Great Leaders Reflect: Start a Leadership Journal Today
Feb 21, 2025
Leadership Journaling: There’s Power in Regular Reflection
Have you ever stopped to reflect on how well you’re leading? Every day, you attend meetings, make decisions, send emails, and coach your team. But how often do you stop to think about whether your actions and decisions are helping your team and organization?
Once a week? Once a month? Never? Naughty step if your answer is the latter.
Reflection is the key to growth. The most successful leaders intentionally make time to assess, learn, and refine their approach.
Reflection helps them to recognize patterns, uncover blind spots, and make more effective choices. It strengthens self-awareness, fuels better decision-making, and deepens their ability to lead with purpose. And while reflection can happen in their minds, putting pen to paper is where the real transformation happens.
In a world where executives, solopreneurs, and senior managers must adapt, a leadership journal can help. It provides a clear way to improve decision-making and leadership skills. Most importantly, it helps boost emotional intelligence. And trust us - it works.
Why a Leadership Journal is More Than Just Pen & Paper
A leadership journal is a tool that the world’s most successful leaders swear by. And yes, that includes us. If you think it just means writing what you are grateful for or what you did that day, you are mistaken. While both of those things are important, a leadership journal is much, much more than that.
First, let’s look at what a leadership journal definitely is not:
- A story of events. You are not Ernest Hemingway, and you are not that interesting. Sorry, not sorry.
- A stream of consciousness.
- A bullet journal or a planner.
- A scrapbook (you aren’t five years old).
- And it is most certainly NOT a to-do list.
Well, what is it then, we hear you ask.
A leadership journal is, at its heart, a to-be list. Mic drop.
Journaling serves as a powerful tool for deep reflection, helping leaders assess what works, what doesn’t, and how they can improve. A practice that helps leaders become more aware of themselves. It also helps them improve their decision-making skills. Additionally, it allows them to track their personal and professional growth. Unlike a to-do list, which focuses on tasks and outputs, a leadership journal is about who you are becoming as a leader.
Through daily journaling, leaders can:
- Improve self-awareness and emotional intelligence.
- Make better, faster decisions by processing thoughts effectively.
- Track their leadership evolution over time.
- Handle challenges with resilience and confidence.
- Gain clarity and assurance in their leadership style.
A leadership journal is something that should be used every day. This includes birthdays, Christmas, and even the day your child is born. Why? Daily journaling has two main benefits. It helps spot challenges we may not see. It also gives us tools to deal with these challenges. Nice.
And here’s the thing: those who reach the six-month mark almost never stop. Leadership journaling becomes part of who they are, part of what they do, part of how they think, and part of how they grow. After all, wisdom comes from evaluated experience - without the evaluation, there is no wisdom.
Let us be clear: leadership journaling is a transformative tool for becoming the leader you aspire to be.
The Science Behind Journaling for Leaders
Journaling has been around for more than five thousand years, and anything that resilient deserves attention. Fads change, fashions change, styles change but the exceptional best, most worthwhile things persist. Simple.
Research from Harvard Business Review shows that professionals who think about their experiences perform better. Those who do not reflect do not do as well. In fact, another study found that people who journal about their goals are 42% more likely to achieve them than those who don’t. That’s a game-changer.
Additionally, neuroscientists suggest that writing engages the brain’s reticular activating system (RAS), sharpening focus, filtering information, and reinforcing learning. The best of the best, from sales and leadership to entertainment, sports, and politics, journal.
Richard Branson carries a notebook everywhere. Bill Gates dedicates entire weeks to deep thinking. Oprah Winfrey has been journaling since she was 15.
And if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for you.
The Benefits of Journaling for Leadership Development
1. Greater Self-Awareness and Emotional Intelligence
Journaling forces leaders to pause and reflect on their emotions, reactions, and thought processes. Over time, this builds greater emotional intelligence - an essential skill for leading teams, handling challenges, and making sound decisions.
When leaders journal often, they notice patterns in their behaviors and strengths. They also find their important blind spots. This helps them make intentional improvements. And let’s be honest - there is nothing worse than a leader who isn’t self-aware. Don’t let this be you. Journaling can help you become a great leader. It can improve the skills you think you are good at. However, your Leadership Assessment may show different results.
2. Improved Problem-Solving and Decision-Making
A leadership journal helps leaders see the bigger picture. Leaders can learn from their challenges and past choices. This helps them see patterns and improve their decision-making. It also helps them avoid making the same mistakes again.
Take Jeff Bezos; people recognize him for his thoughtful approach to decision-making. He writes down important insights and looks at past choices. This helps him learn from his experiences. With a leadership journal, you can do the same. A place exists where you can focus on what matters. You can think about what is important and what is not. You can also decide what needs to be done to prepare yourself, your team, and your business for the future.
