Tag Archives: leader

The seeds of leadership

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What should we look for in a potential leader who has not emerged yet?

Last year, Steve Murrell posted Tim Elmore’s list of traits he looks for in those he seeks to train in leadership:

  • gifted to lead
  • influential with people
  • fruitful even before they have a leadership position
  • trustworthy in small things
  • serving in some capacity already

This a a great starting point. The first one is a bit nebulous and probably becomes evident only as you look at the other bullets. The last three are certainly related. The idea is that leadership is scalable. Someone who uses relational and spiritual authority to bear fruit without the position is likely to be even more effective once they have positional authority. Jim Collins says as much in his monograph Good to Great and the Social Sectors. So look for fruit, even in the smallest things.

I’m intrigued by the sports management business. Trades, drafts and coaching hires are compelling to me, because general managers are searching for hidden gems. You’ll often see a general manager trade “too much” for a pitcher who was average in the minor leagues or who had a losing record with another team. It’s evident that they see something they can work with in the middle of failure. That’s the job of an established leader: to mine for talent among those with less experience.

When you think of potential leaders in your setting, what are the seeds you look for?

Becoming foolish kings

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My only angle in diversity is my age. One day I will wake up and discover that I’m an “older white male.” It’s my future, whether I like it or not, so I operate with some sense of urgency. Because age diversity is so tenuous, I spend a lot of my peer mentoring time encouraging other young people to step up and offer their gifts. Organizations need young people who are willing to use their leadership gifts!

But here’s the thing: we’re all destined to get “old.” I recall a talk by Mark Driscoll that drew my attention to a couple of obscure verses at the end of Ecclesiastes 4.

It is better to be a poor but wise youth than an old and foolish king who refuses all advice. Such a youth could rise from poverty and succeed. He might even become king, though he has been in prison. But then everyone rushes to the side of yet another youth who replaces him.  Endless crowds stand around him, but then another generation grows up and rejects him, too. So it is all meaningless—like chasing the wind. (NLT)

I think this parable has incredible relevance today for all those with titles and those who aspire to lead. Note that the spotlight in Solomon’s story is on the one who is rising, not the one who has made it. Solomon is not saying that it’s meaningless to aspire to lead; but he is saying that power is an illusion, and striving to hold onto it is like chasing the wind. By all means, take advantage of the moment that God has given you. Step up, express your voice and use your gifts.

But as you do, remember that it will be someone else’s turn far too quickly. All of us are destined to become foolish kings, when we find ourselves out of the limelight. There is always another generation rising up behind us. So hold power loosely, and spend at least part of your moment investing in the next generation.

The key to the parable is this: what makes a king foolish is the refusal to receive advice. There is no age limit to being a learner. Older, established leaders should make it a habit to keep young leaders around them. Perhaps the most valuable thing they bring to a team is the ability to understand the times. Mentoring should be two-way; there’s always something wise youth can teach established leaders.

I pray that whether I’m a young, emerging leader or an established leader, I will always be willing to learn from others. I pray that as a young leader, I won’t think of my own perspective more highly than I ought. And I pray that as my body ages, I will always reflect youthfulness in my attitude and mindset. As Douglas MacArthur puts it:

You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope, as old as your despair.

The most elusive form of diversity

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I think the most elusive form of diversity is age. You only have a limited window to capture the treasure of youth. If you wait to have all your doubts about a young leader’s maturity and experience resolved, he or she will not bring you the diversity you need. You’ll have to move to the next young candidate, who will likely bring the same concerns. The fact is that young leaders are high risk, high reward. Sure, they won’t be the most experienced candidate, but they have more room to grow. More upside, bigger dreams and fewer fears.

In his most recent book, George Barna points out that Jimmy Blanchard became CEO of Synovus Financial Corp when he was 29! How on earth could a company like that turn over their operation to such a young leader? You know he wasn’t the most experienced candidate they looked at. They obviously wanted the energy, ideas, passion for people and leadership potential that he and Synovus became known for. It paid off in big ways. Not only did he oversee the period of greatest growth, but they’ve been voted America’s #1 company to work for.

What are the things you look for in emerging leaders? While you may not get a long resume, there are signs of future success. I’m going to spend some time on that topic in the following months. I think it’s worth exploring, because as Boomers get closer to retirement, they’re going to have to turn over leadership to a generation that’s about half their size. Leadership is therefore going to be handed to two generations, meaning leaders are going to be younger.

