Do They Make You Want To Vomit?

Today at the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit, Bill Hybels delivered the opening message and it was right on. He talked about a time a while back in which he was in a leadership slump. Nothing seemed to be going right and it seemed like he couldn't solve any problem, big or small. As a result, he was losing confidence in his leadership abilities.

Then, while spending some intentional time with God, he heard a gentle whisper from his heavenly Father saying, "You can lead. Look at what you've done. You have it in you!" This encouraged him and then God shared with him four foundational leadership principles.

One of those was something that, on paper, looks very elementary...but in practice, it is anything but. One of the principles Hybels referred to was that it takes fantastic people to move anything from here to there, in other words to make significant progress.

In discussing this point, he said that a leader's job is to recruit, train and develop talented people who will flourish in your culture. He said there is a great way to determine how your team stacks up, give them this test.

If you were to receive a text message right now stating that a certain person on your team has just resigned, which of the following would be your response?
1. "Whew! I sure am glad they're leaving!"
2. "Ughhh! They are such a good person and they're doing a good job. Now I'm going to have to find someone else!"
3. You want to vomit on the spot. "This person is a fantastic person with a fantastic attitude and they are a fantastic fit in our culture. They are irreplaceable."

Hybels went on to say that they spent an incredible amount of time going through this exercise with their entire staff at Willow. The time was very well spent, though.

Hybels said that they then met with every staff member and shared with them the results of this exercise. To those who were in the third category they would say something like, "You make me want to vomit (with obvious tongue in cheek). Really, if you left this organization, that is what I would want to do. You are a fantastic person and you are doing a fantastic job. We hope you are here for the long haul. Now if God calls you someplace else, we'll throw you a party but our hearts won't really be in it. But we want you to know that we hope you will be with us into the future."

Could you imagine being on the receiving end of something like that? It would feel pretty good, wouldn't it? Hybels shared that these meetings helped to build increased loyalty and passion for the vision that God has given them. It was an extremely beneficial thing to do.

After Hybels was finished, we heard from Jim Collins who discussed the importance of having the right people on the bus in any organization before you can talk about growing the organization. The exercise Hybels mentioned is a great way to determine if you really do have the right people on your bus.

So will you do this with your team?

Discipline For Greatness

A few posts ago, I shared about the fact that some of our Truth At Work groups watched Bill Hybels interviewing Jim Collins, author of Good to Great. This interview took place at the 2006 Willow Creek Leadership Summit.

While discussing what makes companies great, Collins shared this formula for greatness, "Disciplined people produce disciplined thought which produces disciplined actions which produces greatness."

I think it would be safe to say that most of us want to be great (I would also bet that everyone would have a different definition of what "great" would look like to them). Yet, so few want to do what is necessary for that to occur. Not many are willing to pay the price, whatever it might be.

Collins is sharing something that shouldn't be surprising to us. In order for greatness to occur, it must start in the individual, with discipline. That's a word that very few people like. That means hard work and effort and giving up things we really don't want to give up.

Over 3,000 years ago, Solomon shared some similar nuggets of wisdom (all from the book of Proverbs):

• Lazy hands make a man poor, but diligent hands bring wealth (10:4)
• He who gathers crops in summer is a wise son, but he who sleeps during harvest is a disgraceful son (10:5)
• Diligent hands will rule, but laziness ends in slave labor (12:24)
• The sluggard craves and gets nothing, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied (13:4)
• The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty (21:5)
  

Interested Instead of Interesting

Last week, some of our Truth At Work groups watched Bill Hybels interviewing Jim Collins, author of Good to Great and pictured above. This interview took place at the 2006 Willow Creek Leadership Summit.

Collins had some incredible stuff to share about what organizations can do to be great.

However, one thing in the interview stuck out to me more than any other thing. At that point in his life, Collins had been going through a spiritual awakening of sorts and he was beginning to embrace Christianity. When asked about this by Hybels, Collins replied that his journey had been helped greatly by his personal board of advisors.

First off, the fact that he had a personal board was impressive to me and a great lesson to us all to not do life alone.

Second, he went on to say that he received some of the best advice from one of his advisors who said, “Jim, you spend too much time trying to be interesting. Why don’t you spend more time being interested?”

Wow. Great advice.

Dale Carnegie said that the best way to attract friends is to show interest in others. That is also a great way to show the love of Christ!

Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Philippians 2:4

People On The Bus

Jim Collins writes in his best-selling book, Good to Great, that great companies all do something when it comes to hiring people. Before they do anything, they make sure they have the "right people on the bus." He says they do this even before they know where the "bus" is going because they know that the success of the organization depends on having good people.

I have had a chance to witness this first-hand. I have been privileged to be able to serve as the chairman of the 19th annual Northwest Ohio National Day of Prayer Breakfast this year which happens tomorrow morning. It has truly been a great experience, probably because of the team that has been serving with me.

Yesterday I received an email from one of the team members telling me that I have been a good leader for this committee. I have to admit, that felt good. You see, I like praise (that is one of my big problems that I know God is working on in me). However, in this case, I really didn't feel like the praise was deserved.

I don't think I did much from a leadership perspective because the group was so good. I knew that if someone said they were going to do something, it would be done. They made my job easy. So any praise really needs to go to God for assembling such a neat group of people.

I have heard coaches in the college and pro ranks say, "Good players help me to be a good coach." Well that same thing holds true in any leadership position. This prayer breakfast experience has really shown me how truly important getting the right people on the bus is!

By the way, Ray Hilbert from Truth At Work is our featured speaker. I am looking forward to God doing some great things tomorrow!