'One great adventure': Frances Hesselbein's career in leadership.

• Author: McCarthy, Kelly
• Position: MY FIRST BOARD - Reprint

From neighborhood troop leader to CEO of the national organization of Girl Scouts, from corporate board seats to founding CEO of the Leader to Leader Institute (formerly the Peter F.Drucker Foundation), Frances Hesselbein has taken on all opportunities that have come her way to move organizations forward with a renewed sense of mission and innovation. Such a career trajectory needs to be captured in print, and indeed she has done that, with My Life in Leadership, published in February 2011 (see accompanying excerpt). In the following interview with Directors & Boards she reviews the doors that opened that led her from Pennsylvania coal country to the world stage.

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As told to Kelly McCarthy

I was living in Johnstown, Pa.--big coal, big steel, big labor town, when I was approached by a very energetic Girl Scout neighborhood chairman looking to recruit leaders for local scout troops.

When she reached out to me I said, Thank you very much but I know nothing about little girls. I have a little boy.' The next time we met she said, 'I have a sad story to tell you. In the basement of the Second Presbyterian Church we have 30 little 10-year old girls in Troop 17 whose leader is going to India to be a missionary. We'll have to disband this group unless we find a replacement'

I was at a weak moment, I guess, and I offered to take the girls for six weeks until a real leader was found. I then ended up staying with Troop 17 for the next eight years until they graduated from high school.

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From there, doors opened. Somehow I found myself on the national board of the Girl Scouts in addition to serving on an international committee that met in Switzerland twice a year.

In 1976, less than six years after taking on the role of executive director in two Pennsylvania councils, I found myself in New York City interviewing for chief executive officer of the Girl Scouts of the USA, the largest organization for girls and women in the world. The position had been vacant for one year. I never would have thought of applying. I never intended to leave Pennsylvania. During the course of that meeting I was asked what I would do in the position if it were offered. Because I wanted to be very honest in my response I described my view, my vision, of a total transformation of this great national organization. When I came out of that meeting my husband John said, 'How did it go?' And I said, 'Oh, I had a wonderful time. But they...