Profile of a Leader: Colin Powell

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“It’s not where you start in life, it’s where you end up and all the places you went in between.”
(General Colin Powell)
Excellence: is the ultimate goal of every leader. Leaders are not born with it, rather they must build it, achieve it. These leaders are the building blocks of every organization. General Colin Powell is the embodiment of an American leader. After years of military excellence, he continued his career on a political level, retiring after 35 years of servant leadership. In his retirement, General Powell wrote his autobiography My American Journey. This narrative outlines his life achievements and failures. In this paper, General Colin Powell will be defined in the context of achieving excellence, starting with how he was taught and what experiences he learned from, to how he trained and built unity within the people he was leading, and finally the values he used in any occupation in the organization, the United States of America.
General Powell received some of the best military preparation the country, and world, offers, including technical, strategic, and leadership training. Still he stands out from his peers as being one of the few individuals who can traverse political party lines, as well as, lead diverse individuals and organizations. Maybe it is his gifted ability to speak; perhaps it is his straightforward, charismatic approach; but more than likely, it is both these traits combined with his personal core values, which make him great. Powell’s intelligence, endurance and committed practice of taking personal responsibility for his actions are included in one of the first stories he tells in his book.
General Powell, as a youth, left a church camp to go drink with his friends. When they were caught, h...

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...1 (2004):
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KHAN, Brig (Retd) M. SHER. "My American Journey Book Review." My American Journey.
Defense Journal, Feb. 2000. Web. 09 Nov. 2013.
Powell, C. L., and J. E. Persico. “My American Journey.” Ballantine Books, 2003. Print.
U.S. Army. (October 1983). Military Leadership. FM 22-100. Washington, DC: U.S.
Government Printing Office.
Vinnedge, Mary. "Power and Influence." http://www.success.com/article/power-and-influence.
Success Magazine, 05 Jan. 2009. Web. 04 Nov. 2013.
Work Referenced
"Colin Powell Biography." Biography.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Nov. 2013.
Glankler, William A. "Colin Powell." American History Online. Facts On File, 2003. Web. 6
Nov. 2013.
Powell, Colin. “A Leadership Primer.” A Leadership Primer. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Nov. 2013.
"Profile: Colin Powell." BBC News. N.p., 19 Oct. 2008. Web. 6 Nov. 2013.

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