© 2007, Action Learning Associates, LLC Design & Illustration by Mike Daymon

L E A D E R S H I P J O U R N E Y
W O R K B O O K

Personal Leadership Stories

“Leadership is autobiographical.
If I don’t know your life story,
I don’t know a thing about you as a leader.”

—Noel Tichy

A C T I O N L E A R N I N G

R I C H A R D O. K I M B A L L, P h. D.

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 Ancestral History

H E A D W A T E R S

“I have drunk deep the waters of my ancestors.”

—Larry Neal, poet

“Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.”

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

• What do you know about your “ancestral headwaters”?

• When you think of your ancestors, do you think of a few

individuals, or do you think of an extended clan?

• What were their challenges?

• Do you have any special memories of your ancestral elders?

Did they pass down any family traditions or customs?

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 EARLY YEARS

Birth

T R A I L H E A D

“Although present on the occasion, I have no clear recollection

of the events leading up to it.”
—Winston Churchill, on his birth

“I am born. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record

that I was born (as I have been informed and believe) on a Friday,
at twelve o’clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began
to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously.”
—Charles Dickens, David Copperfield

• Everyone has a story. How does your journey begin?

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 EARLY YEARS

Family

B A S E C A M P

“A family is a place where principles are hammered and honed

on the anvil of everyday living.”
—Charles Swindoll, theologian

• What memories do you have of your early family

circumstances?

• Did you have siblings? What was your birth order? Think about
and describe your mom and dad or the adults who raised you.
What key messages did they teach you?

• Where did you grow up? How did that area shape you? Did
you and your family spend vacations or summers together in a
favorite spot or with extended family?

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 EARLY YEARS

Growing Up

F I R S T T R A C K S

“The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of

childhood into maturity.”
—Thomas Huxley

• Recall your formative years.

• When you played, what did you like to do?

• How did you organize or spend your “free time”?

• Think about best friends, hobbies, and interests.

• What were your early dreams and ambitions?

• In first grade, how would you have completed this sentence,

“When I grow up, I am going to...”

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 EARLY YEARS

Schooling

L E A R N I N G
T H E R O P E S

“Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and

what to do, and how to be, I learned in kindergarten. Wisdom
was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in
the sandbox at nursery school.”
—Robert Fulghum

“Teachers can change lives with just the right mix

of chalk and challenges.”
—Joyce A. Myers, business executive

• Who were the teachers, coaches, or adults who impacted your

young life?

• How did they make a difference or what did they pass on to you?

• Have you ever thanked them? Should you? Will you?

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 EARLY YEARS

Firsts

P A T H F I N D I N G

First Jobs, First Loves, and other “Firsts” that Shaped You

“While I had originally learned much as a camper—skills of

teamwork, self-reliance, initiative, leadership—I picked up much
more during my years as a staffman.
It is during those years when life is finally molded into
action—when you start to plan where to work, where to live,
with whom to spend your life.
It is during those years that you figure out your path.”
—Michael D. Eisner,
on his first job as a camp counselor

• Discovering your path doesn’t usually involve walking a straight

line, but rather it involves a series of excursions wherein you
“test the waters” and figure out who you really are, what you
want, and what you don’t want.

• What were some of your early jobs and life experiences that
directionally shaped you?

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 YOUNG ADULTHOOD

Personal Highs or
Accomplishments
P E A K S

“I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything,

but still I can do something. I will not refuse to do the something
that I can do.”
—Helen Keller

“It is the ultimate wisdom of mountaineering that a person is

never more human than when he is striving for what is beyond
his grasp, and that there is no conquest worth the winning save
that over his own weakness and ignorance and fear. ‘Have we
vanquished an enemy?’ asked Mallory. And there was only one
answer: ‘None but ourselves.’ It is not the summit that matters,
but the fight for the summit; not the victory, but the game itself.
So it was that mountains would become the anvil upon which I
would forge my character.”
—James Ramsey Ullman, High Conquest

• What are some of your proudest “prouds” (i.e., awards,

recognitions, service contributions, or expressions of your
talents and character)?

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 YOUNG ADULTHOOD

Personal Lows,
Hardships, or
Disappointments
V A L L E Y S

“We are all in a spiral path. No growth takes place in a straight

line. There will be setbacks along the way. There will be shadows,
but they will be balanced by patches of light. Awareness of the
pattern is all you need to sustain you along the way.”
—Kristin Zambucka

• Were there ever times when you felt you were defeated or
lost, and perhaps the storm clouds seemed so ominous that you
weren’t sure of the way forward?

