What Went Well?

This week, I jumped right in. I arrived in Frankfurt (Oder) Sunday afternoon and began working on Monday. I started my first project, employing all of the skills I learned in my training last week. I feel significantly more confident and comfortable in my abilities this week. While I have not yet finished my first project, I am nearly there, and I am quite happy with it so far. I also attended lectures about Ukrainian Roma in the Army, Low Countries Capitalism and the Making of a National Space, and the use of Easy Language in Ukraine. While none of these topics relate directly to my current project, all gave me a much better understanding of the historical and current topic areas relevant to expanding my knowledge of Ukraine. Attending these lectures also allowed me to achieve my goal of attending lectures and speaking about them with colleagues. I am proud of my progress on my project, and I would mainly credit the people around me and the skills I gained in the prior week for contributing to this success. 

What Could Have Been Done Differently?

Just as I mentioned during my training, I did get slightly behind schedule this week. My original assignment was to evaluate 2-3 sources per incident for a set number of incidents. However, I ended up looking at about 15 sources for incident 1 and not completing the evaluation of the other incidents. I was struggling because I did not know how to offer a complete evaluation based on so few sources. My boss ended up being very happy with my work, but I have now slightly extended the time needed for this project. My boss foresaw this issue before I started the project, so there is time built in, and it will be alright. Still though, I recognize that I need to get speedier in my research. Next time, I will spend more time evaluating the information environment up-front so that I can move through it more quickly after doing so. 

Leadership Reflection

Values

This week, curious and determined were the values most visible in my leadership. My work project was absolutely fascinating, and I got really into it. I was particularly interested in attempting to geolocate some of the sites I found pictures of in early sources. At some point though, my determination to find these sites created tension between the value of being fast, which my process was not. 

Character

This week tested accountability. While my boss had known when she assigned me my project for the week that it would likely bleed into the next one, I still felt bad that I did not finish it by the end of the week. For me, learning from that feeling meant reflecting critically on my time management and taking accountability for my use of time. I responded well to the time pressure I faced this week, working quite diligently. However, I recognize that there are areas I can continue to optimize, and I intend to work on that next week.

Capacities

This week, I relied heavily on process, being very thorough with each entry into my documentation spreadsheet. There is extra pressure on this area as the standard for using this type of documentation is a legal setting is extraordinarily high, and mistakes can compromise all evidence collected. I felt a bit stretched managing this fact with my time crunch, but I am still quite happy with the progress I made. 

Ethical Engagement

This week, I primarily occupied a supporting role. My project is supporting the research efforts of my boss, so I spent much of my time engaging with her and carrying out the research and documentation processes. My impact is primarily in lightening her work load and allowing her to focus on other aspects of the project at this time. This week, my understanding of how to decide what to document grew substantially. I came to understand how to prioritize my split between news articles and primary sources and was sure to record my search pathways in my documentation spreadsheet.

Adjustment & Development for Next Week

Next week, I will focus on expanding the speed of my work while maintaining my dedication to process and accuracy. I will start the week by listing out all of my tasks, allocating myself time blocks within the work day for each, and I will then follow that schedule.