Knowing and

Managing Yourself
One

of the most basic human needs is

for self acceptance

Self

acceptance is necessary for

psychological health, personal growth,
and the ability to know and accept
others

The Era of Top Down

Management is Over
Organizations

were once dependent on

a single leaders vision and their ability
to control the behavior of the staff to
achieve their goals
Success was defined with a growing
staff and increasing budgets
Today public administration requires a
different mindset

The Era of Top Down

Management is Over
Nowadays, workers are often empowered to
make decisions to serve their customers
better
We are all asked to be more productive and
prove it through rigorous evaluation
Few public or nonprofit agencies are funded
well enough to grow staff or increase budgets
Even if you will never be a manager, it is
important for you to understand organizational
behavior and the new level of expectations for
workers

Understanding Yourself:
Life Experiences
What

world or national events have

taken place during your lifetime?

Which

of these influenced you most

dramatically?

How

was you life influenced by these

events?

Understanding Yourself:
Life Experiences

Are there local events that have been

particularly influential in your life?

Were there cultural opportunities or political

events in your hometown that were
particularly influential?

What were your most important educational

experiences?

Understanding Yourself:
Life Experiences
Which

personal relationships influenced

you the most?

What

roles have individuals played in

your life?

Your Lifeline

Responding to
Emotional Challenges
Emotional

challenge refers to any real or

perceived threat to our security, self
image, or sense of self worth that
stimulates our instinctive self protective
tendencies
These protective tendencies often make
us aggressive or we withdraw (fight of
flight)

Responding to
Emotional Challenges
Nearly

all emotional challenges within

an organization are interpersonal in
nature
Interestingly, our response is to focus
on trying to change or control the
behavior of other people
The truth is that we can control only
ONE person in a relationship -Ourselves

Responding to
Emotional Challenges
Learning

about ourselves can help us

understand how values and traits
influence our behavior and how we see
things
We need to recognize that others may
not necessarily see things the way we
do
We need to also recognize that our
values and traits can influence behavior
of others

Learning About Ourselves

Most

of us recognize that selfawareness and self-understanding are

strongly related to our sense of wellbeing, interpersonal relationships, and
overall success in life
Nonetheless, many of us still avoid
learning about ourselves

Learning About Ourselves

We tend to be afraid of any knowledge
that would cause us to despise
ourselves or to make us feel inferior,
weak, worthless, evil, or shameful. We
protect ourselves and our ideal image
of ourselves by repression and similar
defenses, which are essentially the
same techniques by which we avoid
becoming conscious of unpleasantness
or dangerous truths. (Maslow, 1962)

Learning About Ourselves

The

opposite is also true, some of us

fear our highest potential so we
struggle against our own greatness
(Maslow, 1962) and deny our potential
for leadership
Knowledge of self may be essential to
being an effective worker in public or
nonprofit organizations which are
relationship intense organizations

Learning About Ourselves

Cognitive

knowledge

An

intellectual understanding of basic

technical skills that are required

Behavioral
The

skills

practice and experience of employing

technical skills until second nature