In this assignment, you will focus on uncovering assumptions and implicit biases and applying critical thinking to two articles about women in leadership. You will also practice conveying your ideas in the form of a mind map. A mind map is a visual diagram that shows a central topic with related tasks, words, concepts, or items. Mind mapping is useful when you are trying to capture and organize ideas and thoughts about complicated topics or problems.

You can draw the mind map in Prezi or a drawing tool of your choice, as long as the final mind map can be copied into a Word document and fit onto one page so the text is readable. Several resources on how to create mind maps are included in this week’s readings. Locate two articles about women in leadership. One should be from a peer-reviewed, scholarly journal, and one should be from either a popular press source (such as Forbes) or a trade magazine (such as Entrepreneurship).

Answer the following questions about each article, while documenting your answers and thoughts in a mind map (one per article):

1. What is the core issue being debated?
2. What logic or reasoning is presented?
3. What are the assumptions behind these reasonings?
4. What implicit biases may be present?
5. How good is the evidence?
6. Based on your analysis and the type and source of the article, what is your critical assessment of the content? How useful is it to researchers? To leadership practitioners? Why?

Once you have completed your analysis and two mind maps, review the Raffo and Clark (2018) article from this week’s resources and make a note of the six different conceptualizations of leadership listed on page 212, also discussed in the Week 2 lecture. Then, write a summary paper in which you cover the following:

1. Discuss the mind mapping process and the conclusions you reached about the two leadership articles.
2. Examine which of the six leadership definitions from the Raffo and Clark article may be present in each of the two articles. Support your analysis and reasoning with examples from the articles.
3. Determine which of the six definitions of leadership you personally agree with most, and explain the assumptions and implicit biases you may hold that helped you come to that conclusion. Share an example of a leadership situation from your work environment, in which your assumptions made you conclude something about the behavior or outcome involved.
4. Challenge your assumptions and implicit biases about leadership and re-interpret the outcome from the workplace example without those assumptions/biases.
5. Conclude your paper by sharing how the process of challenging assumptions and implicit biases resulted in personal learning and how you may use mind maps to facilitate critical thinking in the future.

Attach copies of the two mind maps to your analysis and be sure to include the two articles you used in your references.

Length: 5-7 pages, including 2 pages of mind maps

References: Include a minimum of 3 scholarly resources.

Your assignment should demonstrate thoughtful consideration of the ideas and concepts presented in the course and provide new thoughts and insights relating directly to this topic. Your response should reflect scholarly writing and current APA standards. Be sure to adhere to Northcentral University’s Academic Integrity Policy.

Upload your document and click the Submit to Dropbox button.