Unleashing The Power Of Rubber Bands Part 10

Whenever I talk to people about what they enjoy doing and what they are good at, it helps me to make better decisions when it comes to placing them in an area within an organization that lines up with those pa.s.sions.

But for some people, answers to these questions don'tcome easy. If those you are leading are young, lack experience, or have simply never given much thought to these types of questions, the best thing you can do is to encourage them with the word try. try. Ask them to choose a role, project, or ministry that seems intriguing, and then Ask them to choose a role, project, or ministry that seems intriguing, and then try try it for six months or a year. it for six months or a year.

I always encourage people to make a six-months-to-a-year commitment, both for themselves as well as for the area that is taking them in. It often takes people that long to really live deeply in the experience before they can determine if it is a fit. And if an area of the organization is willing to take a risk on someone without experience, the people involved in that area deserve enough time to benefit from their investment.

Observe. Once I ask people to share what they most enjoy, I then spend some time talking about what Once I ask people to share what they most enjoy, I then spend some time talking about what I I have seen in them: areas of giftedness, skill, and pa.s.sion. You can also gather feedback from other leaders and those they work with. These observations from outside eyes help them-and you-to get a better view of their effectiveness and fit, along with ways in which they can grow. have seen in them: areas of giftedness, skill, and pa.s.sion. You can also gather feedback from other leaders and those they work with. These observations from outside eyes help them-and you-to get a better view of their effectiveness and fit, along with ways in which they can grow.

When I first started working for Axis, a young man named Brad emerged with much enthusiasm for leadership. But from what I had observed, although he was a gifted leader, he had spent much of the past year jumping from area to area, changing whenever it got difficult or he got bored.

It is tempting, when you don't have many leaders, to say "good enough" too quickly. And while it is true you can't wait for perfect leaders, I had concerns about Brad's ability to persevere and commit to something.

One afternoon, Brad came to me bubbling with excitement over a new group we were starting. He wanted to be a part of the new endeavor and couldn't wait to get started. I said, "How about if you continue to lead where you are right now, and let's see where things are in six months?" I could tell he did not like my response, which interestingly made me all the more committed to that direction. I knew that if Brad continued jumping around to different areas of leadership, he could easily end up harming the ministry more than helping it.

In addition, and probably more importantly, Brad would hurt himself. Something unhealthy was driving this constant movement. My responsibility as a leader was both to the ministry and to Brad.

So Brad, not happily, moved back to his area and stayed for the next six months. And I watched him out of the corner of my eye. In fact, to be perfectly honest, I kind of ignored Brad on purpose. I had gotten the sense that much of what drove his leadership was the need to be noticed and applauded.

You have probably already made the connection, but my strong suspicion was that I was able to recognize all these things about Brad because, well, you know . . .

After about seven months, I invited Brad out to lunch. We had a great conversation. I mean great great. I wish you could have been there. We moved rapidly to bedrock issues ofpride and insecurity (funny how they almost always pop up together), of his frustration with me, and of his need for approval and attention.

He spoke about how, just a couple of months into the process, G.o.d had shown him these things. He had realized that leading was not fundamentally about him. Of course it was in some ways, but in other ways he had not noticed before, it was about others. And once he made this connection, he began to really love the people he was responsible for. He found himself leading and leading well, not noticing if anyone else was noticing.

He knew the names and stories of everyone on his team. He knew their strengths and weaknesses. He had aligned them on the team accordingly and was a great encourager of their efforts. He directed their actions and spoke honestly to them when he saw sin in their lives. He a.s.sisted them when they needed support, he built trust with them, and he shared from his heart about who G.o.d was and why they were doing what they were doing.

Sometimes six months can make all the difference in the world. Brad had a couple of people on his team thathe had readied to take over his leadership, and when he moved on, that team kept going with barely a hiccup. And we did move Brad on. We put him in a leadership role on another team that he was so excited about. For the next few years, Brad led that team to flourishing. The multiple teams he oversaw were full-actually some had a waiting list of people wanting to join. The area he led was full of life and people were transformed as a result. Brad was too.

