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This Is Me

Share Your Leadership Foundations

THERE ARE TWO KINDS of people in the world: those who liked art class as children and those who were absolutely terrified of art class. Do you remember art class? Oh man, talk about separating the creative types from the mere mortals. For many of us, this is where our artistic phobia was born; our drawings looked like Salvador Dali paintings, we couldn’t get the glue to work, and any kind of subjective assignment totally freaked us out. If you’re the visually creative type, bless you—keep doing your thing. The world needs more people who can take a box of crayons, a few pipe cleaners, and some sparkly buttons and turn them into something beautiful. As for the rest of us, we crave direction and the structure of letters and words. Pictures aren’t our thing; we communicate with language, not visuals.

You know you’re in one of these two camps—don’t even try to hide it. Put it this way: Do you like to play games that require you to draw? Thought so; nothing much has changed since the second grade, right? And this has carried over into your work life, yes? Well, whether you’re artistic or can’t draw a stick figure, this next challenge has something for you. You can use either talent to build your leadership skills. And no matter how you do this, it’s going to come out perfect, because it’s going to be all about you.

Here’s the idea: You’re going to represent yourself in words and drawings on a single sheet of blank paper. Ready, begin! Just kidding—I’ll give you a little more direction than that (just wanted to mess with all you structured types). First of all, any size paper will work; you can start with regular copy paper, but if you’re really ambitious, you can do this on a poster board and tap into your artistic side. OK, got your paper and a pencil or pen? That’s all you need—now, just fill up the page with information that defines and describes who you are as a person (see Figure 5). Start writing and drawing whatever comes to mind; capture things that would help someone understand you or tell the story of your personal journey. Where did you come from? What lessons did you learn early on that shaped your values? What’s important to you—why are you working? What inspires you? What are your passions, and how do they impact how you see the world? Anything that says: “This is me—this is what I’m all about” is perfect for this exercise.

What’s Your Unique Story?

I first saw this technique used by Karl Werwath, who was a senior executive at a company where I was serving as the head of learning and leadership development. We had invited Karl to be a speaker at our high-potential leadership program because we knew he was a role model for servant leadership and living the company’s values. Everyone knew Karl was a great leader, so we were eager to hear what he had to say about managing complex organizations and leading change. Now, when preparing for these sessions, we always asked to see the executives’ slides, so we could sync up messages and keep them on track. When we met with Karl, he said he wanted to tell a few stories, and oh yeah, he had one slide he wanted to share, but he would bring that with him to hand out. When we asked if we could see it, he looked at us with a twinkle in his eye, and said: “Just trust me; I’ve used it for years, and people seem to like it. I’ll bring it to the session.”

So we trusted him, and I’m sure glad we did. Karl turned in one of the top-rated sessions we’d ever had, and to my knowledge, is still teaching the same session today. You know why it’s so popular? Because he just tells stories and talks from his heart about leadership and what it means to him. He talks about his parents and the lessons they taught him that he still uses as a leader. He talks of his family and his hobbies and how they provide much-needed balance to his hectic work life. He encourages participants to ground themselves in their own values, and he caps off the session by handing out his version of this document. Then he takes the group through it with humility and passion. It’s a magical session, and participants love it. I remember my astonishment at the document’s simplicity and elegance, and I asked him after the session what he called it. Karl just shrugged his shoulders and said: “I don’t really have a name for it. When I give it to new people who join my team I just say: ‘This is me. I want you to know where I’m coming from, because this is how you’ll experience my leadership.’” That weekend, I took out a piece of paper and wrote my own “this is me” document (Figure 5). I suppose one could update this document from time to time as they gain new perspectives, but I haven’t found the need to do so; today everything on this page is just the way I wrote it years ago. Like Karl’s document, this was my first and only version—and that’s part of the beauty of the exercise.

Why would you want to do this? I think the question is, why wouldn’t you? Talk about adding something cool to your leadership toolkit—it makes you think about what’s truly important, and the document is a great way to share your leadership foundation with others. Have fun and get creative with this; you might choose different buckets or headings or use more drawings to share your story. In the end, you’re creating a one-page time capsule of who you are, which explains why and how you show up as a leader. Once you’ve got it the way you want it, share it with your team; encourage them to make their own pages, and go outside on a beautiful day and share them with each other.

No matter your level of creativity, you can’t miss with this exercise. And just imagine how proud you would make your second-grade art teacher!

Bootstrap Takeaways

Share Your Leadership Foundations

1. Who are you? Think about everything that is important to you, and write or draw it on one page.

2. Share the document with your team, peers, boss, and others. Let them in on what drives and inspires you.

3. Use your “This Is Me” document as a teaching tool. It’s a great way to talk about work-life balance and your priorities.