One final thought. Eventually, every young leader risks becoming what they hate most: an established leader holding onto power too long. Therefore the most important trait to cultivate in young leaders if you want age diversity is the desire and ability to develop others. Maybe I’m biased, but I think if you want any kind of diversity in your organization, that’s the most important trait to have in all levels of leadership. Looking for that ability should be part of all hiring and promotion thought processes.

Development should never be an add-on. If you’ve put the right people in leadership positions, they do it naturally and organically. The next generation benefits, ethnic minorities benefit, the organization benefits. Everyone benefits when you have developers in your organization. Just ask Synovus.

Romans 12 – self confidence

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16 And don’t think you know it all!

…or act like you know it all. I remember working at Pace Warehouse when I was in college. There was one area of the store that I devoutly avoided. If a customer asked about it, I would try to find someone else to answer their questions or pretend I never heard them and walk away: Tires. I knew nothing about tires, and customers could tell I knew nothing about tires. That’s when a veteran employee — aged 25 or so — took me under his wing and explained that customers don’t like it when you don’t have answers for them. It’s all in the delivery; you have to speak with confidence (even if you don’t know what you’re talking about). Yikes!

Even worse than acting with confidence you have no right to have is thinking you know everything when you don’t. Ambition and self-confidence grow from the same stock. Both are good, but easily abused. Many young leaders think they have the skills and ideas to solve the world’s problems right now, and perhaps they do, but they lack opportunity and credibility.

Let me offer some perspective from Bob Creson, Wycliffe USA’s president:

It’s hard to say this (as an older leader to younger leaders) but there really is no substitute for experience.  And, often it takes one or two very difficult experiences to form the foundation of a leader’s future success.  My father-in-law likes to say, “Education is expensive.”  He’s not talking about formal education but rather the hard knocks required learning the lessons of leadership (and life, for that matter).  I can point to several of these in my own experience (both inside and outside of Wycliffe) that continue to shape my approach to leadership to this day.

It goes back to your attitude. Do you approach life, colleagues, reports, kids and clients like you know it all? Or like a learner always willing to have your views challenged with a new perspective? The question I have to ask myself again is, “Are you more interested in being discovered or in being developed?”

As we start a new year, and I wrap up my series on Romans 12, let’s agree to approach 2010 as learners. There’s always more room to grow in our leadership abilities.

Young leaders aren’t into credit

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In March and April, I did a series on young leaders. Another characteristic came to surface recently that I wanted to add to the list: young leaders don’t care who gets the credit.

You’ve heard the saying, “There is no limit to what can be accomplished if it doesn’t matter who gets the credit.” (Interestingly, I just looked it up and no one really knows who said that!) Well, it’s certainly true in an open source, viral  world like ours.

If you’re not interested in hierarchy and moving up the ladder, but rather in being part of a team, then ideas tend to flow more freely. If you’re not into self-promotion and defending your territory, but rather in seeing your ends successful through any means available, then you’re free to celebrate when movements ignite and move faster and farther than your reach.

Let me point out a concrete example. Wycliffe is celebrating the fact that 109 Bible translation projects were started this past year. That’s the highest number in history! Who started them? A lot of different people. In fact, the only thing I can tell you with confidence is that only a very few were started by Wycliffe. And only a handful working on the projects even know that they’re working on a Wycliffe project. They’re working for organizations like SIL, Translation Association of the Philippines and Ghana Institute for Linguistics, Literacy and Bible Translation. The fact is that Wycliffe doesn’t really translate Bibles. Someone came to me yesterday and pointed out that a recent CBN video claimed that Wycliffe translators were working on Luke 2 — the Christmas story — for nine languages in Tanzania, pointing out that it just wasn’t true.

I say, “Who cares?” As Paul said to the Philippians when he heard some preachers were preaching Christ from selfish motives,

So how am I to respond? I’ve decided that I really don’t care about their motives, whether mixed, bad, or indifferent. Every time one of them opens his mouth, Christ is proclaimed, so I just cheer them on!

The important thing is that 109 translation projects were started! Let’s continue to work in a way that gives the statisticians headaches trying to figure out how to assign the credit. For instance, African nationals doing translation, trained by SIL, funded by the Orthodox Church, their finished product paid for by the Bible League and cheered on and supported by Wycliffe?