Leadership is a relationally intensive job.

Place/Adjust. After the asking and observing is done, I begin to place people in an area that lines up with their gifts. And then, by continuing the conversation, I know when and where I need to make adjustments to that placement. Sometimes adjustments are made in terms of support to make their placement work. Sometimes it means a slight move or additional skills training. After the asking and observing is done, I begin to place people in an area that lines up with their gifts. And then, by continuing the conversation, I know when and where I need to make adjustments to that placement. Sometimes adjustments are made in terms of support to make their placement work. Sometimes it means a slight move or additional skills training.

One of the most important aspects of this phase is the continued engagement of you as the leader. Did I mention that leadership is a relationally intensive job? The success of a person's placement is dependent on your keeping your eyes on the situation, along with ongoing discussion. It is critical that you continue interacting both with the person who has been placed and those who are working with that person in that role.

This part of the process can be frustrating and discouraging for everyone involved. Sometimes you have to have those difficult but necessary conversations-with people who view themselves as teachers but find they cannot teach, with people in administrative roles who have trouble organizing. But between the perseverance required to keep going and the humility to sometimes hear the painfultruth, you can help those you lead to find the right spot. And once you do, it will be worth all the effort.

"So, what do you love to do?"

One of the most gratifying moments I have ever had as a leader was the day that I overheard a conversation between Brad and one of his volunteers: "So, what do you love to do?"

understatement of the Year.

A COUPLE OF MONTHS AGO I was getting ready to leave to speakat a leadership conference. The organizers had given me a topic to speak about when they had booked me, and I was just putting the notes for that talk in my briefcase and getting ready to head to the airport, when someone from the conference called. I was getting ready to leave to speakat a leadership conference. The organizers had given me a topic to speak about when they had booked me, and I was just putting the notes for that talk in my briefcase and getting ready to head to the airport, when someone from the conference called.

They had been thinking and wondered if I could do a talk on something else instead. Apparently one of the speakers hadn't been given an a.s.signment ahead of time, and just that very day had spoken on my subject.

Really? You mean I will have the entire entire plane ride to decide on a topic and write a whole new talk? Really, you shouldn't have. plane ride to decide on a topic and write a whole new talk? Really, you shouldn't have.

So as the plane was taxiing down the runway, I crackedopen a stack of blank paper and began. For some reason, pages of blank, white paper help me do some of my best thinking.

I began to think about what leaders need to hear, and the kinds of things that keep them from being all they need to be. After mulling over all these thoughts for a while, I wrote a talk ent.i.tled "Stop Being Surprised That Leadership Is Hard."

We waste an awful lot of time as leaders being continually surprised at the difficulties we face. I think it simply helps to know that you are exactly right. It is is stinking hard, and once you know that and can remind yourself of it every time, you can move much more quickly past the surprise of it and get on with the work of leading. stinking hard, and once you know that and can remind yourself of it every time, you can move much more quickly past the surprise of it and get on with the work of leading.

I began to think back on the many question-and-answersessions I had ever been a part of, either as a speaker or a partic.i.p.ant. Of all the questions that get asked, most often the person needs to hear not only what to do in a difficult situation, but also just some confirmation that what he or she is facing is tough.

We've all heard the terrific tenet that says when you find what you are gifted to do, do that. One of the unspoken nuances of that principle is that there is a big difference between being good at something and that something be ing easy. My husband is good at golf, but he would never say it is easy. He is also good at preaching sermons, but I have never observed it to be an easy process for him, especially the hard work of researching and crafting those talks. He is good at writing, but watching him agonize over those pages put me at fifty-two years old before I ever decided to write a book of my own.

Something that you're good at and something that is easy-worlds apart. But the combination of "good at" and "hard work" is amazingly satisfying.

Yes, it's true. As a leader, you may have signed on for one of the toughest jobs. You are not wrong. Okay, next question.

