Skills And Competencies Of Change Leaders Management Essay

Skills And Competencies Of Change Leaders Management Essay This essay analysed the skills and competencies of change leaders with the support of literature references and real life examples. Later, the essay focussed on the challenges of change leaders during the implementation of their skills and competencies on change processes, and how these skills and competencies are varying across different levels of leaders in an organization. Finally, the conclusion is drawn on the basis of critical analyses on change leadership and identified the possibility of acting as a change leader by anyone. Introduction For the past two decades, the amount of significant change that the organizations faced in order to survive has tremendously increased, and many of the researchers argued that this situation will continue and demand more of future leaders (Wren Dulewicz, 2005; Senge et al., 2002). Leadership is such a crucial component for undergoing these changes, and identifying the key components of leadership is important for the success of these transformation efforts (Beer Nohria, 2000). Kotter (1996) considered that, leadership is the key to creating and sustaining the successful organization, because it helps the organization to shape its future and sustain its growth. In addition, leadership competencies are also essential to lead the change processes in an effective way (Christensen Overdorf, 2000). According to Sanchez et al., (1996), leadership competencies have a cognitive aspect, in terms of knowledge and skills the leader possesses, and an action aspect that enables a leader to depl oy their competencies in a coordinated manner. Leaders competencies and skills will influence the actions, structures and processes that enhance the change and it further strengthen the effectiveness in implementing change (Gilley et al., 2009). This essay will critically analyse whether anyone can adapt these leadership skills and competencies which is necessary to be a successful change leader. The analysis will be done based on the references of academic research that has been already conducted in this field. Necessary Skills and Competencies to be a change leader Leadership is different from management; leadership complements management but it does not replace it. Because management is about coping with complexity but the leadership is about coping with change (Kotter, 1990). The leadership-skill requirements will vary based on the leaders positions and their levels. The most important skills where the leaders need to be possessed are cognitive skills, business skills, strategic skills and interpersonal skills. Across all the leadership levels cognitive skills are founded to be more important. In addition, interpersonal skills are required for a leader in greater degree than business or strategic skills (Sparks Gentry, 2008). For example) during the group work on simulation game, the leader of the successful team had contributed a great part by understanding the views of the team members and through the organization of team meeting. This helped the team to bring out fruitful ideas and plans uniquely and also it helped the group leaders to emphasize their cognitive and interpersonal skills effectively. Compared to other skills, the significance of business and strategic skills is more required for the leaders in managerial level (Sparks Gentry, 2008). Possessing these leadership skills in change management has been linked to bringing about effective and successful organization change. Although, some of the factors are considered as the barriers for the success of the change, they are lack of understanding of change implementation techniques and the inability to alter ones leadership style or organization functions (Bossidy Charan, 2002; Gilley, 2005). The other barriers identified by the analysis include the inability of the leaders to motivate others to change, poor communication skills, and failure to reward or recognize the individuals who make the effort to change (Kotter, 1996). Hence the ability to understand and manage the change processes is valued as a necessary capability of change leaders. Many of the scholars defined this ability as a social intelligence skill, which is the ability to understand ones own and others feelings, behaviours and thoughts in interpersonal situations and to respond appropriately, which includ es emotional ability (Burke, 2002). Finally, leaders thoughts and skills are manifested through the actions of implementing change across the organization. In this stage, the leaders need to be aware about avoiding coordination issues when the different functional groups in an organization work on a common task. Because lack of coordination will raise conflicts in implementing change and it reduce the success (Kuhl et al., 2005). For example, while working for the multi-product task, the lack of coordination across the leaders from different departments affected the implementation of change. There were lot of conflicts aroused in allocating the budget across each department of the organization and hence it led to the ineffective change implementation. As per Zaccaro (2002), effective leadership requires social reasoning skills to understand, judge and diagnose social situations accurately, and relational competencies to respond to the change and manage them successfully. Since change implementation involves the understanding of multiple level of people (i.e., individual, group and organizational), social-emotional competency is regarded to have a direct impact on the capacity to lead change. It acts as a greater predictor of leading change than managing complexity. Social-emotional competency includes observing the employees views, providing constructive feedback, encouraging the cooperation among team members, maintaining effective interpersonal relationships with others and treating others with respect to regardless of their position or rank (Mathew, 2009). For example) while working for the simulation game, in some of the groups, there was a long debate happened among the team members about the implementation of change strategi es with different views and hence conflicts aroused. The leaders of those teams were also failed to maintain cooperation within the team. This led them to choose inappropriate change strategies and directed towards failure to reach their target. But while enquiring the team who reached the target, I came to knew