Recognition

rec·og·ni·tion

ˌrekəɡˈniSH(ə)n/

noun

noun: recognition; plural noun: recognitions

1. the action or process of recognizing or being recognized, in particular.

   2.    identification of a thing or person from previous encounters or knowledge

   3.    acknowledgment of something's existence, validity, or legality.

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Dan Pink is an extraordinary researcher and expositor on business motivation and leadership.  His best selling book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us and the resulting animation that summarized the book were a revolution to me while transitioning from a banking career to business coaching.

His contention that autonomy, mastery, and purpose were greater motivators than money for most people in most positions, helped me solidify many of my core convictions about leadership.  Clarifying roles, developing people, and wrapping our work in a transcendent purpose is actually the pathway to much more successful enterprises.  His “science” proved that many of the things we’ve discerned about leading a business with a “Kingdom perspective” are fundamentally great business practices as well.

Dan’s most recent book, released yesterday (as I write this) is called When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing and talks about the power of harnessing daily, weekly, annual, and even decade rhythms for more productivity and a better life.  Just the kind of stuff we love to learn and incorporate into our coaching practices.

One thing, in an early release interview with Dan, really caught my attention.  He talked about the “Recognition Gap”.  He quoted a survey that found:

• 80% of all leaders thought they regularly offered praise, recognition, and affirmation to those they lead
• 20% of those they led thought they were regularly offered praise, recognition, and affirmation

This 80/20 disparity is the “Recognition Gap".

Leaders regularly challenge me when I encourage them to recognize and celebrate the accomplishments of their team.  Some of their reasons are…

• “It isn’t natural for me.”
• “I’ve already told them.”
• “They already know that I appreciate them.”
• “I'm afraid they will forget that they still have challenges they need to address.”

But whether professional or personal, child or adult, the path to changing requires two key ingredients:

• accountability to work on the things that must improve
• recognition of the things that are already going well

It takes both.

The problem is that all of the available data points towards us not being very good at either.  Most business owners and leaders regularly acknowledge the need for greater accountability in their companies, but far too few ever talk about the need for greater recognition.

We’re trying to change that.  

We want to help close the "Recognition Gap".

Consider

• How aware are you of the challenges you face with most of your leaders?
• How aware are you of the things that are special, unique, or valuable in each one of them?
• When is the last time you recognized them for their contribution?  (and we mean face-to-face, personally, specifically, and hopefully in the public eye of others)
• Jot down the names of a few key team members, write down what they need to be recognized for, and plan the time and method to get it done.  It may be the most impactful thing you can do for your team members and company right now.

Results

"The achievements of an organization are the results of the combined effort of each individual." 

- Vince Lombardi

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Running backs and quarterbacks know that while they get most of the glory and the compensation, they wouldn’t be experiencing that success if it weren’t for the offensive linemen that protected them and made room for them to do their work.  Gift giving to offensive linemen by the more notable stars of the teams has become legendary.  

Here are some of the more notorious gifts given:

• Tom Brady (2008) - Audi Q7’s
• Carson Palmer (2007) - hot tubs
• Matt Ryan (2008) - Plasma TVs
• Reggie Bush (2011) - Segways
• Colt McCoy (2011) - Big Green Egg Charcoal Grills
• Alex Smith (2017) - Yeti coolers & Gucci bags
• Aaron Rodgers (2017) - ATVs

This is such an expected practice that there are lists published annually of the best gifts given.  Okay, a little bit ostentatious and ridiculous maybe, but the message is clear.  Even the more unglamorous of positions on the team are crucial to the team's success.  That points us toward our fifth dysfunction of a team.

So far, we have discussed the first 4:

Absence of trust

Fear of conflict

Lack of commitment

Avoidance of accountability 

Our fifth and final dysfunction of a team is inattention to results. If we fail to hold one another accountable to the commitments we have made, then this final dysfunction of a team will flourish. 

