The Leadership Trilogy I Didn’t Mean to Write: Leadership as a Moment-to-Moment Practice of Becoming

If you have ever felt like leadership is harder than it “should” be, hard to manage yourself, hard to keep going, hard to work with people who see the world differently, you are not alone. And more importantly, you are not doing it wrong.

For much of my career, I have been writing, teaching, and speaking about leadership through the lens of my own journey and, perhaps even more importantly, through the extraordinary privilege of walking alongside so many others as they navigated theirs.

While much of my work has centered on women, and the stories, struggles, and brilliance of women have profoundly shaped me, it would be incomplete and untrue not to say this clearly: men have also played an essential role in my journey and in this body of work. As teachers, mentors, colleagues, champions, friends, partners, truth-tellers, and leaders, men have helped shape how I think, how I lead, how I love, and how I understand the deeply human work of becoming the best version of myself. Some offered wisdom. Some challenged my thinking. Some offered unconditional support. Some helped me see more clearly through contrast, heartbreak, encouragement, or belief.

This work, and my life, have been shaped by both women and men, because leadership itself is not built in isolation, nor is it the domain of one gender. It is built in relationship, reflection, humility, and the complicated, beautiful practice of learning alongside others.

When I step back now, I can see that my work has unfolded not simply as a collection of books, but as something of a living leadership trilogy. Not because I mastered something. Not because I arrived. And certainly not because I have figured out how to be perfectly evolved, endlessly thriving, or always graceful in the face of difference.

Quite the opposite.

Each book reflects an ongoing, deeply human, moment-to-moment practice, one that every leader I have worked with is navigating in their own way. As am I.

Don’t be a Jerk (to Yourself or Others) AND Watch for Those Invisible Hurdles to Advancing Your Career [Book One]

This work was, and still is, about the daily work of noticing when your inner critic has grabbed the microphone, when fear is driving, when insecurity is shaping your choices, and deciding, again and again, to return to yourself with greater awareness, self-respect, forgiveness, and humor. Mastering yourself is not a finish line. It is a moment-to-moment decision to stop being a jerk to yourself and to others, even in your own mind.

How do we THRIVE once we ARRIVE? (And help others to as well)

Book two, Arrive and Thrive: 7 Impactful Practices for Women Navigating Leadership, was about advancing and thriving. Again, not as some final state of polished success where burnout disappears and confidence remains constant, but as the repeated choice to rise without losing yourself. To navigate ambition, power, politics, opportunity, and authenticity with resilience, courage, and vision. To absorb the inevitable professional setbacks and still choose to move forward. Thriving, I have learned, is a moment-to-moment commitment to return to what sustains you, especially when life or leadership knocks the wind out of you.

What does it take to turn FRICTION INTO FUEL?

And now, Book three, All the Difference: Six Leadership Actions to Bridge Perspectives, Strengthen Teams and Create Value, feels like the natural next chapter. It asks a different question. How do you create value with and through difference, especially when you do not understand someone, agree with them, or even like how they are showing up? How do you stay in the moment and find a path forward when frustration rises, certainty creeps in, and every instinct tells you to shut down, walk away, or write someone off? How do you choose curiosity, respect, learning, and value creation?

Leadership is Practiced Moment to Moment

The deepest through-line of all three books is this: leadership is not built in grand declarations. It is built in moments. Moments when you decide to return to your best self. Moments when you pause to reflect. Moments when you repair. Moments when you laugh. Moments when you choose not to abandon yourself, your wellbeing, or your values. Moments when you decide that difference, while uncomfortable, might still have something to teach you.

There are two practices that I have found make this work infinitely more possible.

#1: Take time to reflect regularly

Real reflection is the willingness to pause long enough to ask: What happened there? What mattered? What did I learn? Where was I at my best? Where did I miss? The method matters less than the practice. Journaling, walking, exercise, coaching, prayer, conversation, tears, laughter. However you do it, the point is to make meaning from your moments.

#2: Don’t underestimate the power of connection

Just yesterday, I invited members of my team over to my home for lunch. We all work remotely, and while we do a solid job of communicating with one another regularly, as one team member pointed out “I need to get out of my home office at least a couple days a week and be with my colleagues.” This, coming from arguably the most introverted member of our team. I never regret when I gather members of our team in person. I don’t want to confuse this with full time back to office mandates (don’t get me started on how this isn’t the play for so many of us if you want our best effort.) And… none of our work was ever meant to be done alone. 

We all need live and virtual connection with our colleagues and more broadly our “people.” Our wisdom council. Our strategic personal advisory board. The people who celebrate when we win, tell us the truth when we are off, remind us who we are when we forget, and reassure us that we are going to be okay when we feel lost. That group will evolve over time, as it should. New teachers. New truths. New reminders. But none of us becomes who we are meant to become entirely alone.

My invitation

So perhaps what I have really been building, through every book, every person I have had the privilege to learn from, and every hard-earned insight, is an invitation. An invitation to practice, moment by moment, what it means to lead yourself better, live better, laugh more, forgive faster, and love people, including yourself, with enough grace to keep going. Not perfectly. Not permanently. But faithfully.