Energize Your Leadership | Joanne Guidoccio

I am happy to feature Dr. Hoda Maalouf and her contributions to the anthology, Energize Your Leadership.

Here’s Hoda!

My writing journey started in 2013 when I ventured forth and opened my own blog. I was at first hesitant to post anything. I knew I could write “decently,” as my instructors always seemed to enjoy my essays but that was many years back. But when my father passed away four years ago, it did not take me long to realize that I had started to forget some of his amazing stories. Dad was an excellent story teller but never sat down and wrote anything. It bothered me a lot that if I would leave my stories unpublished, imagination and facts would eventually mingle and fuse together, making it difficult for me to know later on what really happened and what did not. So I decided to document the many stories that I can still clearly recall in a blog entitled “Powerful Lessons from Everyday Life.”

As soon as I started sharing my stories online, my social media interactions increased, along with the number of my social media friends and subsequent invitations to write on blogs and periodicals. But due to my tight timing constraints—between raising a pair of rambunctious 6-year-old twins and my full-time job in academe—I had to turn down some of these generous and unexpected offers.

A year ago, a close SM friend, Alli Polin, asked me if I could write a chapter on “gratitude” in an upcoming leadership book that she was planning with four other SM friends. Alli’s invitation was quite appealing! I have so many personal stories that touch this issue. Moreover, I truly admired my future book co-authors as we were members of common SM communities.

How the book was conceived…

Through online meet-ups, Alli, LaRae Quy, Terri Klass, Chery Gegleman and Karin Hurt created an outline for our book that aimed to find ways of motivating and energizing leaders. When the sections and chapters of the book came together, the coaches selected 11 leadership experts from across the globe with diverse professional backgrounds and perspectives. Each one of us was asked to write a personal chapter telling the story of a struggle—as well as a powerful insight—that led to us energizing our own leadership. It was noticeable that whenever we faced an energy crisis, it often led us to self-discovery and eventually to renewed accomplishment. And hence the three actions we commonly make to achieve growth and renewed energy are: Discover, Ignite and Break Through.

Blurb

“Energize Your Leadership: Discover, Ignite, Break Through” was written by 16 authors with one common goal—to inspire people to rethink their personal and professional attitudes. Sixteen real-life stories were composed for readers who want to excel and make a difference in the lives of their students, colleagues and so on. The book is divided into four parts: “Energize Yourself,” “Energize Others,” “Energize Your Workplace” and “Energize Your Future.” Each chapter’s content stands on its own, so the book can be read in any order. Furthermore, all chapters follow the same framework: the author’s personal narrative, the lesson learned from the story, a few key questions for the reader to ponder, and finally some action steps based on the theme of each chapter.

Bio

Dr. Hoda Maalouf was born and raised in Beirut, Lebanon. She moved to the UK at the age of 25 to study at Imperial College, London. She was there for nearly seven years, earning a Ph.D. in Communication Engineering. Hoda returned to Lebanon in 1998, at which time she joined the faculty of Notre Dame University. She teaches, advises graduate students and serves as head of the NDU Computer Science Department. A mother of twins, Hoda is equally interested in science and the arts, and enjoys drawing, writing and social media.

“Be grateful to be alive!
Get up, shake off the dust and move on with your life.”
Hoda Maalouf