ED BRENEGAR - COMMUNITY OF LEADERSHIP Programs

Lewis & Clark for 21st Century Leaders

How to lead organizations into unknown territories of new knowledge,
global relationships, and teamwork.

One of the greatest American adventures in exploration ever launched can provide us with insights about leadership and achievement in uncertain times that we need now more than ever before. This talk will look at the famous expedition of Captains Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, and from its amazing accomplishments draw out lessons needed by all organizations in the 21st Century. Audience members will emerge inspired and with a big picture for how to do the little things right as they face new challenges and move on to future success.

THE LEWIS & CLARK EXPEDITION STORY

At the dawn of the 19th century, what came to be the western United States was an unknown territory. It was a region that extended from Mexico into Canada, and was controlled by Spanish, French, British and Russian commercial interests. America, still a new nation, barely 25 years old, was concentrated on the eastern seaboard, with new settlements springing up along the rivers that flowed to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic. Only the most visionary leader would look beyond the Mississippi River to see that America's destiny lay in the West. Thomas Jefferson, writer of the Declaration of Independence and third President of the United States, did exactly that. It was his vision that gave rise to the Lewis & Clark expedition. The Lewis & Clark expedition was the quintessential American enterprise--entrepreneurial, expansive, technologically innovative, and built on determination, resilience in hardship, and teamwork. Their venture as the Corps of Discovery is a model for understanding how other ventures into the unknown came to be uniquely American in character. At the close of the 19th century, Fredrick Jackson Taylor wrote an important historical essay claiming--just a hundred years after Lewis & Clark--that the American frontier was closed. The last hundred years has shown that new frontiers still exist, and that ventures into the unknown are more the norm today, than at anytime since Lewis & Clark's expedition.

THEIR STORY OF LEADERSHIP FOR OUR TIME

This presentation tells the story of the Lewis & Clark Expedition from the perspective of what they did to be a successful team in their venture into the unknown territory west of the Mississippi. Their inspiring tale of friendship, achievement in the face of hardship in unknown territory, and impact upon the future of the United States provides us principles for leading our organizations into the unknown territory of the 21st century.

Audience: Professional, civic, and education groups
Time: 1 hour

Dr. Ed Brenegar / Community of Leadership Programs
210 Wood Dale Drive, Hendersonville NC 28791 - 828/693-0720 voice/fax - 828/275-1803 mobile - ed@edbrenegar.com

© Copyright 2002 Ed Brenegar