RGLP Recap: Reframing Global Leadership Session

Last night, we enjoyed an incredibly engaging and thought-provoking session with Dr. Gama Perruci, Dean of the McDonough Leadership Center. Dr. Perruci began the session by tracking the concept of global leadership throughout history, and challenged us to think critically about our current state of globalization and what it means to possess global consciousness. 

During the second part of the program, we participated in a simulation, in which the majority of the class pretended to be visitors to the fictitious island of Albatros while six members acted out a greeting ceremony. After observing the ceremony, the visitors to the island offered descriptions and interpretations of what they saw. Dr. Perruci then gave us the cultural explanation of the ceremony, and it became immediately clear what the simulation was meant to demonstrate: our cultural values and understandings often distort our interpretations of what we are observing, and it can lead to inaccurate and misleading assumptions. 

My main takeaway from the session and the simulation was that when evaluating other cultures, we must take a relativist approach and evaluate a culture for itself and not in comparison to our own. As our world becomes increasingly globalized and interconnected, it is becoming absolutely crucial to adapt a more open mindset and globally conscious framework that allows for the construction of cultural bridges and action-orienation. Dr. Perruci left us with several questions to think about as we further our careers and enter a globalized workforce: How should global leaders handle cultural differences? What is expected of global leaders under global consciousness? Hopefully, we will all continue thinking about these questions throughout RGLP and practice global consciousness both on campus and beyond Dartmouth.

-Written by Lauren Gruffi '17, Fall 2015 RGLP participant