Leadership is already difficult, and in this moment in time we must add the complexities of the collision of modern and postmodern cultures, the familiar but acceleratedissue of rate of change, and the emerging global village that is reshaping reality. A leader without courage, resilience, optimism, curiosity,and perseverance will simply not last.

The combination of "good at" and "hard work" is amazingly satisfying.

This is not about getting paid more to keep you in the game. This is about being a completely different-and better-kind of leader.

Not only is the old model of the omnicompetent leaderdated, it simply won't work anymore. There is too much to accomplish for one person to be responsible for or capable of handling everything. Too much is at stake and the world is moving too quickly for us to go back. People want to be a part of something together, not just following the leader.

Late one evening when I was an emergency room nurse, a confused and frantic babysitter rushed through our automatic gla.s.s doors. In her arms, she carried a limp, barely conscious three-year-old boy wrapped in a blanket. She had been taking care of him for two nights while his parents were out of town on a short vacation.

The illness had come on suddenly, with a slight coughgiving way to a fever over 104 degrees and a rapidly increasing lethargy. She was absolutely beside herself as we whisked that child ontoa gurney and into a treatment room.

People want to be a part of something together, not just following the leader.

Immediately a team of highly trained, pa.s.sionate people sprang into action under the leadership of a gifted emergency room physician.

And of all the options that doctor had at his disposal, the one thing he didn't have was the ability to save that kid by himself. Time was too precious, there was too much at stake, and too many things needed to be done for one person to accomplish everything. There was no other option except for that team of people, functioning as peers, to be well led by one.

In what looked like a ch.o.r.eographed event, the doctor quickly a.s.sessed the kid's condition and effortlessly slipped a breathing tube in his airway, all the while calling out for one person to set up a spinal tap tray, the X-ray technician to get a portable chest film, the lab person to draw blood and send it for immediate tests and results. He asked the nurse to insert a catheter and check vital signs, and called out a series of medications to be administered as soon as the IV was in. He responded to test results by asking for oxygen to be started, and made changes in the medications as new information came in.

Test results, along with a telltale rash, confirmed our worst fear: bacterial meningitis. At one point, about forty minutes into our efforts, the doctor paused for just a moment as the seriousness of the situation began to set in. He looked us all in the eyes and said, "We need to save this kid." And without another word, something clicked, and we all moved into an even higher level of precision, flow, and determination.

Later, as we all stood around and talked about the experience, the doctor admitted that he had added thinking like a parent into the matrix of thinking like a doctorand thinking like a leader. During those first forty minutes of working on that child, the doctor knew that the nurse at the front desk was calling the parents, who would surely ask questions in fear and disbelief, and then get into a car for the two-hour drive home-while we were simultaneously trying to save their child.

He said that in medical school, most of the teacherstalked about separating personal feelings from the work. Made sense. Until one teacher told them just the opposite. Outside of the obvious need for boundaries and separation, this teacher told them they would be much better leaders in the world of medicine if they factored in the relational component of treatment. The doctor we worked with that night said that perspective changed everything for him.

There were a couple of times that night when the boy quickly deteriorated, and each time there was the intense, focused, quiet work of a determined team, with the background noise of machines and procedures. Things got so bad at one point that even though the parents had arrived, the doctor couldn't leave the room to talk with them.

You could have cut the tension in that room with a knife. We all wanted him to be able to go out and tell those parents that their boy would make it.

A few hours later, he did. And he did.

There is simply too much at stake, and things are simply moving too quickly for us to do anything but build and lead a great great team of people. Get people who are better than you and be glad for it. Get people who can come up with new and innovative ways to do things, and applaud that. Get people who will tell you the truth and make great, collaborative decisions. Get people who will relentlesslypursue the best, both for themselves and for everyone in the organization. Get strong leaders at every level in the organization. team of people. Get people who are better than you and be glad for it. Get people who can come up with new and innovative ways to do things, and applaud that. Get people who will tell you the truth and make great, collaborative decisions. Get people who will relentlesslypursue the best, both for themselves and for everyone in the organization. Get strong leaders at every level in the organization.

