Locus of Control
According to the definition of Gillian Fournier (2016), based on the concept of Julian Rotter, locus of control is “the extent to which people believe they have power over events in their lives. A person with an internal locus of control believes that he or she can influence events and their outcomes, while someone with an external locus of control blames outside forces for everything”. Manktelow (2017) says as the environment around us changes, we can either attribute success and failure to things we have control over, or to forces outside our influence.
Based on the Rotter’s Test, the results
show I have internal locus of control. Manktelow (2017) states that people who
develop an internal locus of control believe that they are responsible for their
own success. According to the author, people with an internal locus of control,
in general, engage in activities that will improve their situation, emphasize
striving for achievement, work hard to develop their knowledge, skills and
abilities, are inquisitive, and try to figure out why things turned out the way
they did, take note of information that they can use to create positive
outcomes in the future, have a more participative management style and they are
more likely to succeed.
Making a self-reflection of my leadership
behavior and the test result, I can easily see how the result is accurate. Regarding
to my career development, I constantly attend workshops at the company and I try
to link and apply all the knowledge learnt in my Master Degree to my work
environment. When a situation happens in my work environment, the first thing I
do is critically think about it, evaluating all the possible reasons behind the
incident, the best solutions and possible consequences before taking an action and
I make sure my entire team communicates with me about everything is going on
regarding to service, safety and security. I build trust on my relationship with
my team members for them to feel safe on sharing with me all the adhoc situation, therefore I have the
maximum control over it, and if not, I immediately inform to those who has.
Apart from the subjective characteristics,
I directly work with my team, as closely as I can, to make sure I am instantly ready
to solve any problem they do not have the knowledge or do not feel confident to
do so. At the beginning of every day at work, I set up a sheet of paper with
each member name and their responsibilities and duties throughout the day and verbally
brief them about it. Doing so, I make their tasks clear and if something goes
out of order, I know exactly who to talk to, thus I am able clarify accurately
what is happening.
Another trait that shows my locus of
control is my communication skills. I always keep my team updated about everything,
no matter if they are involved directly or indirectly on the situation, and
with team I mean the inclusion of my superiors. There is a situation I passed through
two days ago, which illustrate my internal locus of control.
One of my team members noticed a ground
staff breaking a security rule. My employee followed the correct SOPs (Standard
Operation Procedures) and made sure no security threat was actually taken
place. Even though, she informed me as soon as I approached her. I knew it was
not something major or to worry about at that point, but I started thinking
through it, with a holistic point of view and future consequences. In a minute
time, I informed my superior about it, even knowing that someone’s job was at
risk now (ground staff). I passed only factual information, with no assumptions
and conclusion and left the decision to my superior since I cannot override his
position and decisions. He took the first necessary steps towards the situation.
While other decisions were taken, I need to comfort my team member, while she
was feeling guilty knowing what could happen to the staff. I explained to her
the importance of sharing all the information with her seniors, why I decided
to follow up and passed the information and the reason why the incident was escalating
to security authorities. After I was confident she felt she did the right thing
I went to my superior to know what was going on and if I could assist somehow. Measures
were taken by authorities and the head of airport security, who took over the
situation.
I gathered with all team members, even the
ones I was not directly working with to inform them about the incident and the
outcome, and I requested extra vigilance. By the end of the day I approached my
employee to praise her regarding to her situational awareness and communication
skills, and an official report was raised to her manager to recognize her
strengths and motivate her to keep them up.
Reflecting through this incident, I noticed
I was trying to have control in barely every single step, directly influencing
in most of the outcomes, and even in people’s future behaviors.
Manktelow (2017) covers some negative traits
that people with a strong internal locus of control tend to have, as: being
very achievement-oriented and wanting to control everything, which can lead to difficulties
in taking direction and relating with others.
In my personal life I face this challenges
as consequences of my internal locus of control. I want influence in every
difficult decision my parents are passing through and sometimes I notice I am
giving orders to them, as I am in the position of doing so. My fiancée gets
overwhelmed sometimes as well, since I want to know every single detail of his
day (people he met, what he did, what he will do, decision he took and so
forth). I do not do it intentionally or consciously. It is my natural habits
and the way I deal with the world as a whole.
There are a lot of positive outcomes on
having internal locus of control, but if the negative side of it is not managed
well, it can lead us to failure, not matter on which scope of our lives. We
need to keep in mind that random events do occur for all sorts of reasons.
While we can manage many of those with enough determination and hard work, some
we cannot. (Manktelow, 2017). It rests on us a high leveled risk management and
tolerance to deal with things that eventually will be out of our control, and
this is my goal to be achieved in my personal life.
REFERENCES
Fournier, G. (2016). Locus of Control. PsychCentral.
Retrieved from https://psychcentral.com/encyclopedia/locus-of-control/
on April 14, 2017.
Manktelow, J. (2017). Locus of Control: are you in charge of your
destiny?. Mind Tools. Retrieved from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newCDV_90.html on April 14, 2017.
Rotter, J. B. (1966) Generalized expectancies for internal versus
external control of reinforcement. Psychological Monographs: General and
Applied, 80, 1-28. Retrieved from http://www.brandeis.edu/roybal/docs/Locus%20of%20Control_website.pdf
on April 14, 2017.
Sinicki, A. (2017). The
importance of a Central Locus of Control. Retrieved from http://www.healthguidance.org/entry/16868/1/The-Importance-of-a-Central-Locus-of-Control.html
on April 14, 2017.
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