The fact is that issues of control and credit have crippled many initiatives before they ever got off the ground. God will hold many people and many organizations accountable one day for that incredible waste of resources.

Here’s my question: How can we make this happen faster? What about open source translation? What are your ideas?

Romans 12 – ordinary people

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16 Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people.

This was one of the verses that made me think the entire chapter was written to leaders. The issue isn’t how much or whether you enjoy the company of ordinary people. It’s that you even think there are classes of people.

Now, let’s be careful here. We have to acknowledge that leaders are different. The sacrifices, stress, risks, crises, blame and weight of decisions are enough to make Dan Allender conclude that if you’re not called to lead, why on earth would you ever do it? Leaders are different. But as leaders, what is our attitude toward those differences?

Pride sneaks into a leader’s life in subtle ways. Leadership positions feed it because of the uniqueness of the profession. Isolation can feed it. Holding onto secrets can feed it. Safety concerns can feed it. Decision-making power can certainly feed it. Let me share a subtle example.

I recall a story I read in Freakonomics. Some researchers came up with a pretty simple way to measure employee honesty: they talked to a bagel company that provided bagels to the break rooms of businesses in a major U.S. city. This company used an honor system, a little jar beside the bagels to gather payment. Over time, the empirical data showed some trends. Which group of employees as a general rule cheated the most? Right. The entitled ones on the top floor!

It hurts to read that! So, let’s have some discussion. What has worked to help you overcome the pride that sneaks up behind isolation, secrecy and security? How do you continue to think of yourself as an “ordinary person”? What keeps you grounded?

Of course, Jesus would have a problem with the idea that leaders are ordinary. Remember that the night before he was arrested, he gave a powerful lesson to his disciples. John 13:3 recounts that because “Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God,” he got down on his knees and did the lowest possible job in that culture: he washed his disciples’ feet. Jesus stated counterculturally that leaders should be last. Not ordinary, but last. The pyramid is inverted, and leaders are at the bottom.

So, let’s not try to be lofty leaders, or even ordinary people. Let’s be men and women who exist to support and encourage and serve those whom God has entrusted to us.

Bulbed light?

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I remember a design project at Georgia State where I participated in a team responsible for marketing a lightbulb company. Our ad campaign pretty much got trashed by the judges as unoriginal, but we hit on one thing that I think is worth remembering: the way to sell lightbulbs is to change your focus off the bulbs. Our company sold “100% bulbed light.”

It’s a subtle difference, but I believe perspective makes a big difference in a company. Do people care about the bulbs or the light? At the Threshing Floor last Friday, I was reminded that Hallmark isn’t a greeting card company, but a social expression company. According to George Barna’s Master Leaders, Disney isn’t in the theme park business; it’s in the happiness business. Banks are in the peace-of-mind business. And so on.

A perspective focused on the end experience of the customer is going to meet their needs better and result in a better product. Do you know what your real business is? What is the feeling that your customer will go away with? It’s about vision, and vision starts at the top.

Last month, one of Wycliffe USA’s board members summed up Wycliffe’s business. We’re not in the Bible translation business, but the Bible transformation business — lives changed by the Word of God. That’s our vision.

Back to the design project. Of course it was a marketing campaign. Only a marketing campaign could convince the pubic that incandescent bulbs are anything more than: “80% bulbed heat, 20% bulbed light.”

Romans 12 – criticism part II

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My pastor, Chan Kilgore, once said that people never build monuments to critics. Is that really true? When he said it, I immediately thought of a lot of the figures in the Revolutionary War. Thomas Payne and Paul Revere were pretty serious critics. But there’s a difference between protesters who take potshots and protesters who do something about their beliefs. And victors always get to define the terms. Instead of “critic” and “traitor,” we in the United States prefer “forefather” and “patriarch.”

The question I want to consider is: why should a leader bless those who persecute him? Verse 20 gives one answer: to heap “burning coals” on them. It seems to me that alone could serve as a nasty motivation for “kindness.” But is that what this passage is about? Of course, the Bible preaches a countercultural message: seek genuine blessing for your critics. Why?

