At Chicago Booth, we believe each individual has his or her own leadership style. How has your family, culture, and/or environment influenced you as a leader?

Sample One

I come from a family of entrepreneurs. When I was ten years old I spent the summer at Uncle Joe’s farm in Vermont, helping him with his organic yogurt business. My sister Claire started a jewelry business in college, and built it into a successful internet retailer. My parents were always starting, ending or selling their business ideas and inventions. The common thread in everyone’s behavior was relentless curiosity and a driving desire to see an idea become reality.

The business bug also hit me at an early age. I started with a landscaping business in middle school, and expanded to add two part-time employees in high school. In college I saw an opportunity to make money tutoring high school students on the SAT and started a niche college consulting business.

Then I took a job in a small consulting firm after college. I was attracted to the opportunity because I would be able to explore many industries and learn crucial analytical skills. As a junior member of the firm I spent my first two years following the lead of the consultants and learning how to analyze client problems and put together a coherent presentation.

In my third year at the firm I was promoted and tapped to lead a project for one of our most active clients, a local energy firm. I was assigned two junior level employees to work on my team. I was thrilled at the opportunity and immediately poured myself into the project. I asked the team to meet and set the scope of the project, and then I prepared a presentation for the client. Everything was going smoothly until mid-way into the engagement when one of my team members told me he was having a hard time keeping up with the pace of the work. I was so enthusiastic and single-minded about the project I had neglected to consider how my team was doing. Caught up in the entrepreneurial passion, I was not managing my team resources effectively.

I appreciated the candor of my team member, and we discussed how to adjust the pace of our work and still achieve our goals. I brought the entire team together to finalize the plan, and we were able to complete the work to praise from both our company and the client.

This moment was defining for me. I truly value the passion and dedication that my family instilled in my through their pursuit of realizing ideas. This is still a driving force for me, and I know that when I ultimately lead my own company I will also consider how to lead and engage others by inspiring them, and also realizing they have needs of their own.

Sample Two

When I arrived at college in Iowa I had never seen snow, and rarely experienced weather that required a winter coat. At the same time my roommates didn’t understand my passion for watching cricket on my computer over the weekend. It was immediate culture shock.

After a few months I made friends in my dorm and my classes, and we discovered that a mutual love for our school football team and going to parties could smooth many of the background differences between us. This experience of adjusting to an entirely new culture is one I often draw on while leading teams at work or in my extracurricular activities.

Recently I was asked to produce a play by a college friend of mine. She was starting a small theatrical company with her friends from the graduate program in performing arts she attended. While I always enjoyed the performing arts in college, my professional background in banking wasn’t the strongest preparation to produce a play. I didn’t understand all of the roles in the production, and I was not confident about my ability to work with a team of creative people. At first I struggled to express my own point of view, until my friend told me how much she appreciated my guidance on the budget and schedule. Her comments made me realize that I could bring a unique perspective to the production, and that I should also appreciate that actors had a different approach. I started to attend rehearsals to understand everyone’s role in the production. The cast became used to seeing me, and friendships developed. With mutual respect came a smooth team environment. The cast, director, and technical crew looked to me to provide the schedule and budget management, and I collaborated with all of them to determine the best use of our time and money.

This experience in culture shock led me to a second play producing effort, and now I am working with the company to produce a short film and raise money for a traveling production next summer. I know that my collaborative leadership style has been shaped by learning and understanding how to navigate across cultures and personalities.

Sample Three

My commitment to volunteering started early because my parents were always actively involved in the community. I remember waiting in the car while my mother delivered care packages to the elderly in our neighborhood, or donating my toys and clothes to the homeless shelter at holidays. I felt particularly strongly about Kids Works because the tutors had helped me to learn to read when I was having a lot of difficulty at school. My parents and teachers couldn’t get through to me, but the college student who tutored me figured out how to motivate me to read books on my own. Now an avid reader, I have been volunteering at with Kids Works for the three years since college.

Last year I was selected to run volunteer recruiting for the organization. I believed strongly in the mission of the group, yet I knew that the commitment required to really help kids learn to read was difficult for many professionals to find appealing.

I knew that dedicated volunteers had made a real difference in my life, and I used that passion and vision to market the opportunity to other young professionals in my network. I spoke to several of my friends who gave me the feedback that they saw the value in volunteering, but also wanted to meet new people and find professional opportunities in their spare time.

I decided to set up a happy hour for potential volunteers and I printed brochures that highlighted the benefits of the organization and the networking opportunities. I thought that if our target group saw the social and professional opportunities of volunteering it would attract more interest. To prepare for the event I asked all of my friends to attend and bring at least one other person who might be interested in joining Kids Works.

The event was an unmitigated success, and led to tremendous interest in the organization. I collected 15 applications for volunteers, which is more than we had received in an entire year of organic recruiting.

This was a strong leadership opportunity for me, and especially meaningful because of my background with the organization. The experience of being helped to achieve my own goals in life has shaped my leadership style of building a shared vision to create change.