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Airmen from 145th Airlift Wing enhance leadership skills during LTAS

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Patricia F. Moran
  • 145th Public Affairs
CHARLOTTE, N.C. --  Members of the 145th Airlift Wing were given an opportunity to enhance their leadership skills by attending a Leadership Team Awareness Seminar (LTAS) held at the North Carolina Air National Guard Base, Charlotte Douglas International Airport, March 17 and 18, 2016.

The mobile training team from the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute, located on Patrick Air Force Base, Fla., offered the class to senior enlisted advisors in order to raise awareness of the personnel dynamics that impact unit cohesion and mission effectiveness.

Stephanie Seymour, one of four instructors from the LTAS mobile training team, provided human resource and equal opportunity training addressing specific topics relevant to leadership in the 145th Airlift Wing, as well as the Air Force as a whole.

"It's a really important tool that opens people's eyes to learning that there's many different constants that people might have in their minds, but they don't quite know how to represent it or bring it out. These seminars definitely do that. It challenges people and it allows people to see things from another person's perspective," said Seymour.

The training incorporates participants' personal and professional experiences in solving organizational issues, beginning with how values and prejudices are formed and acted out.
Participants are encouraged to bring real-world issues and problems to the table.

"We try to get everyone to open up and talk about their issues amongst themselves. We like to hear them be able to say 'here's the problem, but now what can we do to help find a solution to the problem?' They're brainstorming a lot to get these ideas to come along, also opening up their minds to how their junior Airmen may think and how they perceive leaders to be," LTAS instructor Kimberly Flowers stated.

The two day seminar gives Airmen a chance to give and receive feedback and explore the impact of their personal behaviors on others, the group and on larger organizational systems. It concentrates on socialization and dynamics of power, sexism and sexual harassment and offers tools to help lead a culturally diverse workforce.

"It's a great opportunity to learn about institutional discrimination, a great opportunity to learn about conflict management, diversity, which we teach, and let everybody know that I may not think like that; you think like that, but we can agree to disagree," Flowers concluded.