Inattention to results occurs when team members put their individual needs (such as ego, career development, or recognition) or the needs of their divisions above the collective goals of the team. Like a chain with just one link broken, teamwork deteriorates if even a single dysfunction is allowed to flourish.  

If we don’t manage the tension connecting every monkey in the barrel, the whole strand will fail.

Members of a truly cohesive team:

1. Trust one another.

2. Engage in unfiltered conflict around ideas.

3. Commit to decisions and plans of action.

4. Hold one another accountable for delivering against those plans. 

5. Focus on the achievement of collective results.

This ultimate dysfunction is a result of people caring more about their own success than that of the group.  It is no wonder that we experience this on our teams when so much of the broader culture is focused on individual success.  Shaping a culture that celebrates the collective achievement first is difficult and must start from the top.

I was part of a team that launched a successful and well-attended men’s ministry at a church.  We had just finished one session and we were planning to extend it into a second to keep the momentum with the hundreds of men.  We heard that the pastor wanted us to shut everything down and execute on a different idea he had.  When we asked if we could meet and make our case for continuing, we were told…

“We have to figure out how to convince him that continuing this program is his idea.”

It was one of the most demotivating and discouraging things I’ve ever heard.  To produce superior results with high levels of employee engagement and a sense of ownership from every team member, we have to build cultures that celebrate the collective results of the team and not the ideas or accomplishments of a few.

As leaders, it all starts with us.

Consider

• Does your team struggle with any of the five dysfunctions?
• Do you know that having a problem with any of them breaks down the opportunity for your best results?
• Which ones does your team most struggle with and how are you going to address those problems?
• Check out Patrick Lencioni’s “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team”.  He has exercises and experiences that will help you overcome each of them.  We’ve helped a lot of teams work on these issues and Patrick’s book is a great resource.

Commitment

"The difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. The chicken is involved; the pig is committed."

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The other aphorism that comes to mind is “having skin in the game.”  We are talking about a level of commitment that looks more like ownership.  Continuing on with Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a Team, the third is lack of commitment.

1. Absence of trust

2. Fear of conflict

3. Lack of commitment

The ability to trust that being honest or vulnerable is okay leads to the opportunity for healthy conflict. Voicing even dissenting opinions in an appropriate way without fear leads to better solutions and the ability to commit to decisions made, even when they are different than your own.  Remember that quote from the guy in the last post?

“I feel like they are genuinely interested in hearing my opinion.  And because I trust and respect them, even when they decide differently from the way I wanted, I can support the decision.”

Without having aired their opinions in the course of a passionate and open debate, team members rarely, if ever, buy into and commit to the decisions made.

Here is a simple test.  Ask yourself a couple of questions: 

Do you feel like you are constantly dragging and pulling your team in terms of accomplishing what you think you have all agreed to?

Does it feel like no one else is really interested in achieving the goals you’ve set?  That you are the only one who really cares?

If you answer to either of the above questions was “yes”, why do think that is the case?

In our experience, decisions made by senior management rarely elicit the true input of team members and don’t have near the level of perceived commitment from that team.  

And we get it.  

They work for you.  

You are paying their salary, for goodness sake.

On some level, they should just enthusiastically do whatever you’ve directed them to do for the money you are paying them.  We agree.  Interestingly enough, however, determining a solution on your own and demanding execution:

• doesn't produce the best solution
• doesn't build a sense of ownership and commitment
• won’t get you there as well or as fast

This is why we are so committed to the idea of owner-to-team-conversion.  The team leadership of companies.  

The reason we encourage the things we do is that we want you to get to where you want to go.  To get there sooner, faster, and with the feeling that you have the buy-in and commitment of the entire team along for the journey.

We don’t want you to survive, we want you to thrive.  Having a lack of commitment from your team is one of the biggest stumbling blocks.

Consider

• Are your employees really clear on what you want them to do?
• Do they attack appointed tasks with enthusiasm and a high level of commitment?
• Do you feel like nothing ever gets done unless you are constantly driving the tasks and staying on top of them?
• How much do you think your team’s level of commitment is the culprit?

