Graham Keynote Leadership Speaker

At the 8th Annual Leadership Conference, titled “At the Intersection of Who You Are & What You Do,” and held at California State University, Long Beach on Saturday, Jan. 27, Stedman Graham was the keynote speaker.

Graham’s topic and his passion is trademarked and referred to as “Identity Leadership: Purpose. Passion. Performance.” To evoke Maya Angelou, “We are braver and wiser because they exist, those strong women and strong men... We are who we are because they are who they are.”

Angelou could easily have been speaking of herself or of her close friend Oprah Winfrey — who happens to be Graham’s longtime life partner. Graham demonstrates how he has become “braver and wiser” through his devotion to building strength and leadership skills in the lives of others.

The focus of Graham’s talk is on the importance of building a strong sense of self-identity. He clearly conveys the truism that in allowing others to define us we become disempowered and, therefore, enslaved to the perception others hold of us.

Graham touched on the struggles he has faced in his own lifetime, such as racial discrimination, growing up with two disabled brothers and being the first in his family to graduate from college.

Through a commitment to lifelong learning and the realization that self-actualization is achieved through love, starting with the love of self, Graham succinctly captures the benefits of his homegrown philosophy of Identity Leadership, by proposing that with a strong sense of identity we can enhance performance; define, plan and prepare with purpose and direction; build a foundation for growth and development; build leadership skills; and develop emotional intelligence.

As evidenced by the obstacles he has lived past and through, Graham is obviously a practitioner of the principles he preaches.

To reference Maya Angelou’s words once again: “Now that I know better, I do better.” By listening to and learning from Stedman Graham we in the audience may, perhaps, know better; the test will be will be in whether or not we do better. Maybe, we are the leaders we’ve been searching for.

ben@beachcomber.news