Homegrown Leadership

On its surface, Roxanne DeLille¹s life story wouldn¹t read like a textbook success story. She grew up with limited means, the oldest of 10 children in a family of mixed ethnic background, married young, became a parent soon after and even struggled with addiction in her young adult life.

While Roxanne¹s story might not be the textbook case study, it does offer an even more valuable lesson and illustrates a point she loves to make: “You never know where leadership is going to show up.”

Her life story also underscores the notion that communities can develop their own leaders with mentors who encourage and build leadership capacity as well as by fitting local talents with local leadership needs.

Developing the Capacity for Leadership:
“Human beings are much like their communities. People need the same eight dimensions to be healthy.  At some point along the line, all those things fell into place for me.” ­ Roxanne DeLille

Roxanne spent much of her young life in Wisconsin and Michigan “making do with what we had and looking for creative ways to survive.” But, despite economic challenges and the ethnic intolerance issues that arose from her American Indian heritage, she grew up in a family that was close and emphasized the values of hard work and “making something from nothing.”

Looking back on her own experience, Roxanne experienced her first glimpse that she had leadership potential not only from her parents but also from an elementary school teacher, Mrs. Dahlms.

“She really made me believe I could write and that I was smart,” Roxanne remembered. “It was the seed she planted that made me believe I could go back to school.”

After a young marriage, young parenthood, a stint as a hairdresser in Minneapolis and treatment for alcohol and drug addiction, Roxanne returned to school and found another important ally on her leadership journey, the late Jack Briggs, former president of Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College.

Through Jack¹s support, the college helped Roxanne continue her education.
She earned a bachelor¹s degree

from the University of Minnesota, Duluth in 1999 and earned her master¹s degree from the U of M Twin Cities campus in 2005. Throughout her educational endeavors, said Roxanne, Jack Briggs and later Fond du Lac President, Donald Day, provided educational opportunity with hope and encouragement that she would bring her skills back to Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College.

“My capacity for community leadership was built because there were people who believed in me,” said Roxanne. “I don¹t think people can lead without that (capacity building).”

Identifying Future Leaders:
“Leadership is everywhere, all human beings have the capacity to lead ­ you just have to find that thing, that place that moves them.” ­ Roxanne DeLille

Roxanne¹s leadership journey has now taken her full circle. Today she is the one identifying the leadership skills in others, both as a professional educator and a leadership trainer with the Blandin Foundation.

She works on the philosophy that leadership is everywhere and developing the skills of others first begins with being aware of the people that are around you and the gifts and talents those individuals offer.

Leadership potential can be found in actions such as the young social worker, who organized “Honor the Youth” runs from Minneapolis to Red Lake after being compelled to action by the suicides of a nephew and two other young American Indian people. Leadership also can be exhibited in an act as simple as the young person who wants to effect change when they see something in the world they believe to be unjust.

Current leaders can develop future leaders by nurturing, encouraging and reinforcing these accomplishments both large and small ­ the acts of leadership that take place in our communities all around and everyday.

Roxanne¹s favorite quote from Isaac Newton guides her own philosophy on her personal leadership journey and summarizes the effect that one can have on development of new leaders: “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

Note to readers: Roxanne DeLille teaches Speech Communication and American Indian Studies at Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College in Cloquet. She is a participant of the Ojibwe original religion and is involved in numerous American Indian initiatives at local, regional and national levels. She also is actively involved in the Central Hillside Community in Duluth, where she lives. Roxanne has been a BCLP trainer since 2006.