Now Available — 2026You already know
You already know
how to survive.
You learned it early — in a household that was difficult, in a childhood that asked more of you than it should have.
You probably don't think of that as a strength. You may have spent years trying to put it behind you.
This book is an invitation to look again.
About the bookInner strength comes
Inner strength comes
from struggle.
Ted Leonhardt built a firm, made millions, lost them, and came back to understand what his childhood had actually given him. Not despite the difficulty. Because of it.
The attunement he developed to survive — reading rooms, sensing fear, holding groups together — became the instrument he used to lead, and to help others lead. He spent decades not knowing he had it. Self-understanding, in his experience, arrives late. But it arrives.
His story is one path. You have your own. The Work Beneath the Work is written so you’ll be thinking about yours as you read his.
From the IntroductionSaturday. I gathered my prized pipe cleaner men along with their plastic horses and weapons and headed out into the morning. I’d been dreaming of this day all week. Sunny. Warm and dry enough to kneel by the rockery and lose myself entirely.
I didn’t know what to call that state then. I know now: it was flow. And I know something else now, too: that in the rockery, with my imaginary group and their plastic horses, I was already practicing the thing I’ve spent my professional life trying to understand. I was learning to hold a group.
Choose Your Edition
Ebook
The Work Beneath the Work
$9.99 USD
- Instant download — read on any device
- 294 pages with 62 pen-and-ink illustrations
- Includes Going Home Day, a song by Don Young inspired by Chapter 10
- Available worldwide
Limited - Signed at EventsArtifact Edition
The Work Beneath the Work
$49.99 USD
- Full color throughout — 62 pen-and-ink illustrations in their original form
- 170 gsm premium bond — heavy, warm stock
- 294 pages, 8 × 8 inches
- Signed by the author at events
- Ships within 5–7 business days
Standard Paperback — $24.99 · Also available on Amazon and through booksellers worldwide via Ingram distribution. Black and white interior, perfect bound, 294 pages.
Praise
"The Work Beneath the Work does something few business books dare: it shows its origins. Ted Leonhardt traces the attunement that makes him a trusted advisor back to a body that learned, before it had words, not to trust the arms that held it. That lineage gives this book an authority no framework can fake. Anyone who has built their competence out of an early rupture, named or not, will recognize themselves here — and anyone who leads people will read their own team differently after finishing it."
Dr. Barbara Sumner
Author, On Human Adoption and the Manufacture of Identity · PhD, Victoria University of Wellington · Oscar-shortlisted documentary filmmaker
"Putting yourself out there, being transparent, showing people where you come from — is risky, and genuine. Ted morphed loss and trauma into a reflective approach to his personal work and his executive style. As a psychologist and an adopted person, I feel deeply attuned to Ted and his work. Beneath the work is always the work on oneself. His book is so very easy to want to read — and in the end informs the professional, especially creatives, how to keep in touch with your origins and bring your whole self to the table."
Joyce Maguire Pavao
Psychologist and adopted person · Author, The Family of Adoption (Beacon Press) · Lecturer in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
"The Work Beneath the Work is as much about Leonhardt's journey as it is about our own. He handles his prose with the care and tenderness he was never shown growing up — and gives us permission to finally talk about the serious subjects he was never allowed to discuss. We need more stories like his that reveal just how much the way we were raised shapes the way we work."
Josh Levine
AI + Work Futurist · Author, Great Mondays (McGraw Hill) · Adjunct Faculty, California College of the Arts Design MBA
"As a long-time former agency creative and strategy executive, I can tell you that no one enters the industry with a desire to manage people. The attraction is the work. The focus. The obsession. Add talent and tenacity, and one day you wake up in charge. That's where Ted's remarkably moving, insightful, and on-the-money book really delivers. Required reading for any creative leader who desires sustained success for themself and the people surrounding them."
Rob Osler
USA Today Bestselling Author · Decades at leading global creative agencies, working on many of the world's best-known brands
"The Work Beneath the Work beautifully illustrates something many adoptees spend a lifetime discovering: our survival strategies don't disappear when childhood ends. They evolve into careers, relationships, strengths, and sometimes extraordinary gifts. Ted Leonhardt tells that story with honesty, grace, and remarkable insight. I believe this book will stay with readers long after they've turned the final page."
Pamela A. Karanova
Adoptee advocate · Founder, Adoptees Connect & Adoptee Remembrance Day · Author, Born in the Shadows, Living in the Light
"Ted's book wonderfully illustrates how trauma shapes and ultimately transforms us. His response to childhood trauma is told with honesty, and his evolving creativity is shown in the pen-and-ink drawings accompanying each chapter. It is a heartfelt story of a path to creativity and freedom that only Ted could tell — yet all can share."
Lusijah Marx, RN, Psy.D.
Clinical psychologist · Co-Founder, Radiance Integrative Health & Wellness · Founder, Quest Center for Integrative Health
"I've been reading Ted's essays for years — it's amazing to see them brought together in one book with even more context and insight. The Work Beneath the Work is thoughtful and full of wisdom that's especially valuable for anyone working in a creative field. A must-read for creative professionals, founders, and anyone interested in understanding the human dynamics behind great work."
Arianna O'Dell
Entrepreneur, journalist, and founder of Airlink Marketing · Featured in Fast Company, Inc., and Grammy.com
"As an adoption social worker who has placed over 100 children in adoptive homes across a 25-year career, I am appalled at how badly Ted's adoptive parents handled his adoption. What impresses me equally is how Ted transforms that childhood trauma into tools that help creative professionals perform at the highest level possible for them."
Mary Knight, LICSW
Psychotherapist · Former adoption social worker · Author and filmmaker · Documentary films viewed over one million times
Going Home DayA song inspired
A song inspired
by Chapter Ten
Don Young read the Camp chapter of this book and called to say he'd written a song about it. Don is a brand strategist, musician, and composer who publishes music under the name Emperor Jones. What he made is included in the ebook edition of the chapter.
Don writes at inhomestudio.substack.comAbout the Author
Ted Leonhardt
Ted Leonhardt co-founded and grew a corporate communications and branding firm to $10 million in fees with a team of 50 before selling it. Later, as Chief Creative Officer, he led 500 creatives across 27 offices worldwide.
For the past twenty years he has advised founders and leaders of creative firms — helping them negotiate, lead, and do their best work. He writes at tedleonhardt.com and on Substack, where he explores the relationship between creative work, leadership, and the lives that shaped the people who do both.
He lives in Bellingham, Washington, with his wife Robin.
Your struggle built
something real.
Three editions available now — ebook, standard paperback, and Artifact.