expected desirable outcome. People with this belief system believe the
control on their lives come from their inner self. According to Rotter’s locus of control theory,
these individuals are internalizers. Conversely,
there are some people who believe they have no control over their lives, they
are just victims to forces beyond their control or understanding. These individuals carry the belief that they
have very little influence over what happens to them, and that theirs not much,
they can do. People who believe that
they’re lives are controlled are called externalizers.
According,
to the Rotter’s locus of control scale, I fall on the side of the
internalizers. Meaning that I believe
the outcomes in my life is mostly because of my doing. An example of this is when I decided to separate
myself from my team members to show leadership that I have skills in areas that
may not be fully expressed in my current role.
I schedule a meeting with my senior manager to discuss what I have in
mind to not only increase my value on the team but to also create more agility. I informed my senior manager that I will be
working with the lead integrator on training new incumbents by teaching half of
the course for the first 2 months, and thereafter I will begin teaching the
entire course. The result of taking
action and controlling the outcome I desired led to recognition from leaders
and team members that ultimately had beneficial value such as a high-performance
review and increase pay percentage. Like the path-goal theory suggest, leaders,
must adjust to their followers by influencing individuals perception of work
goals, self-development goals, and paths to goal attainment (Gibson, Ivancevich
& Donnelly, 2000).
My
experience with leadership underpinned by the behaviors of others with emphasis
on the locus of control theory has been extremely positive and the most surprising
ways. Most recently I was informed that
the V.P of production operations stated to a group of gentlemen at the
Johnstown, PA facility that I have been doing an remarkable job with the
performance management teams (PMT). The
fact that I have a sense of self-efficacy to perform and produce positive
results in any situation has allowed me to be promoted within my group as the
person to get things done. From my perspective
locus of control is far from poppycock. leadership can predict my behavior in situations
related to the PMT. I believe
internalizers can be compared to Maslow hierarchy of needs theory because we
have need for inclusion, differentiation, autonomy, and job variety controlling
our outcome.
Reference:
Connors, R.,
Smith, T. (2011). Change the culture, change the
game: The breakthrough strategy for energizing your organization and creating
accountability for results.
Ivancevich,
J. M., & Gibson, J. L. (2005). Organizations: behavior, structure, processes.
Irwin Professional Pub.
Northouse,
P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice. Thousand Oaks,
CA: Sage.
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