I recently finished Jim Collins’ book What to Make of a Life, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.

If you know Collins (Good to Great), you know he doesn't just write business advice. He studies human trajectories. I know Collins as a great business and leadership author, one who studies companies and the leaders within those companies. So when I began reading and realized the book was more like biographical reviews, I was confused. But, since I love reading biographies, I was immediately motivated. 

In this book, he does a fascinating side-by-side comparative analysis of people with similar backgrounds who ended up living parallel lives in some sense, but doing so sparked by different motivations. The core thread running through these stories is a concept called encodings.

Encodings are the innate inclinations, natural curiosities, and hidden gifts hardwired inside each of us. Collins points out that for an encoding to actually become a life's passion, what he calls finding your "hedgehog,” two things have to happen:

1. You have to actively engage in experiences that bring those hidden traits to the surface.
2. You must be in an environment that nurtures and protects those traits so they can grow.

Reading these stories hit me deeply. It made me reflect with gratitude on the people who saw encodings in me when I was just a kid. But more than that, it reinforced a core truth I’ve carried through 20+ years of corporate leadership and into my work as an executive coach: So much human potential goes completely untapped simply because no one bothered to create the right spark.

Stories You Can’t Get From a Headline

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What I love about deep-dive books like this are the incredible, hidden stories you'd never catch in a quick article or headline.

Take Cardiss Collins. I had never heard of her, nor her story before reading this book, and it blew me away. In the early 1970s, she was working behind the scenes in local government finance. When her husband, a U.S. Congressman, tragically died in a plane crash, she was plunged into sudden grief. Yet in the middle of that mourning, leaders around her urged her to run for his vacant seat.

She had no formal political background, and she was a Black woman, no less, in a time when diversity across national public elected office seats was nearly non-existent. But she took the leap. That tragedy pushed her into an environment that unlocked a deep, hidden encoding for public service. Cardiss Collins went on to win 11 straight elections, serving nearly 25 years in Congress as a trailblazing leader. Her story is a powerful reminder of the incredible leadership capacity sitting quietly inside people, just waiting for the right moment, and sometimes the right nudge, to emerge.

Then there is John Glenn. Long before he became a legendary fighter pilot, test pilot, and the first American to orbit the Earth, his encodings were sparked by a simple act of exposure. When Glenn was under ten years old, his father arranged his very first flight in an airplane. That single moment ignited something very deep within. He eventually went against his family's wishes to join the military because those internal encodings were so strong.

Glenn had a natural genius for airplane mechanics, but he also had another rare encoding: an unusual, unshakable calm under extreme pressure. Who would have known that a simple flight arranged by a father would ignite the spark that eventually made him the first U.S. astronaut to orbit earth?

The Power of Exposure and Nurturing

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These stories mirror what I’ve witnessed in my own life and in the lives of people I’ve mentored.

For five years, I served as a Big Brother in Dallas. Fairly early in our relationship, I asked my 12-year-old "Little Brother" where in the world he would go if he could travel anywhere. His answer? Six Flags Over Texas, a place just 30 minutes from his home. I was shell shocked, and could not believe what I just heard, so I repeated the question thinking maybe I was unclear, “no I mean anywhere in the world?” Same answer. Because his entire world was bounded by a two-square-mile block in a tough neighborhood, Six Flags was the furthest thing his imagination could reach. He didn't lack capability; he lacked exposure. You cannot dream about what you’ve never seen.

When I was a teenager, my mom started bringing home daily newspapers from work. I found myself fascinated by the sports box scores. I’d stare at the numbers and calculate batting averages, free-throw percentages, and yards per carry and do my own side comparisons of teams and individuals. My mom noticed my interest and kept bringing home more papers, including the business and money section. That simple, nurturing act helped me discover a natural affinity for quantitative analysis, which ultimately led to a finance major and a 20-year career leading enterprise strategy, finance and operational teams.

A Call to Leaders: Be the Spark

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It brings me so much joy to look back and see how simple moments of exposure shaped my life. But as leaders, it also gives us a profound responsibility.

I’m absolutely convinced that everyone around you, on your executive team, in middle management, or two levels down, has hidden encodings. They have gifts they might not even realize they possess. If we only judge people by their current job descriptions, we miss the incredible, untapped capacity sitting right in front of us.

If we want to build thriving organizations, we have to create an environment of active exploration and continuous learning:

• Look Beyond the Resume: Talk to your people about what genuinely excites them outside their daily routines.

• Provide Low-Risk Exposure: Put high-potential individuals on cross-functional projects or strategic task forces outside their comfort zone just to see what sparks.

• Make Space for Exploration: When someone tries something new and stumbles, treat it as a learning milestone, not a failure.

Cardiss Collins needed a community to believe in her. John Glenn needed a father to take him on a flight. My Little Brother needed someone to show him a world beyond a two-mile radius.

When was the last time you checked in on the hidden potential sitting deep within your organization, and what environment are you creating to help them reach it?

Is your leadership team leaving untapped potential on the table? Schedule a strategic conversation with Bonafide Leaders to learn how we help executive teams elevate performance and maximize enterprise impact.