Assessment 1 - Review of positive and negative change agent skills

The purpose of the review is for you to record recent work events in which you identify leaders

acting in a change agent role behaving in a positive or negative way. Think about how they

implemented the change. Choose events from your organisation which involves leaders

attempting to change something, which can be analysed as to whether or not you perceived it

as positive (i.e. constructive, useful, functional) or negative (destructive, not useful or

dysfunctional). You may wish to further classify events as examples of either effective or

ineffective change leadership, or both. You should determine if the events fit in with Kanter's

(2005) framework for leaders who are making an intervention. If an event does not fit in with this classification, then add to the

classification. Be clear about an event, analyse the event, and provide concise relevant details

to support your arguments.

The review will provide you with the opportunity to consider and articulate ways of

understanding skills of leaders. If pertinent, you should feel free to speak of personal

experience and to discuss mistakes. Use made-up names and be objective as this is not the

place to explore your feelings about work.

Your work can draw on concepts from Weeks 1 but may also include Weeks 2, 3 and 4 if

necessary.

Try to choose events that have happened very recently, say in the past few weeks. The more

recent the events, the more detail you will remember and the more salient the analysis will be.

Your work should be presented in essay style. It should have a coherent argument or set of

points that you develop through the essay. Avoid heavy descriptions of events that have no

relevance.

Include short details about the business such as size of organisation, size of team, nature of

business, seniority of leader that the event(s) concern.

In terms of content, it is suggested that you include the following structure:

1) Introduction of the leadership skills identified by Kanter

2) Examples of positive leadership skills displayed

3) Examples of negative leadership skills

4) Conclusions about Kanter's classification system