that the team leader had delegated the roles to each team members based on their knowledge about the game and by providing constructive feedback on their views. This helped them to maintain a good cooperation within the team without giving the ways for any conflicts and also it provided a way to reach their target within the time limit and budget. Within a change specific context Higgs and Rowland (2000, 2001) indicated a cluster of change leadership competencies associated with coaching and developing others. In addition, Giglio et al. (1998) also emphasized the importance of leaders coaching role in the change process. Because a good leader should motivate their employees in order to make them aware of the change process. This will be done by providing appropriate coaching to them. According to Hudson (1999), coaching skills enable leaders to approach situations from new perspectives and to question the status quo. Moreover, the leaders who coach their employees can enhance their renewal capacity and resilience, which has significant influence on organizational success. Finally and more importantly it allows others to make and learn from mistakes. Huq (2006) argued that the leadership competencies can help to create the six sigma cadre in an organization. He argued that the personal and corporate competencies play a vital role in creating this six sigma cadre. Personal competencies include the technical knowledge and charisma of the leader. Whilst the corporate competencies include the combinations of skills and knowledge or experience that enable a leader to implement the change program successfully. However, the available evidence shows that, even the experienced leaders were deviated from these competencies in some circumstances. The most recent examples of sudden corporate implosions (Enron, Lehman Brothers) have apparently raised concerns about the nature and influence of bad leadership. Higgs (2009) have identified that the causes of this leadership failure were due to combination of personal flaws and performance shortfalls. While exploring this concept, he also identified a range of causal factors for these implosions which are skill deficiencies, being insensitive to others, betraying trust, arrogance and being overly ambitious. He argued that the personal flaws were more vital than skill deficiencies as drivers of derailment. Finally, Northouse (2010) emphasized the importance of charismatic/value-based leadership in change management. Value-based leadership reflects the ability to inspire, motivate and to expect significant performance from others on the basis of core values of the change process. This kind of leadership comprises being visionary, decisive, inspirational, trustworthy, self-sacrificing and performance oriented. The powerful example of value-based leadership is the life and work of Mahatma Gandhi. Challenges on implementing leadership Skills and Competencies during change Initiating and managing organizational change is a significant challenge for todays leaders. The leaders role in change process is to make their employees to understand about the need of change. Understanding organizational change involves analysing types of change within the organization. No matter its size, any change has a ripple effect on an organization (Gilley et al., 2009). At the macro level, frequent organizational change focus on strategy and business models, technology, product and services, structure, processes, culture, acquisitions or expansion or downsizing (Lewis, 1994).Consequently, it challenges the leaders of all level in an organization in terms of managing the complexity of the change (Biech, 2007). One of the challenges that good leaders often face is solving the unsatisfactory performance of the staff in an effective way. Leaders who failed to clarify their expectation to employees and to respond openly against the performance problems are considered to be an ineffective leader (Redfern, 2008). While working on the multi- product task, in some of the groups, the leaders did not clearly respond against the performance problems of their team members. It is not possible to expect all the members in a group to work effectively, but the leaders could give prior instructions to the each individual about their expectation from them. Hence many of the groups lacked the complete participation of all the members in their team. As an effective leader, they should make all the team members to get involved in a work to achieve success. The crucial challenge that many of the leaders consider is the resistance to change, and it have a noticeable impact and influence upon the success of an organizational change project. Resistance is commonly regarded as a behaviour which is not congruent with the attempts of the change leader (Bartunek, 1993). In this case, the leaders should analyse the resistance from motivational perspective and, more particularly, from an identity-based perspective, that is examining the employee attitudes to the change and their own attitudes to the resistance (Dijk Dick, 2009). Some of the literature evidence suggests that changing organizational behaviour is the fundamental challenge for a leader while leading organizational change (Argyris, 1993; Kotter Kohen, 2002; Burke, 2002). Burke (2002) emphasized that leaders should deal with competition for resources, power and political dynamics; dispel resistance; and exemplify desired behaviour change. Finally and more importantly, the distinctive feature that leaders need to possess is the ability to identify the right person for the right job and to train employees to succeed at their jobs. To succeed consistently, good leaders need to be skilled not just in evaluating people but also in evaluating the abilities and disabilities of their firm as a whole. During change implementation the leader must ensure that the right message has been communicated through right approach. Implementation is perhaps the most adverse phase of change. In this stage, communication plays a significant role during the throes of the implementation phase. Without an effective human communication, the change process cannot be implemented successfully. Hence the implementation of change challenges communication skills of a leader (Russ, 2008). In addition to communication challenge, the leaders may also face the challenge on time constraints to implement the change. This kind of challenge impacts the success of the change process, because a change