English is my second laguage Please help check my grammar se

English is my second laguage. Please help check my grammar, sentence structure, punctuation, topic sentences. Please check carefully. Thank you very much!

I really enjoyed reading this article because one of my strength is strategic. I realized strategic is not all about coming up with an easy solution or be able to solve a problem quickly. But there are many different aspects to it. For instant, in this article, the authors say that in order to become a successful strategic leader, one need to attaint six main abilities: the abilities to anticipate, challenge, interpret, decide, align, and learn. I personally think all 6 abilities are important, one need to understand all of them in order to become a strategic leader, if someone has all 6 abilities, they will be able to cope with any situations.

            Ability to anticipate is a skill to detect uncertain threats and opportunity. One must have a far vision and be able to know right away what is the results if something come up along the way. They must understand their competitor’s perspective and also their own company situation and be able to predict what happen next. Ability to challenge, I think the main point for this ability is to have an open minded, willing to take feedback and criticized but not get affected by it. The important thing is never jump to any assumption without viewing the problem through different aspects. Sometimes, the more we think about a problem, the more confusing it gets. Asking another person that doesn’t relate to the problem is one of a good solution. Because the way they approach the problem is different, so they might have a better idea. Ability to interpret, this skill saying a leader should observe and be able to summarize the whole situation. They should carefully look at a situation, understand it clearly before they decide to take any actions. They should see for themselves and not just listen to other’s ideas. The article has been talking about a decision in the last two abilities, and yes decision making is also an important skill to have. A leader should have different options in their mind. Use ability to challenge and interpret to look at a big picture, determine the best one and also be able to predict the result. Ability to learn is another important skill, the article says that we have to value success as well as failure. Learn and study the failure, defined the cause of it so next time we won’t step on that mistake again

At the end, this article shows that all the abilities are equally important. We can’t be mastered one and expect to become a successful strategic leader. Each of the skills has its own unique way and they go hand in hand with each other. However, I think that each of the abilities more focusing on the long term benefit, and what if we want quick outcomes. These abilities will be too hard or too bothersome to apply in the process

At US Bank, our group having a difficult time with “Align”. A lot of members in our group often say “no one ask me” and “no one ever told me”. Some people usually assume if they understand something, other people will understand too, but that’s not always the case. Especially we have a lot of new people. The training process is not consistent, so a lot of mistakes happen because everyone doesn’t have comment knowledge. Our managers change their process all the time, but forget to tell the rest of the team about their plan, so we often confused about the procedures, and the way they want us to process things.

We’re really good at anticipating. We connect with other departments and different group to have a better understanding of the situation; our communication is very on point. Of course, in such a big organization, miss-communication also happen sometimes, but we try every day to eliminate that. We have a meeting every quarter to predict the future as well as review the last year data.

Ability to learn is also a good skill that we apply every day. We tried to make everyone become a floater, so we have a lot of back up. We have training every day, after one people master at their desk for a few months, we train them on different desks. Whenever we made a mistake, our leader always says “that’s how you learn” and its very encouraging people in our group. We started to pay more attention on what we did, ask questions and make sure to never make the same mistake twice.

I am not quite sure about challenge, everything we do follow a rubric, sometimes we try different things, but most of the time we find ourselves going back and stick with original rules. Lately, we’ve been thinking about changing some procedures that could save us times. We discussed a lot, but no action yet, I think our leader still try to figure out the process to ensure it run smoothly.

Decision, we follow the rules, and we don’t do anything without approver. We always need someone to do 2^nd check and 3^rd check. Often, I can’t find myself make decision, because I might get in to big trouble, and it will go all the way to the CEO. Some of the task that we do is very sensitive, so even my managers sometimes have to ask the higher managers as well. Sometimes, there were some situations that require quick response, our group will have a quick discussion to find the best solution and do it. Of course, we all have to take responsible for our action.

            In conclusion, this article is a good guide line, but in some situation, I don’t find myself, or leadership team using all of them. It is more for long term vision where a leader has time to think through and apply all these skills. Unless they have mastered all of them and be able to react quickly. But for our department, we want to get thing done quick, it will be a little hard to utilize all 6 abilities.

Solution

I really enjoyed reading this article because it the basic idea revolves around strategic decision making skills. I realized that possessing a strategic sense is not just about coming up with a workable solution or to be able to perceive or resolve a matter quickly, but its horizon spreads far beyond. For instance, in this article, the Authors says that in order to become a successful strategic leader, one needs to attain six core abilities namely the ability to anticipate, challenge, interpret, decide, align and to learn. I personally think all these six abilities are important and one needs to comprehend all of them in order to become a successful strategic leader. Therefore, if someone who possess all these abilities, have a potential to cope with any given situation.

