Nowhere Man: Autoethnographic Reflections on Identity, Family, and Leadership.

The purpose of this self study was to discover the values and attitudes I model as a leader to support people in doing their best work. Specifically, do I practice leadership intimacy as defined in this study? Leadership intimacy is defined by addressing these research questions: What values do I lead by? And, what attitudes and practices do I model as a leader? Autoethnography is a qualitative genre of research I used in this study. It describes the researcher and his or her personal experiences within a social context, in this case a research university. Autoethnography is often described as exploring a particular life, to understand a way of life.\u27 In this study, I reflected upon vignettes that illustrate how my values and attitudes as a leader have been shaped. These formed the basis for deeper reflection, discussions, and interviews to explain my practice. Interviews were conducted using the 360 degree model to collect data. The data were then analyzed using idea units. Idea units are discrete ideas that can be found in writing regardless of the language used to describe them. Coding for idea units in any narrative follows the same pattern or procedure regardless of the idea being coded. The attitudes and values most often cited were those demonstrating metanoia, humility, and solicitude. I learned each one of these values from my children. As I reviewed each of these values, it became clear that a framework where life informs work informs life is the engine that drives leadership intimacy.\u2