process which is not completed in time budget cannot be considered as a successful process (Meyer Stensaker, 2006). For example) during the simulation game, many of the groups were not able to reach the specified target in time. Hence the teams which did not meet the target in time were considered as unsuccessful te ams. An effective leader used to display effective leadership behaviours in order to reduce the stress on change work, such as coordination with other leaders in an organization, concern for wellbeing of the staff, frankness and willingness to involve in two-way feedback, and self-awareness. They recognize and give importance to effort of others in an organization and support their initiatives. They will share problems, engage colleagues in their solutions, and try to achieve the goal in a way that further problems do not arise (Redfern, 2008). But in real-time implementation, conflicts may arise between the change leaders of different departments or between the change leaders and employees. However, it can be avoid using open communication and through mutual coordination (Higgs, 2009). For example) even when implementing the multi-product task, such kind of misunderstanding aroused between the leaders from different departments due to different leadership behaviours. But the conflict cou ld be avoided by focussing towards the organizations objective rather than focussing on leaders departmental objectives. This could be done through effective negotiation and careful consideration of organizations current key change requirements. The central aspects of the change leadership are creation and promotion of commitment and trust. It is the leaders role to bring conditions for learning by stimulating fruitful conversations. Fruitful conversation can take place only when the relationships are characterised by trust, commitment and integrity. Hence the challenge of change leadership is promoting commitment, trust and integrity in firms. Obviously, change leaders cannot promote these qualities unless they themselves possess these qualities (Nilakant Ramnarayan, 2006). The managers who focus solely on managerial tasks may fail to provide strong leadership or to sustain the performance. Because over management of employees could lead to impairment of motivation (Redfern, 2008). Hence the leaders should learn to acknowledge the sustainability challenges and then develop appropriate skills and competencies to meet those challenges (Ferdig, 2007). Leadership skills of different levels Based on the literature references on change leadership, many of the researchers suggests that, an effective leadership depends on three basic personal skills, they are technical, inter-personal and conceptual skills. Technical skill is knowledge about specific type of work or activity and the inter-personal skill is ability to work with people. Finally, conceptual skills are abilities to work with different ideas and concepts. Leaders from different management level require different proportion of these basic skills. Leaders from top management level mainly require inter-personal and conceptual skills rather than technical skills, whereas the leaders from supervisory management level require greater proportion of technical and inter-personal skills than conceptual skills. But the leaders from middle management level require all these three basic skills in equal proportion (Katz, 1955; Northouse, 2010). As per the research conducted by Sparks and Gentry (2008), leading employees towards change and resourcefulness were found to be important for leaders across different managerial levels. Leading employees towards change includes setting clear performance expectations, delegating the change work to employees based on their skills and being patient and fair with employees. Resourcefulness includes being a strategic thinker; being a flexible problem solver during any stage of change implementation; understanding and working efficiently with top management. Charismatic leadership usually emphasize the leaders at top management level during change (Waldman et al., 2004). But some of the literature evidences implies that not only top-executives can motivate employees by formulating a compelling vision or by providing a behavioural role model, but also non-executives at lower management levels can possess charismatic leadership during change (Michaelis et al., 2009; Seyranian Bligh, 2008). Conclusion The above analyses and findings revealed that effective leaders should possess cognitive skills, business skills, and strategic skills for the successful implementation of change. But the available evidences show that, even the experienced skilled leaders have failed to possess the above leadership skills in certain circumstances. The corporate implosions of Enron and Lehman Brothers were illustrating the same. In addition, during the simulation game, many of the team leaders were not able to lead their team towards success. This was due to lot of conflicts and misconception prevailed within the team while implementing the change strategies. Apart from this, some of the barriers also exist against change leaders which impacts the change processes directly. They are lack of understanding of coordination in team, poor communication, inability to identify the right person for the right job and inability to motivate others. And the analysis on leadership competencies shows that the social-emotional competency has a significant impact on leading change across the organization. However, many of the challenges exist in implementing the leadership skills and competencies during change. They are resistance to change, changing the organizational behaviour, communication challenge, time constraint challenge, and finally challenge in promoting trust, commitment and integrity in organizations. While working on multi-product task, the team leaders were faced these kinds of challenges in implementing the change. Hence, these kinds of issues, barriers and challenges on change raised the question that whether anyone can act as a leader during change. Because, the above analyses and evidences shows that many of team leaders often faced issues while implementing the change and even the experienced leaders were also failed to lead the change effectively at some situations. So it is not possible for anyone to be a successful leader of change. The skills, competencies and behaviour of a person can only determine whether they can act a change leader or not.