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 YOUNG ADULTHOOD

Defining Moments

B A D L A N D S

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me

there lay an invincible summer.”
—Albert Camus

• Have you ever had a “defining moment” or crucible wherein

there appeared to be ‘No Way Out’? How were your values
tested, and how did you summon wisdom and leadership
courage?

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 YOUNG ADULTHOOD

Turning Points

F O R K S I N
T H E R O A D

“I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
—Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken

• Can you identify key “turning points” in your life where your
life path significantly diverged, and if you had taken the other
fork, much would have been lost?

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 YOUNG ADULTHOOD

Mentors

T R A I L B L A Z E R S

“None of us got where we are solely by pulling ourselves up

by our bootstraps. We got here because somebody—a parent,
a teacher, an Ivy League crony, or a few nuns—bent down and
helped pick us up.”
—Thurgood Marshall

• Who were the elders, particularly in your business career, who

positively influenced you and mentored you?

• How did they approach leadership?

• How did they make a difference for you?

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 MIDLIFE

Leadership Philosophy

I N T E R N A L
C O M P A S S

“Leadership is what moves the human spirit forward.

We dull our lives if we don’t view it against a grand
background—a larger destiny.”
—David Oldfield

• What are your own beliefs about leadership?

• As a leader, I believe...

• As a leader, I will not tolerate...

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 MIDLIFE

What New
Challenges
Await You?
U N C L I M B E D
H E I G H T S

“Even on the top of Mt. Everest, I was looking at the other

mountains and thinking how to climb them.”
—Sir Edmund Hillary

• For peak performers, there is always the next mountain, the

next challenge, or the next opportunity. What are yours?

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 MIDLIFE

Growth Edge

C U R R E N T S
O F C H A N G E

“The mastery of the art of leadership comes with the mastery

of the self. Ultimately, leadership development is a process of self
development.”
—Kouses and Posner

“The important thing is this: To be able, at any moment, to

sacrifice what we are for what we could become.”
—Charles Dubois

Complete the following:

• I have been successful because of...

• I have been successful in spite of...

• In order to get ready for the next level of leadership, I need to...

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 MIDLIFE

The Hand-Off

B R I D G E
B U I L D I N G

“How am I doing as a leader?’ The answer is, ‘How are the people
you lead doing? Do they learn? Do they manage conflict? Do
they initiate change? Are they growing and getting promoted?’
When confused as to how you are doing as a leader, find out
how the people you lead are doing.You will have the answer.”
—Larry Bossidy

“The greatest leader is not the one with the most followers, but
rather the one who has developed the most leaders.”
—Tom Peters

• How are you growing and developing the next generation of

leaders?

• As you have been helped by your mentors, how are you

growing and developing your team and your direct reports?

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 MIDLIFE

Dream List

F I E L D O F
D R E A M S

“Most of us go to our graves with our music still inside us.”

—Oliver Wendell Holmes

“I have a dream...”
—Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Create a personal “Dream List” that would identify at least five

things that you want to do in the years remaining in your life.
Your list might include a father-son or mother-daughter trip to
an adventurous place; it might involve learning a new language;
it might involve a service commitment; it might be imagining
and cultivating a new garden; or it might be a qualitative dream,
such as building a deeper relationship with a spouse, child, or
grandchild.

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 ELDERHOOD

New Beginnings

T E R R I T O R Y
A H E A D

“The only joy in the world is to begin.”

—Cesare Pavese, Italian writer

“To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go

on creating oneself endlessly.”
—Henri Bergson, French philosopher

• What new adventures lie ahead for you?

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 ELDERHOOD

The Power of
Purpose
W E L L S P R I N G

“This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose you
consider a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you
are thrown on the scrap heap.”
—George Bernard Shaw

• Articulate your deepest purpose...keep it simple...don’t worry

about “word-smithing.”

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 ELDERHOOD

Legacy

J O U R N E Y ’ S
E N D

“When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live
your life in such a manner that when you die, the world will cry,
and you will rejoice.”
—Anonymous

“Our lives are a journey between birth and death, two miracles
we’re guaranteed. Our earth journey...we determine by individual
choices, choices affecting the entire universe.”
—Chuck Robinson, Dakota elder

• What personal values or wisdom do you want to pass on to

those you care most deeply about?

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 ELDERHOOD

Your Loved Ones

S A F E H A V E N

“Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family.

Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.”
—Jane Howard

• Share your personal photographs with your team.

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