Leaders for the 21st Century Leadership Exercise

Cathy Anthofer-Fialon and Bob Nida lead the middle schoolers at the conference through a personality test. She gave us a couple of the same exercises they used with the kids. The first was a sentence, and we were asked to count the number of letter Fs. The less detail-oriented people missed some of the letters in recurring words, like the word "of". The second exercise was the logo of a zoo that had pictures of animals in both positive and negative space.

The test that Cathy used with the kids is the Real Colors Personality Test. It identifies four core personality types—Gold, Green, Blue, and Orange—to help individuals understand themselves and improve communication with others.

• Gold: Organized, dependable, and responsible; values structure and tradition.
• Green: Analytical, logical, and independent; enjoys problem-solving and innovation.
• Blue: Empathetic, cooperative, and relationship-focused; values harmony and connection.
• Orange: Energetic, spontaneous, and action-oriented; thrives on excitement and adaptability

A major point for the students was to understand that it is important to have people with different skills in a group.