Leadership Digest: Edition 42

This is our favorite time of year here at FounderForward, as we get to work with our clients on two very high-leverage activities: looking back (reflection) and looking forward (goal-setting). The former tends to be an activity that isn’t given the same importance as planning and is often rushed or skipped entirely. Reflection is by no means a luxury. We look back to get perspective, to make meaning of our actions and experiences, to learn and to grow.

In addition to our standard “10 Questions for Year-End Review,” which provide broad and valuable insights for all workers (and humans), we’ve crafted a set of more focused reflection questions specifically designed to help you assess how you showed up as a leader over the past year. These questions were inspired by key themes from our major articles and essays.

Feel free to select the questions that resonate most with you, answer all of them, or leave some unanswered—what matters is that you take the time to reflect on your leadership journey and the impact it has had on both yourself and your team.

Questions of the Week:

1. What were my greatest successes and accomplishments? And what did I learn from them?
2. What were the biggest challenges or difficulties I faced? And what did I learn from them?
3. What decisions did I make this year that had a meaningful impact on my life, and what influenced those choices?
4. What are 1-3 things I would have done differently this year?
5. Where did I spend too much of my time? Not enough?
6. What brought me happiness? What brought me fulfillment? ?
7. What brought me sadness? ?What brought me anger?
8. What am I most grateful for? Who should I thank?
9. What did I learn about myself this year? What else did I learn this year?
10. What personal and professional growth have I noticed in myself since this time last year?

Download Our Year-End Reflection Workbook