Abstract

This article examines the career narratives of healthcare executives to develop a model of executive leadership competencies. Interviews with thirty executives drawn from a health leadership podcast are examined for themes of leadership failures and surprises. Grounded theory is used to identify a pattern of weaknesses from the lived experiences the executives, then a positive model of leadership is developed from these lessons learned the hard way. The final model consists of three nested categories: organizational awareness, constructing the team, and self-regulation.