3. A Clearer Leadership Vision
Writing about leadership goals, team dynamics, and business strategies helps leaders clarify their vision. It also keeps them aligned with their long-term objectives. Leadership journaling can help provide a roadmap that keeps leaders focused and accountable.
Now, we’re sure ALL leaders know their vision, mission, and all that malarkey off my heart, right? Well they should. If they don’t, they’ve got bigger problems.
Answer me this - how often do you ask yourself whether your actions and decisions are a reflection of this vision? We’ll leave you with that thought…
By regularly articulating your leadership philosophy, values, and aspirations, you develop a stronger sense of purpose. And a leader with purpose is a leader people want to follow.
4. Increased Resilience and Stress Management
Leadership isn’t easy. It comes with pressure, uncertainty, and high-stakes decisions. You spend endless hours at the office. You are away from your family, even though you promised to balance work and life better.
Journaling provides a space to process challenges, gain perspective, and offload stress. A chance to write what your mind is thinking but your mouth couldn’t possibly say out loud exists.
According to research, journaling helps reduce stress and improve mental clarity. When things get tough, your journal becomes your most trusted advisor.
5. Enhanced Communication and Influence
Warren Buffett believes strong communication is a leader’s most valuable skill - and we agree. A leadership journal helps refine your ability to articulate ideas, inspire teams, and build stronger relationships.
When you journal consistently, you’re training your brain to organize thoughts clearly and concisely. No more rambling or stumbling. And that clarity translates directly into how you lead and communicate - clear, precise, and to the point. Over time, people’s B.S alarm will no longer be ringing every time you speak.
6. Accountability and Continuous Growth
A leadership journal helps measure growth (both personal and professional) over time. It keeps you focused on continuous improvement - after all, you can’t evolve if you keep doing the same things over and over. A journal holds you accountable and pushes you to become the best version of your leadership self.
A leadership journal will also intentionally develop your strengths and, perhaps even more importantly, actively improve your weaknesses. By reflecting on key challenges, insights, and lessons learned, you’re setting the stage for sustained progress. Because at the end of the day, that’s how great leaders grow and how great businesses thrive.
7. Encouraging Creativity and Innovation
The best ideas don’t come from staring at a screen hoping and praying something will come to mind. The best ideas come from stepping back and making the time to think deeply. Journaling encourages creative thinking by providing a space to brainstorm, explore new concepts, and refine strategies. It can even help you navigate the dreaded C-word so many of us fear… change.
Many great inventors in history kept journals. Leonardo da Vinci and Thomas Edison are two examples. They used these journals to write and develop their ideas. Researchers found 3,500 notebooks with about 285 pages each. This totals over 5 million words of Thomas Edison’s notes. Impressive.
To sharpen your thinking and refine your leadership approach, start by putting pen to paper. But don’t worry, we aren’t suggesting you write 5 million words. Start small, start simple, but just start. As we always love to quote here at My Daily Leadership, “To begin, begin.”
Begin Your Leadership Journaling Journey
So you may be thinking, “Ok the above is great, but how do I get started?” Well dear leader, you are in the right place. Our award-winning book, My Daily Leadership - A Powerful Roadmap for Leadership Success is the place to start.
At its core, the book is built around the power of leadership journaling. Providing you with a roadmap to transformation. Throughout its pages, you’ll find structured journal prompts that help you reflect, analyze, and refine your leadership approach.
Looking for a competitive advantage? The book will provide you with the mindsets, strategies, and tools to help you become a great leader. By implementing our Five Core Elements of Exceptional Leadership and by implementing our 20 Critical Performance Competencies, you’ll be on your way to creating real, lasting change for yourself, and those you lead.
Get your copy of the book today.
Eager to jump straight into journaling? Download our 31-day guided leadership journal prompts.
Self-guided journaling can be powerful. This means sitting with a blank sheet of paper and writing what comes to mind. However, using a structured approach can improve your leadership even more.
With our complimentary download, over one month, you’ll develop the powerful habit of daily reflection, self-mentoring, and self-analytics. However, we do recommend downloading the journal prompts after reading our book, My Daily Leadership: A Powerful Roadmap for Leadership Success, to maximize your development. There’s no excuses now.
Your Leadership Growth Starts Today
A leadership journal is what separates great leaders from good or average leaders. And if you’re reading this, we know you’re not here to settle for average.
If a leader tells you they’re serious about growth and about developing themselves, their team, and their company, but they don’t journal: don’t believe them.
No matter if you are an executive, solopreneur, or senior manager, journaling can help you. It offers clarity, insight, and discipline. These tools are important for facing the challenges of leadership.
So pick up the pen and start reflecting.
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