Ancient Cassiterides

Ancient geography The Cassiterides, meaning Tin Islands (from the Greek word for tin: /Kassiteros), are an ancient geographical name of islands that were regarded as situated somewhere near the west coasts of Europe. The traditional assumption, ignoring Strabo, is that Cassiterides refer to Great Britain, based on the significant tin deposits in Cornwall. Herodotus (430 BC) had only dimly heard of the Cassiterides, â€Å"from which we are said to have our tin,† but did not discount the islands as legendary. 3] Later writers — Posidonius, Diodorus Siculus,[4] Strabo[5] and others — call them smallish islands off (â€Å"some way off,† Strabo says) the northwest coast of the Iberian Peninsula, which contained tin mines or, according to Strabo, tin and lead mines. A passage in Diodorus derives the name rather from their nearness to the tin districts of Northwest Iberia. Ptolemy and Dionysios Periegetes mentioned them — the former as ten small islands i n Northwest Iberia far off the coast and arranged symbolically as a ring, and the latter in connection with the mythical Hesperides. Probably written in the first century BC, the verse Circumnavigation of the World, whose anonymous author is called the â€Å"Pseudo-Scymnus,† places two tin islands on the upper part of the Adriatic Sea and mentioned the marketplace Osor on the island of Cres, where extraordinary high-quality tin could be bought. [6][7] Pliny the Elder, on the other hand, represents the Cassiterides as fronting Celtiberia. At a time when geographical knowledge of the West was still scanty, and when the secrets of the tin-trade were still successfully guarded by the seamen of Gades and others who dealt in the metal, the Greeks knew only that tin came to them by sea from the far West, and the idea of tin-producing islands easily arose. Later, when the West was better explored, it was found that tin actually came from two regions: Northwest Iberia and Cornwall. Diodorus reports: â€Å"For there are many mines of tin in the country above Lusitania and on the islets which lie off Iberia out in the ocean and are called because of that fact the Cassiterides. † According to Diodorus tin also came from Britannia to Gaul and thence was brought overland to Massilia and Narbo. [8] Neither of these could be called small islands or described as off the Northwest coast of Iberia, and so the Greek and Roman geographers did not identify either as the Cassiterides. Instead, they became a third, ill-understood source of tin, conceived of as distinct from Iberia or Britain. Od najdawniejszych czasow Brytania znana byla ze swych zloz metali. Fenicjanie i Kartaginczycy sprowadzali stad glownie cyne (plumbum album). Jej glowne zloza wystepowaly w starozytnosci, podobnie jak dzis, na wybrzezu Kornwalii i wyspach stanowiacych jej przedluzenie, slynnych „Wyspach Cynowych† (insulae Cassiterides). W srodkowych rejonach wyspy obficie wystepuje zelazo, ktorego zloza powierzchniowe eksploatowali Brytowie, a z glebokich kopalni wydobywali je Rzymianie. Rzymianie tez rozpoczeli eksploatacje bogatych pokladow miedzi, ktore wystepuja glownie na terenie dzis. Kornwalii, Cardigenshire i Anglesey w poblizu Llandundo. Gory Walii byly natomiast terenami zlotodajnymi kopano tam tez srebro. Tacyt mowi po prostu: „Brytania dostarcza zlota, srebra i innych metali, ktore sa nagroda za zwyciestwo. †Ã‚   Wyobraznie rzymskich najezdzcow rozbudzaly tez inne legendarne bogactwa wyspy, o ktorych opowiada niezastapiony Tacyt: „Ocean rodzi perly lecz nieco sine i blade. †

The Wanderer

I sat there on the bus, contemplating the abnormal events of the day and staring at the thick snow that lay outside. It was a long bus journey back to my house and I had a long time to spend with the not particularly talkative driver. I think the driver had become accustomed to my presence as I travelled on the bus every Friday night. He would always let me on the bus without charging me and wait for another ten minutes and see if anyone else got on, which they never did. I had not, for as long as I remember had a conversation with him, and had for a long time now forgotten the sound of his voice. The only sound I would hear on a typical journey was the quiet grumbling of the bus driver and the loud roaring of the buses engine. Nobody got on the bus this late at night. I was as I was saying, contemplating the events of the day, when I was interrupted mid thought by a more pressing realization. The bus was now stopping. This may seem a very normal thing for a bus to do, this bus however never stopped except for myself. The bus had stopped to let on another passenger. I looked forward to this, as my usual journey would include no human interaction. The passenger was a man, that I guessed to be in his mid thirties. I took a quick look up and down him. I looked up and down him again with a bit more detail. No snow, he must have been standing at the bus stop for a little while, as buses never come on time, yet he had avoided getting any snow on him. My own boots were cased in a think slushy mess, but his fine black shoes were hardly even wet. My jeans and thick jacket, which I was quite fond of, were no longer covered in snow but were wet from the snow that had melted in the comfortable warmth of the bus. His trousers that had been ironed to perfection and the suit that he wore were both black as midnight and looked of incredible quality. The man himself was bald and was cleanly shaven; he was yet to face me as he was talking to the bus driver. He carried nothing in his hands but kept his body still with his arms by his sides while talking. I started to hear their conversation after I was done scanning his person. â€Å"Shame that it had to happen isn't it?