My Life in Leadership: The Journey and Lessons Learned Along the Way

How does a woman with no college degree, rise to become the CEO of The Girls Scouts, win the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and get named by Fortune Magazine as the “Best Nonprofit Manager in America”?  

My Life in Leadership: The Journey and Lessons Learned Along the Way (Jossey-Bass; 978-0-470-90573-9; February 2011) by Frances Hesselbein reveals her remarkable personal story and the principles that have served and guided her well throughout her extraordinary life. The book offers a look at what shaped Frances Hesselbein personally and as a leader, from her youth in the hills western Pennsylvania to her professional journey with the Girl Scouts of the USA where she went from troop leader to transformational CEO, to how Peter Drucker handpicked her to found and lead the Drucker Foundation, and how she later transitioned the Foundation to the Leader to Leader Institute. With excitement and humility, she relives the key moments that have shaped her life of leadership including the day she received the country’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

This extraordinary book also includes stories about her world travels to deliver her message of leadership and her notable experiences with as well as what she has learned from some of the most distinguished leaders of our time including Peter Drucker, John Gardner, Max DePree, Presidents Clinton and Reagan, General Eric Shinseki, Jim Collins, Warren Bennis and Marshall Goldsmith.

As inspirational as it is practical, My Life in Leadership is filled with Frances Hesselbein’s universal leadership lessons that will serve any leader, of any gender or age, in any sector.