Ursinus Bonner Blog

I found myself extremely disappointed with the lecture this past Thursday. Though only able to comment on my observations before regrettably having walked out of the lecture, I feel convinced I witnessed enough to form an opinion of it. Doc seems like a kind and fascinating man, but I have problems with the lecture he presented. I had expected a higher caliber of leadership advice besides positive thinking, confidence, and the like. Furthermore, Doc seemed to equate leadership with capitalism and material success. He spoke much of the necessary skills to survive a trying career or to score job interviews and offers, which I suppose he likens to leadership. The question to ask us is not if we know how to make a million dollars. Perhaps had he continued to talk about how a good leader spends her money to help society, this would have been a pertinent question to ask. Rather, it seemed as though increasing one’s material gains was the ends to one’s being a leader, not the means to do good with such gains.

The point at which I walked out was his less-than-compelling example of confidence. He retold a personal anecdote, of walking up to a beautiful girl in front of the boys he coached and asking for her “digits” in order to show the merits of confidence. The butt of the joke being that she was only in high school, Doc seemed to overlook the complete sexism and alienation immersed within his example.

To summarize the crux of my dissatisfaction, I do not think Doc seriously undertook the challenge to teach us students what is necessary to being a good leader. It is not as easy as saying “I can,” and it does not require college degrees, successful jobs, or money. It is filled with difficult decisions, confusion and fear, self-sacrifice and a complexity which absent in Doc’s lecture. From what I witnessed, Doc may have shown us how to succeed as businesspeople, but not as leaders.

I agree with the previous comments. Whereas I have the same opinion with Val in the belief that the lecture was lively and kept the audience captive, I don’t agree with all of the points Doc was trying to highlight. For starters, I agree with Zannah’s statement on how his priorities were off kilter. Personally, I would put family above all else, and at times that may mean sacrificing valuable time that could be spent improving my leadership skills or in Doc’s case my position on the corporate ladder, however that would be a sacrifice I would be willing to make. Secondly, although I know that his speech was directed towards student athletes I feel as though he could have at least mentioned other approaches to acquiring leadership skills. He failed to mention taking any initiative to volunteer throughout communities, which are often times still important with sports teams too. While, athletics may be important in helping build some leadership skills, unless someone plans on becoming a professional athlete, athletes will most likely need to also focus their attention elsewhere in order to attain necessary leadership skills, because you can’t be an athlete forever.
Despite my dislike of some aspects of Docs speech, I still found some of his points to be worthwhile. For example, he mentioned that when a person fails at a task (or like his example an exam) it doesn’t necessarily mean that the person is incompetent, they just need to continue trying to succeed but by an alternative method. We could apply this point in Bonner, when we are trying to plan our service events and hit a road block, we should just step back and evaluate the situation and try to approach it from a different angle. I also agree with one of his initial points, that although a person may possess the technical skills to succeed they also need to possess good personal skills and the capability of applying both these skill sets in real world situations. Overall, I would rate this lecture as satisfactory; while some of his main ideas seemed valid others were just disappointing.

Not to join in on the event-bashing, but I feel exactly the same as the last three ladies to chime in.
The biggest problem was that the wrong people were invited – Sailes is a sports psychologist, and he gives talk on how to get athletes to use the skills they learn in sports to make it ahead in the corporate world. As Bonners, I think it’s safe to assume that our largest concern is not just buying ourselves big houses and nice cars – we want to lead the world into becoming a better place. We were told that we would be learning about leadership skills, but all we got was a seminar on workplace confidence.
I was miffed by his example of confidence as well, but the example he gave that really bothered me involved his three examples of students making decisions that didn’t concern their future – The one who dropped out and became a teller, the one who mixed coke and alcohol, and the GREEK who killed his friends drunk driving. All three example were intensely effective in getting his point across, but as a dedicated member of my sorority (if you didn’t know, greeks were also encouraged to attend – it is, after all, another organization on campus that requires leaders) I was offended that he had to slide in the fact that the student was Greek, especially when Ursinus hates us enough already and they told us to go. I know it was a small deal, but it got my goat enough for me to comment.
He did have some good interpersonal advice, but for me it was falling on deaf ears – I’m not a student athlete, and I most definitely do not want to make a million dollars. His cockiness and poor use of examples didn’t make up for his abilities as an engaging speaker.
I’m really glad SOMEONE felt the same way I did, because after the event I had to go do Spanish homework with a student athlete business major who absolutely loved the talk…
=)

Now what I got from the presentation was it is very important to have mental toughness, confidence, and to prioritize and that was it. Those things are essential to overcome obstacles, but they are too simple and things I already realize are important for leadership. I also agree with Kristen and Zannah that the presentation was for a very specific audience. The presentation was geared toward athletes and people interested in business and becoming a millionaire, which are things that do not interest me. Yes, it takes a lot of confidence, and dedication to become a CEO, but to me those are selfish goals and not about service and what the Bonner program exemplifies. If he mentioned how through business one can influence the economy of a country that can in turn benefit people in poverty, the environment, and other social issues then maybe I would think it related to being a leader. Now don’t get me wrong I think Dr. Gary Sailes is a man who has worked very hard throughout his life, overcome many obstacles, and knows what it takes to be a successful citizen of his community, but I did not get that from his presentation. He should have given more examples of life experiences for why he has this way of thinking and how he came to be what he is today. That would have provided more advice about leadership than his planned out power point presentation did.