In an industry roiled by change, IT leadership is crucially important. A veteran executive urges his peers to thoughtfully assess their leadership strengths and weaknesses. I recently received an email from someone I have mentored over the years, in which he described what he liked about my approach to leadership. It's not every day you get fan mail from a direct report, and this note from Raghavendra Manavalli, our Director of Development in India, prompted me to stop and really think about my "leadership style." THE EMAIL LED ME TO CONSIDER WHAT LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES I HAVE MADE MY OWN AND SHOULD CONTINUE TO REINFORCE AND REFINE. I'm a senior executive at a $1.8 billion company, and anyone in my position clearly has done some things right to reach this level. But I had never really looked at myself from the outside and identified what had made me a successful leader. Raghu's email led me to consider what leadership principles I have made my own and should continue to reinforce and refine. It also got me reflecting on whether I sometimes have fallen short of adhering to those principles. Because I found this exercise useful, I thought that others might benefit from a similar selfassessment. We've all read helpful books on leadership, but you can't adopt every good piece of advice. You must develop your own approach, honing it over time. Identifying and articulating 24