Some exercises are engaging for the moment and some exercises can keep you thinking for a long time after you completed the task. The first impression exercise is one where you may reflect for several days or weeks on the image you are projecting.

Another exercise you may want to reflect on for the rest of your life is your leadership journey and the lessons you shared. This is usually a very personal story recounting the people and experiences that have influenced the beliefs and behaviors you exhibit as a leader.

So take some time this week or when you decide to be reflective and pull out the page in your notebook from the session and look back at the notes you made at that time. Ask yourself, what were the most important lessons you learned during this journey?

During the leadership journey exercise you are asked to reflect back on the events and experiences that have left you with various leadership lessons, beliefs or values. For many participants, this is the first time they have focused explicitly on what has influenced their beliefs about leadership. What makes this retrospective view so powerful for many people is this ability to clearly identify what you learned from these different situations over these decades. It is even more insightful to ponder how these experiences have influenced implicitly your approach to leadership, along with your behaviors.

For example, having worked for someone during your journey who behaved in a way that you found offensive has no doubt shaped your view of, “I don’t ever want to treat people that way.” Knowingly or unknowingly, you are likely to have behaved in a way that is true to this observation you made years ago. The opposite is true as well. If you worked with someone you admired for the way this person treated others, you made a mental note so if or when you were in charge, you would mirror this desired trait as the excerpt below illustrates.

“My high school coach used positive feedback, good attitude, trust, and a collegial atmosphere as the foundation to success, while my college coach used yelling, fear and intimidation as a means to promote success.  As I saw the effectiveness of these two approaches, it made me realize that the fear and intimidation approach was a short-term solution and did not lead to long-term success.  I use positive feedback, trust and a team based approach in my management style today partly as a result of these early experiences.”

Our leadership journeys help us understand our point of view on leadership as well as the roots these points of view are connected to. This enables you to have a good deal of self-awareness about why you approach or practice leadership the way you do. These insights not only inform your point of view about leadership, they also provide you with the self-awareness that allows you to be more intentional about how you act when you are in a (formal or informal) leadership role.

Understanding the experiences that may shape your point of view on leadership is a cornerstone for enhancing your ability to be a more effective leader. Hence, it is important to spend some time drawing out the most influential lessons from your leadership journey. These insights may allow you to be more deliberate in practicing leadership you see as aligned with your lessons or in some cases, you may need to “reframe” a lesson to allow you to move forward in your quest to be a successful leader.

For example, if someone were thrust into leadership roles earlier on in life and resented these responsibilities, this person may resist situations where s/he could step up and lead today. Understanding where this resistance comes from can allow someone to reframe this early experience and free the person up to choose times when s/he may willingly step up to lead. Or if you grew up in a culture where leadership was associated with the hierarchal person in charge, it may be helpful to reconcile this historical view with the philosophy that leadership can be distributed.

So take some time to go back and answer a few questions to continue exploring your point of view on how and why you lead the way you do.

1. It will be useful for you to spend some time drawing out the most important lessons from your leadership journey.

2. Looking at these lessons, what are some of the themes or overarching insights you believe currently influence your behavior today?

3. How might you build on, refine or add onto the lessons from your leadership journey as you look ahead?