Leadership Coaching Lounge – a successful start in 2012

15.02.2012

In January and February 2012, the first Leadership Coaching Lounge (LCL) took place, a new cooperation of the Northern Institute of Technology Management (NIT) and the Kühne Logistics University (KLU). During four sessions, students from both NIT and KLU discussed challenges in leadership and discovered new ways to cope with upcoming problems. The Leadership Coaching Lounge was led by Prof. Dr. Niels Van Quaquebeke of the KLU.

One of the requirements of the LCL was to give students a non-university setting to break typical class thinking. This requirement was given at the Vinyl Room of the 25hours hotel at the Hafencity, where the seminars took place. 

Prof. Van Quaquebeke on the LCL: 
“The goal of the Leadership Coaching Lounge is that students are empowered to solve own difficult leadership challenges which often involve deep rooted dilemmas. Because students discuss their challenges in a group, they profit directly from the diversity in perspectives which often reveals paths that simply did not occur to them individually. It was great to see how the students went to action right after each coaching session and were able to report progress in the follow up sessions."

 

Read on to get a direct impression by two students who attended the LCL – Sujaritha (NIT) and Jeetendra (KLU) have kindly answered a couple of questions:

NIT: What intrigued you to apply for the LCL? 

Jeetendra: I applied for the LCL as I needed some guidance in the leadership challenges which I was facing already and to learn how to deal with the same type of challenges in future in case they occur. 
My expectation was to cope with some current leadership challenges and to learn some leadership tips which would help me in my work later.

Sujaritha: I believe that leading oneself and teams effectively is the single, most important trait that would have the highest impact on one’s career and one’s personal life. Based on my professional experience of five years as programmer and project leader, I came to appreciate this even more. At the Leadership Coaching Lounge, I was looking forward to learn some theoretical and practical ideas to lead a team and to communicate effectively. I was also keen to identify key leadership qualities as well as gaining some principal ideas that would augment my existing perceptions about leadership and enable me to become a better leader.

NIT: The 3 most important things you took from the LCL?

Sujaritha: Firstly, leading others is not about making others work for you by commanding or by bossing around. It is about making others wanting to work for you. We need learn to communicate so as to reach out to different types of people in a variety of situations. By communicating effectively one can diffuse even a crisis situation.

Secondly, taking leadership means taking initiative to understand a situation and identify the challenges involved. 

Thirdly, before one can solve any problem, one needs to be aware of one’s own attitude, involvement and the desired outcome. By focusing on what he/she can do, a leader is self-empowered to solve a problem and obtain better control over a situation.

Jeetendra: The three important things that I learned from this coaching were:

1. Not to have Prejudices against people.

2. To have a clear vision of my own goals and my goals for the people working with me.

3. Every change takes time and every small step taken towards improving any situation has a role in changing it.

NIT: Why was this new format so attractive to you?

Jeetendra: The environment was quite nice and friendly and it was like a small group event like after work get-togethers. There was music being played when we reached and the Professor greeted us and introduced with each other in a very friendly way which also helped to break the ice between the participants.

Sujaritha: We had a very friendly atmosphere at Leadership Coaching Lounge. We were a group of peers who got together with a purpose - to learn about leadership. The group was open, frank, encouraging, caring, and supportive to one another. Prof. Van Quaquebeke enabled our group to have such a nice atmosphere by encouraging structured and constructive interchange of ideas.

NIT: What did you fancy most at the LCL? 

Jeetendra: What I liked the most was how the Professor moderated it and involved everyone he made us feel like we were in a small CIRCLE OF TRUST and - off course - the snacks and drinks were also very good!!

Sujaritha: The approach of “learning by doing” appealed to me immensely. We were taught a method which we used to analyze a current leadership challenge faced by one of us. We came with alternative courses of actions which could be applied in the situation by the concerned person. We also received feedbacks once the suggested solutions were implemented in real world scenario. The success of fellow students in applying the solutions and their positive results did greatly encourage and motivate us.

NIT: Let’s talk about the format and teaching method:

Sujaritha: The teaching method was special in the sense that students crossed the line of being just observers and became kind of instructors. Instead of just sitting back in a class and listening to a lecture, we took an active part in learning. We were a group of eight people of different backgrounds. Each of us could bring different perspectives to the same situation. We learnt from each other through sharing our experiences, suggestions and feedbacks.

Jeetendra: He made learning fun; it was not like a normal classroom teaching where we were supposed to take notes of everything that he said, but here we actually doing the things and learning by doing things on our own.

NIT: Any suggestions or wishes for the next bunch of sessions?

Jeetendra: I could not find any flaw in the course – so I cannot suggest any improvement. For me it was perfect. It would be great to have one or two follow-up sessions for the Professor to check whether we have implemented the stuff we have learned.

Sujaritha: I am immensely satisfied by the learning experience at the LCL and extremely grateful to NIT and Prof. Van Quaquebeke for offering it to us. I would not change any single aspect of it – I would only suggest to maybe extend each session a little. We were so involved in the discussions - not only did we loose track of time, but also wanted more!