Get strong leaders at every level in the organization.

Get them and then lead them. Lead them at the level they deserve to be led, which will demand more from you than ever before. Yes, this kind of leadership is hard. Yes, this kind of leadership is great.

Leadership is hard because it requires clarity. And if clarity isn't hard, it isn't clarity. It can be simple, but it cannot be easy.

Leaders are obligated to tell people what is expected of them. If they don't, people will move toward what is urgent or what is easy. Neither of which may be their best contribution to the organization.

Here's what I mean. If I go to work for you every day and you have not told me what you expect me to do, I am operating in a vacuum, and with a fair amount of anxiety. I am not by nature an anxious person. I just don't have any idea what I should be spending the majority of my time on. So when someone else presents something as urgent, or if nothing nothing presents itself as urgent, I start looking around for file cabinets that need cleaning out. At least I will know when that job is done. Well, there I go. Spending all of my well-intended energy on someone else's agenda. presents itself as urgent, I start looking around for file cabinets that need cleaning out. At least I will know when that job is done. Well, there I go. Spending all of my well-intended energy on someone else's agenda.

And then, through no fault of my own, the organization is not driven by the vision, but by everyone else's sense of what is important at any given moment, or by the myriad of easy jobs at my fingertips. Talk about a diffusion of energy, and a loss of vision.

I don't think I like working for you.

And then I sense your mounting frustration that what is supposed to be getting done isn't. But since you haven't been direct with me about what I should be spending my time on, why should I expect you to be direct about your frustration? And so, in the way that only pa.s.sive-aggressiveresponses can produce, I have this vague and uneasy sense that you are not happy with me even though you never say anything. Not with words anyway. But you sure communicate displeasure indirectly. Not many things more miserable than enduring that.

No, I am sure sure I don't like working for you, and a guydown in accounting has a brother-in-law who just started a landscaping business, and they need a telemarketer. So in goes my two week's notice, and you are left believing that you just can't get good workers these days. I don't like working for you, and a guydown in accounting has a brother-in-law who just started a landscaping business, and they need a telemarketer. So in goes my two week's notice, and you are left believing that you just can't get good workers these days.

Leaders owe clarity, both to the organization and to the individuals at every level.

Leadership is hard.

I just want to repeat that a couple of times in this chapter so you don't miss it.

Leadership matters. It matters deeply. It matters that we live out our lives in the giftedness that G.o.d graciously bestowed, and that we help others do the same. Much of that is at the heart of what it means to lead.

It's important that what we do intersects with what the world needs, that the work we do has a favorable and strong impact on this beautiful and broken world. G.o.d's beautiful and broken world.

Leadership matters. It stands at the crossroads of what we do and who we are, and that is a profound place. It requires that we shape vision and develop a plan and work hard. It requires that we become stronger in our resilience and forgiveness and determination and love.

Profound places bring with them requirements and obligations, and leadership is no exception. Even when we would rather wait until the problems come to us before we respond, leadership requires that we go looking for and initiate and move toward the problems so that we can intercept them when they are small.

As leaders, we are obliged to expand our capacity for chaos and change, and increase our tolerance for necessary ambiguity. We are obliged to add to that the discipline and structure needed at the right moment in order to solidify and direct everyone's efforts.

We owe to those we lead a level of communication that goes beyond saying things once, and we owe them the time and creativity to make those communications clear and reasonable and compelling. The grace of our words, the urgency that synergizes, and the repet.i.tion that reminds-these things are our responsibility.

Leaders bear the burden of leadership. Not so much thatothers have nothing to do, but enough so that the burden doesn't become a discouragement to those on the team.

Leaders bear the burden so that hope has free reign. We do not carry the burden out of ego, but rather out of hope.

Perhaps the greatest enemy of leadership is discouragement. And if that's the case, one of the best treatments is knowing that leadership is hard. Perhaps that knowledge will keep discouragement at bay enough to allow you the s.p.a.ce to grow into the leadership needed to move forward.

