Chapters of Leadership: Settling - Introduction (full)

Your Story of Leadership

Imagine with me you are the main character of a story and everyone you knew was reading it. Now imagine the story is centered around your journey as a leader ~ are you excited for them to read it? Are there chapters in the story you want redacted? What would you title it? What would those who have worked with you title it? Would you be excited to see your leadership story written, edited, published and brought to the public conscience? Who are the supporting characters in the story who help you reach your full potential? Do you know how you want the story to end?

Don’t judge my story based on the chapter you walked in on

Here is a confession - for a long time my paradigm for leadership centered around my willingness to step in and make a decision, give opinions and tell people what they should do - requested or not. What I have come to learn, through many years of failing, is this was simply a chapter in my leadership story - not leadership defining. And so, though this was a faulty paradigm, it was a necessary chapter in my story towards finding a deeper and richer understanding of what leading actually means.

I want to encourage you, regardless of where you are in your leadership story, to stop and recognize you are in a chapter of your ongoing story. Whether you feel you are making no difference, impacting on a large scale or somewhere in between, the canvas of your leadership is being colored in by each chapter.

Throughout the past 2+ decades of leading myself, others and teams, I have found four distinct chapters of leadership. Each of these are distinct, definitive and dynamic aimed to take us further into our journey. Similarly to a good story, they have ingredients which connect you to the metanarrative - in our story of leadership these ingredients are purpose, indicators, key responsibilities and emotional connection.

Don’t judge YOUR story based on the chapter you are walking in now

Possessing awareness of these key chapters I have derived from my leadership story - from settling to perfecting there is a shared understanding and experience. As the unknown author of the quote above states, don’t let others base your leadership present, past or future on the chapter they walked in on. Even more importantly…don’t judge your own story based on the chapter you are in right now. In the pursuit to be well | rooted, there is always more to learn, hills to climb, chapters to write, depths to discover and lest we forget heights from which we can fall.

Stay Rooted~