† The bus driver said in a burst of conversation. This in itself came as a shock to my system; it was such a long time since the bus driver had spoken in my presence. What was a real shock is what came next. â€Å"Yes, the poor elderly lady must have been quite shaken by the ordeal.† replied the stranger. His voice was eerie. He talked normally of course, but that was the problem, it was too normal. He voice stayed at the same volume and pitch all the time, he didn't change the level of excitement in his voice. He had no accent, he spoke perfectly and I was surprised to find that the bus driver, who had a strong accent, could understand him. It was then I realised that they were in fact talking about what they had interrupted me thinking about. Earlier in my day I had witnessed an attack on an elderly lady. A young teenager had an interest in her handbag and its contents. My good nature combined with my belief that today's youth should not be able to do as they please, caused me to leap into action. I had started shouting at the young boy and walking towards him, I expected him to run away and that to be the end of it. I pushed the boy back from the old lady and told her that she would be okay and should hurry home. It was after this as I was swinging round to give the boy a stern talking to, that I felt a sharp blow to my neck and then it was black. I woke up about two minutes later with a bit of a sore neck but otherwise unharmed. The stranger walked down the bus and sat at a seat just in front of mine. I had seen his face as he walked down but there was nothing interesting about it, apart from the fact there was nothing interesting about it. He sat with the same amazingly straight posture as when he was standing. â€Å"Where you gettin' off then?† the driver cried down the bus. â€Å"Crescent Road† the stranger replied. â€Å"Oh, surprise surprise† the bus driver chuckled to himself. The stranger didn't understand what the bus driver was talking about but I did. The bus driver still only had to make the one stop because mine and the stranger's stops were in fact the same. I thought this to be a remarkable coincidence. I returned to watching the snow falling gently outside. The night sky seemed to give me the impression that tonight was different in some way to every other night. I was snapped out of this small trance by the stranger standing and making his way to the front of the bus. Fortunately he was on the bus to remind me that at some point I would have to get off, and up I leapt. The bus pulled in to the stop as I staggered to keep my balance. The stranger moved to the side to let me past and to say thank you to the driver. I got off the bus and stepped onto the crisp snow that had just fallen. The stranger followed and we started on our way home. The stranger barged past me and started to walk briskly. I thought this to be quite rude and so I started to walk just as briskly to catch up with him. Even when in a hurry the man walked with impeccable posture. â€Å"I much prefer the summer to this.† I said jokingly in an attempt to spark a conversation. The man simply took a deep breath and proceeded to walk more slowly. I walked beside him, he looked quite troubled. I felt compelled to try and comfort him. I reached to put my hand on his shoulder as my brain prepared my next sentence. He stopped. His head darted in the direction of my face. It was not that he was looking at me, more that he was looking exactly in my direction. His look was empty and cold. He continued on his way and I kept my distance, I hoped he would enter one of the houses that we were passing but he didn't. He continued to wander the same way as I was. He wandered across the small road we came to and up onto the footpath that lead up to my cul-de-sac. The road was known for being dangerously icy. The path was also terribly dark and had trees along either side. This was all well and good during the daylight hours, but at night however the trees took on a more sinister presence and seemed to position themselves to block out the view of the moon or any other source of light. In front of me was the man, no more than five metres away. I could only just make out his suit and trousers. I could only just make out his shape. He was getting further away from me. I was trying to navigate the slippier parts of the path. â€Å"Are you having as much trouble as I am?