Some discouragement is our own fault. The results ofpoor leadership ought ought to be discouraging. When our stubbornness,our pride, our lack of knowledge, or so many other possibilities create discouragement, the results are deserved. And it ought to be a prompt for apologies, correction, and growth. to be discouraging. When our stubbornness,our pride, our lack of knowledge, or so many other possibilities create discouragement, the results are deserved. And it ought to be a prompt for apologies, correction, and growth.

But much of the discouragement that saps the energy from leaders is inevitable. And sometimes that discouragement is wearying to the point that we want to give up, or worse, we decide to stay but end up leading in mediocre ways.

Leadership is hard, and we all need to stop being surprised by that. We need to give it a slight chuckle and a nod, and then keep going.

Because leadership matters. Done well, it is one of the most rewarding endeavors there is. And it matters wherever it is done. It might seem like it only matters at Microsoft or Apple. But it doesn't. It matters at companies whose names you wouldn't even recognize. You might think it only matters at McKesson or Cleveland University Hospital, but it also matters at small pharmaceutical companies that aren't traded on NASDAQ, and at small community hospitals that serve generations of the same families.

You'd think great leadership only matters at famous nonprofit organizations like Make-A-Wish or the Leukemia/ Lymphoma Society, but it also matters at small, unknown groups that are feeding the poor and housing the homeless and raising money to support public education. It matters as much at these places as it does anywhere else.

For every Zagat-rated restaurant, there's a mom-and-pop eatery that's being well led. For every large university, there's a local junior college that is being led by great leaders. For every megachurch that has its own leadership conference, there is a small or medium-size church that's getting it right. It doesn't have to be famous to be great.

It is so easy to mistake well known for better, and renown for expert. It isn't so. And since most of us lead out of the spotlight, we need to remind ourselves that leadership right where we are is desperately important. Being in the top 1 percent is much too narrow a place to call success. Don't wait to get famous to get good.

Your best leadership efforts are needed on a daily basis, right where you are.

So whatever that takes, do it. Get out the rubber bands, the books, and the Post-it notes. Stretch them, read them, post them. And start by convincing yourself that leadership matters.

Faith is a vision that our destiny is to be absorbed in a tremendously creative team effort, with unimaginably splendid leadership, on an inconceivably vast plane of activity, with ever more comprehensive cycles of productivity and enjoyment- and that is what eye has not seen, nor ear heard, that was before us in the prophetic vision.

DALLAS WILLARD.

About the Author.

Nancy Ortberg is a founding partner of Teamworx2, a business and leadership consulting firm that provides fast-paced, practical, and compelling sessions to leaders and their teams. Teamworx2 works with businesses, schools, nonprofits, and churches to address issues of organizational effectiveness and teamwork.

A former teaching pastor at Willow Creek Community Church, Nancy has spoken at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Catalyst, the Leadership Forum, the Telecare Leadership Conference, the Omnicell Leadership Conference, the Rethink Conference, and the Orange conference. She is also a consulting partner for Patrick Len-cioni, president of the Table Group and best-selling author of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.

Nancy and her husband, John, live in the Bay Area and have three children, Laura, Mallory, and Johnny.

Acknowledgments.

Collective efforts always yield something more magnificent than those made by a single person. This book is no exception, and is much better for the fingerprints of Carol, Kathy, Lisa, Elizabeth, Ron, and Jennifer at Tyndale House Publishers. I am grateful for your belief, encouragement, and vast efforts.

To the many, many wonderful mentors in leadership I have had over the years. To Jamie Barr, Max DePree, Barbara Harrison, Bill Hybels, Nancy Beach, d.i.c.k Anderson, Russ Robinson, Patrick Lencioni, Amy Hiett, Jeff Gibson, and David Simpson, to name a few-I am daily and eternally grateful.

And to John, Laura, Mallory, and Johnny, who inspire and delight me on a regular basis.