LEARNING TO LEAD IN THE FIELD

Land Management Internship, The Nature Conservancy

Part of PLC's program requirements require Alternative Leadership Experiences. Typically, these experiences provide opportunities designed to further leadership development through real-world encounters. For my lower-division alternative leadership experience, I was lucky enough to have an internship with the Nature Conservancy. As an asset management intern, I was based partially in the office and in the field. This gave me a unique insight into how an organizational mission is carried out through policies that continue beyond the office walls. During my time in the field, I was charged with monitoring TNC’s properties for evidence of degradation and improper use. With few exceptions, these properties were remote with little ability to contact the home office. In effect, I was alone and expected to make leadership decisions on the fly.
There’s something about being given the keys to an off-road vehicle with minimal instructions and high expectations and then making it out to tell the tale that really does something for your self-esteem. This experience gave me a newfound confidence in my leadership capabilities. My actions were having real impacts for a goal that I very much care about. My reports from the field were fueling actual policy change within the organization and creating actual changes for the ranchers, rattlesnakes and greater prairie chickens that depended that all depended on the preservation of this land.
It also gave me insight that, while I was technically a follower, I was more capable to affect change in this position that in any other situation I had ever been in. The impacts of active followership are real.