Point number 2: critics are essential in the life of a leader. Many gurus have written about the inability of senior leaders to get accurate assessments; candor is inversely proportional to level of position. Therefore, if a leader can receive it, the poignant commentary of a critic is essential because of his immunity to persuasion. He provides that “alternative” viewpoint we need so much.

I have a challenge for you. Next time you’re persecuted, ask yourself, “What if they’re right?” It could cast some light onto your blind spots.

An Old Testament example takes it one step further. In 2 Samuel 16, David’s son Absalom has taken the throne by force, and David is forced to flee from Jerusalem. While David is at a low point, an opportunistic descendant of David’s predecessor begins throwing stones and verbal lobs, claiming that David is getting a taste of his own medicine. David’s men want vengeance, but he rebukes them:

My own son is trying to kill me. Doesn’t this relative of Saul have even more reason to do so? Leave him alone and let him curse, for the Lord has told him to do it. And perhaps the Lord will see that I am being wronged and will bless me because of these curses today.

David shows incredible restraint, perspective and confidence in God’s Sovereignty. I think we’d all do well as leaders to respond the same way. What if God has given you a critic for a specific purpose? If you could see criticis that way, wouldn’t you pray for them, seek to bless them tangibly and work to overcome them by doing what’s right?

Lest we idolize David too much, let’s look at the rest of the story in 1 Kings 2:8-9. Years later, when David gives his final instructions to another son who is taking the throne legitimately, he admits that Shimei stuck in his craw. David tells Solomon,

I swore by the Lord that I would not kill him. But that oath does not make him innocent. You are a wise man, and you will know how to arrange a bloody death for him.

Don’t we wish! If only we could all keep our hands clean and leave it to our sons to clean up for us. Not sure how to respond to that one. It certainly speaks to the deep, irreversable pain a critic can bring to a king. It’s easy to do the right thing for a while, but difficult to let go of the feelings surrounding the experience.

Reluctant leadership on election day

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Here’s an election day special for you.

I enjoyed an article in the Orlando Sentinel this morning (you can find the article here) about the difficulty of finding candidates willing to let their names stand for mayor in small towns across the U.S. Apparently, not too many people jump at the chance to lay off city workers, close firestations and make the budget balance for a salary of $600 per year.

For instance, the case of Emmett Dofner. In 1987, the 150 residents of McClelland, Iowa decided to write his name on their blank ballots — blank because there were no candidates for mayor that year. When he began getting congratulatory phone calls, he thought it was a prank. Nevertheless, he threw himself into the job and concluded two years later that he’d done his share. Time for someone else.

They’re anticipating that he’ll be elected by write-in vote for his 12th consecutive term today.

That’s reluctant leadership.

Romans 12 – criticism

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14 Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them…. 17 Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable…. 19 Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,

“I will take revenge;
I will pay them back,”
says the Lord.

20 Instead,

“If your enemies are hungry, feed them.
If they are thirsty, give them something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap
burning coals of shame on their heads.”

21 Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.

Criticism is one of the hardest things for a leader, in part because so many are driven by a desire for approval. This passage speaks to the very heart of that issue. I think I can sum up these verses with two main points. First, a leader’s response to criticism will reveal his heart — his faith and his character. And second, that critics have their place. We need them because they can provide contrast and excellent feedback.

Nothing exposes a leader like a good critic. People who get under our skin, who persecute us or who find fault with every attempt to move an organization forward can fester like nothing else. They try us most because they are immune from all of our skills of influence and persuasion. They therefore quickly expose our foundations. Do we really have faith in God’s sovereignty? Do we really believe that God will deal with them? And what is our character made of? Are we really honorable, kind and full of grace? Or are we vengeful and vindictive, impatient and short-tempered?

I got a recent insight on this topic from Shepherding a Child’s Heart. When kids are bullied at school, what do parents teach them? Tedd Tripp’s response draws straight from Romans 12:

It doesn’t take grace from God to ignore the oppressor. It doesn’t take supernatural grace to stand up for your rights. To do good to oppressors, however, to pray for those who mistreat you, to entrust yourself to the just Judge, requires a child to come face-to-face with the poverty of his own spirit and his need of the transforming power of the gospel.

So, whether we’re a leader or a child, God calls us to a higher standard that cannot be achieved apart from His supernatural grace at work in our own lives. What’s the condition of our own hearts?

Since I’ve taken so long composing this post, I’m going to go ahead and publish part 1.