† I exclaimed trying again to get the attention of the wanderer. â€Å"Don't be silly† the wanderer turned and said. I could only just make out his face and was unsure whether he was talking to me or himself. Before I could come to this decision he turned and started the brisk walking again. I followed to catch up with him and was looking for him through the black screen that was in front of my eyes. I hit the ground. It hurt and I was catching up on what had just happened. I had tripped up on the shape of the wandering man. He had fallen in on the ice and from what I could see had hit his head off the ground. I leant over to help him up but was knocked away as he lifted himself off the hard frozen ground. He held his hand to his head, and I was now quite worried about him, he looked like he had hit the ground with some force. He looked very frightened and was almost running along the road. We exited the small wooded path and to a fork in the road. I could see my house from here it was the first in the cul-de-sac on the right. The wandering stranger made his way along the road to the left and I felt it was my duty to follow him and to see if he was okay. Luckily for him his house was not far along the road and he entered the front gate of an impressive looking building, the wanderer had found his home. He left the gate open for me and I entered the garden. He entered the house and I followed. I stood in his porch as he rushed upstairs. I heard the sound of running water and I assumed that he was cleaning himself up. He returned a short while after and came slowly down the stairs. He was talking to a woman which I can only presume was his wife. â€Å"I am fine really, I just got a bit shook up along the path there† the man said. â€Å"I do worry about you, you know† Replied his wife â€Å"Look what happened to that kind gentleman in town today. He helps an old lady get her handbag back and gets beaten to death† I stood there baffled, and felt a shiver down my spine. I started to feel myself slipping away as I struggled with the events of the day. I had stopped wandering, I had found my home and I knew where I had to go†¦

Henry Murray s Theory Of Perception Of The Id, Ego, And...

Henry Murray designed an approach to personality that includes conscious and unconscious forces; the influence of the past, present, and future; and the impact of physiological and sociological factors. The influence of Freudian psychoanalysis can be seen in Murray’s recognition of the effect on adult behavior of childhood experiences and in his notions of the id, ego, and superego. Although Freud’s imprint is clear, Murray gave unique interpretations to these phenomena. His deviations from orthodox psychoanalysis are so extensive that his system must be classified with the neo-Freudians rather than with the Freudian loyalists. Two distinctive features of Murray’s system are a sophisticated approach to human needs and the data source on†¦show more content†¦Not every person has all of these needs. Over the course of your lifetime you may experience all these needs, or there may be some needs you never experience. Some needs support other needs, and some oppose other needs (see Table 5.1) (pg. 187). Murray’s original research program involved the intensive study of the personalities of 51 male undergraduate students undertaken by a staff of psychiatrists, psychologists, and anthropologists. Thus, specialists with different training observed each subject using various techniques, in much the same way a complex medical diagnosis is prepared. Each observer presented his or her diagnosis to the Diagnostic Council, a committee of the five most experienced staff members. The council met with each subject for 45 minutes and rated the subject on several variables. As the data accumulated, the council reassessed its ratings, reviewed the information, and arrived at a final determination. So much information was collected on each person’s life that the data had to be divided into time segments; these were called proceedings and serials. The basic behavior segment, the proceeding, was defined as the period of time required for the occurrence and completion of a pattern of beh avior—from beginning to end. A proceeding involves a real or fantasized interaction between the person and other people or objects in the environment. An imaginary interaction is called an internal proceeding; a real interaction is called an external proceeding.Show MoreRelatedPersonality Theories5586 Words   |  23 PagesPersonality Theories Almost everyday we describe and assess the personalities of the people around us. Whether we realize it or not, these daily musings on how and why people behave as they do are similar to what personality psychologists do. Personality psychology looks at the patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behavior that make a person unique. Some of the best known theories in psychology are devoted to the subject of personality. Almost everyday we describe and assess the personalities of