Ability to anticipate is a skill to detect such threats and opportunities that are uncertain in nature and hence difficult to foresee. One must have a vision of foreseeing and should also be able to know decipher the anticipated results that may come its way. One must further understand their competitor’s perspective and also of their own Corporate situation and accordingly, be able to predict what could possibly happen the next. With the next type of ability, that is the Ability to challenge, the USP would be to have an open mindedness who is willing to take feedback and accept the criticism, rather than getting affected by it. The most essential part here is, to never jump to any conclusion or to hold an preconceived notions, without viewing the problem through different aspects. Sometimes, the more we think about a problem, the more confusing it gets. Asking another person who is neutral to the concerning problem, is one of the good solutions because the manner in which such a person may approach a problem would be independent and unbiased, so they might have a better idea or solution corresponding to the same. Next is the Ability to interpret which is a skill that states that a leader should possess good observing talent and accordingly, be able to summarize the whole situation. Such a leader should carefully look at a situation, identify with it clearly, before the leader decides to take any actions upon it. Such a leader should further believe in one’s own conscience rather than blindly believing into what others have to opine the leader with. The article, with respect to the last two abilities, refers to the decision-making skills which another very significant skill that a leader should have. In this regard, there should be various alternatives available before the leader for consideration. Thereafter, the leader should utilize the other ability which the ability to challenge and to look at a bigger picture, thereby determining the best one out of the available alternatives and thence being able to predict the result with more conviction. Ability to learn is another important skill, as per the article that demonstrates that one has to value one’s failure as well along with the success. It is essential that with every failure, there is a learning also attached to the same. The failure needs to be studied and accordingly, the causes of the same is examined so that it forms a base to rectify expected errors in the days ahead. This ensures lack of repetition of the mistakes once again.

In the end, this article urges that all the above discussed abilities are equally important. It is not possible to achieve the milestones in the career life by only mastering in one of the abilities while neglecting the others, in order to master oneself as a successful strategic leader. Each of the skills has its own unique characteristics but also goes hand in hand with each other, hence complementary. However, I am personally also in the opinion that each of these abilities, if needed to worked together upon, can though help in achieving the benefits in the long-term with its definite focus, but in the short-term, if the leader wishes to achieve the results at a quicker pace, these abilities would be rather bothersome if one decides to work on all of them together.

At the US Bank, our group having a difficult time with “Aligning” everybody’s interests. A lot of members in our group often say “no one asks me” or “no one ever told me”. Some people usually assume if they understand something, so would the others in the group but such may not be the case. Especially in our case where we have a lot of new people in the group who have not been provided with a training process which is consistent with that of the older ones in the group. As a result, our group is prone to lot of mistakes because lack of common basis of knowledge and understanding among the group-mates. Our managers change their processes without notice, every now and then, but fail to intimate the teammates with their plans and this results into confusion about the procedures and thereby the teammates are unable to comprehend what is expected out of them in terms of processing of the tasks.

We, as a team, are very good at communicating. We try to connect with other departments effectively as well as with other groups in order to have a better understanding of a given situation. Therefore we vouch upon our communication skills. However, with the fact that our Organization is a large Organization, there are at times, the scope of miscommunication. But we attempt to mitigate the same to extent possible. We further have quarterly meetings to forecast our future strategic activities. Here, in our Organization, Ability to learn is also a relevant skills that we apply every day. We attempt to make everyone such a ‘Think-pot’ in themselves that if need be, we could back upon them. We further have regular training activity wherein once a certain colleague has mastered upon the processes of his profile, we impart them training to learn the other job profiles too. In a situation where we commit mistakes, our team leaders rather encourage us by saying that that is how one learns. In this regard, our members in the group keep on encouraging each other. It helps us become more attentive thereby lessening our chances of committing any more mistakes. We think twice before taking an action.

I am not quite sure about the challenge because for everything, we do follow a rubric although sometimes we try our hands of different things, but most of the time we find ourselves going back and sticking with actual set of rules. However, lately, we’ve been thinking about changing some of the procedures that could save us time. As of now, in spite of lot of discussions, no action is yet taken but I believe our leader is still trying to figure out the process to ensure it runs smoothly.

In terms of decision, we follow the rules and do not do anything without seeking a proper approval. In fact, we believe in getting our activities checked twice and even thrice. Often, I fear of taking decision all on my own since should such a decision go wrong, I would have to face the CEO because we engage ourselves into certain tasks that are very sensitive and thus even our managers would have to refer to their seniors to execute the same. However there are also such situations wherein quick responses are expected and in that case, our group undertakes a quick discussion to arrive upon the best solution to the issue and accordingly put it into action. Of course, even for such an action, each of us are jointly and individually responsible as well.

Thus to conclude, although this article forms a good guideline but in certain situation, I cannot relate myself in. I do not find myself or the leaders in my team applying all of the them. These are rather subjective to the situation our team is in and not all are applicable at the same time. Hence I believe, for a long-term vision, these abilities are relevant, but unless the leader has mastered all these skills, it shall be otherwise difficult to act upon it quickly and hence since in our Department, actions are rather expected to be at a quicker pace, all these six abilities hardly apply to us.