Transformational Leadership

The Mission of University reads as follows:

University prepares individuals to lead and serve by providing high- quality, practice-based educational programs in law, taxation, business and related professions – as a nonprofit institution – in an innovative and challenging learning environment that embraces professional ethics and diversity.

When applying the mission of GGU to this course, the most important priority or objective is for the student to be able to apply what they have learned in their own professional practice that reflects innovation, ethical conduct, and a strong embrace of diversity, inclusion, and belonging as well as the transformation of people, organizations, and societies.

This final signature assignment functions also as a Capstone Project. A Capstone Project is the opportunity for students to demonstrate that they have understood the course content and can apply the content in professional practice in a way that advances performance, inclusion, empowerment, and the delivery of organizational results.

The Perspective for Approaching the Final Capstone paper:

This final project should be considered a reflection and integration paper rather than a pure research paper containing multiple sources. The student should keep in mind that the instructor is already familiar with Kouzes and Posner’s approach to Transformational Leadership. This means that, when it comes to writing the Capstone paper, the instructor is far more interested in the student’s own original thinking, application, and integration of Transformational Leadership than he is about what other researchers and authors have to say about Transformational Leadership.

Grading for this Capstone Project will be based on the following 5 areas:

1. Did the student follow the assignment guidelines?
2. Did the student demonstrate critical thinking, personal reflection, integration, and application of the material presented during the entirety of the course?
3. Does the student’s writing demonstrate effort and clarity around the concepts presented during the course? In other words, does the student’s writing make sense and can it be successfully lived out and demonstrated in the student’s professional setting?
4. Did the student identify a minimum of 6 sources that were used to support their positions, perspectives, and strategies?
5. Do the writing mechanics, grammar, and punctuation reflect the high standards of writing at The School of Undergraduate Studies?
6. Is APA formatting consistent throughout the student’s paper?

Paper Content and Structure:

Kouzes and Posner (2017) presented the 5 Practices of Transformational Leadership. The student is to take each of the 5 practices and apply each practice to their own personal and professional context. The following structure can be used in the paper:

A. Opening the paper with how the student has encountered and navigated the course content and the value of the course content or overall class in the student’s personal and professional development. What assumptions and practices about leadership did the student bring into the class that were reinforced and supported throughout the 7.5 weeks of the course? Conversely, what assumptions and practices about leadership did the student bring into the class that were challenged, abandoned, or in need of moderate or significant modification?

B. Define each of the five practices
a. What does this practice mean to the student?
b. How will the student apply and demonstrate this practice in their current or future business context?
c. What evidence will indicate that the student has been successful with the implementation of this practice?

C. What is the students’ mission and purpose as it relates to their role as a transformational leader of others in business-related organizational setting, in a community-based social organization setting (for example: religious organizations, social service organizations, NPOs, etc.) in a national setting, and in a Global setting?

Sources to be used:

The student must utilize the Kouzes and Posner (2017) text as the primary text/resource for the paper. Six (6) additional resources previously utilized during the course as found in the HBR Coursepack, must be used to support the positions and perspectives advanced by the student.

Structure and Style:

Papers are to have a cover page, references page, and no less than 4.5-pages of written narrative (this page total does not include the cover page and references page). The student must maintain a Turnitin “similarity index” at or below 15%. All papers must adhere to the APA writing guidelines found in the syllabus and clarified through the APA writing style at: http://www.apastyle.org/

All borrowed ideas or quotes must be supported by in-text citations. If any plagiarism is identified by Turnitin, the student’s paper shall be submitted to GGU’s Committee for Academic Integrity.