Accountability

The difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. The chicken is involved; the pig is committed.

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Most companies we interview as potential clients mention the lack of accountability as the root of their problems.  It likely is, but we believe that accountability is a result and a deliverable.  If you haven’t addressed the first three dysfunctions of a team…

1. Absence of trust

2. Fear of conflict

3. Lack of commitment

…then the fourth, avoidance of accountability, is typically a natural byproduct.  Accountability occurs naturally when trust has been established, open and productive conflict is encouraged, and a strong level of real commitment has been achieved.  Addressing those first three identified dysfunctions turns accountability into a much more inevitable outcome.

One of the turning points in my parenting occurred just a few years ago.  I had made up my mind on a situation concerning my daughter.  I do that easily and quickly.  My wife believed my daughter had a valid and well-supported reason for seeing things differently.  When my wife chided her to talk to me about it, she said:

“What’s the point, he has already made up his mind."

I want her to trust my best of intentions for her well enough to tell me her true feelings.  I want her to believe that respectfully offering her differing opinion is okay.  Because I want us to be able to commit to things and feel comfortable holding her accountable.  

Frankly, her feeling that there was no point in sharing her opinions or feelings with me broke my heart.

As we have worked to eliminate those “dysfunctions" in our relationship, much in the way a healthy team should, we have become closer.  She feels like I value and respect her opinions more.  We don’t always agree on things, but she is much more comfortable in committing to the things we decide and I feel very comfortable helping hold her accountable to those things.  Almost as if I have earned the right in her eyes.

Turns out that building more accountability actually requires a lot of humility. 

It doesn’t require more discipline as much as it requires inclusion and thoughtfulness.  It takes valuing and desiring the input and opinions of others.  When those things are present, accountability becomes easier for everyone.

Again, I should expect that the people I pay would do the job I pay them to do whether they like it or not and it shouldn’t require any accountability from me.  But that is the premise that most of us have operated under for a long time.  

And how is that working for us?

I am interested in teams finding a higher level of success and finding it faster.  We can either do the painstaking work that inclusion and building buy-in requires with the team, or bang our heads against the wall in frustration later on.  

Not understanding and addressing these five dysfunctions found in most teams is what keeps us from the success we desire.

Consider

• Does your team struggle with accountability?
• Do you naturally assume that it is your fault for not holding them accountable enough?
• Are you really committed enough to the idea of building accountability that you're willing to address the root causes of its' absence?  
• Are you ready to embark on an owner-to-team conversion that will naturally address all of this?

Conflict

“I feel like they are genuinely interested in hearing my opinion.  And because I trust and respect them, even when they decide differently from the way I wanted, I can support the decision.”

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That quote came from an employee I was interviewing at a member company.  He was helping us determine what was truly unique about this company.  He feels free and even invited to offer his opinion.  Because they genuinely are interested and sometimes factor his ideas into the solutions, he is okay even when it doesn’t go his way.  How good is that?

If we can solve that first issue of trust we talked about in the last post, we can move onto the next dysfunction of a team, fear of conflict.  Turns out that an environment of trust is essential unless a conflict is merely going to be a means to the end of one person winning and being right.

Unfortunately, that is the environment that many of us grew up in and maybe even have experienced in most of our corporate life.  More often than not, conflict is not tolerated or is a zero-sum game where one side of the disagreement is almost always right.  Being right is most often associated with power…either the senior leader in an organization or the head of a family.

Being an entrepreneur or rising to senior leadership meant that you either had to provide every answer or more of the right answers than others.  Beginning to believe that others' dissenting views might actually have some value is an unfamiliar idea to manage.  Senior leaders often bristle when we tell them…

Your team can make a better decision than you can.

The collective wisdom of the experts in their appointed tasks will arrive at better, more comprehensively viable solutions, with more minds and hearts involved in the decision making.  Period.  

If you are going to make a significant company decision, you better have the key representation of sales, marketing, administration, and production in the room.  As lofty and experienced as your line of sight is, the collective perspective of the team will produce better decisions.

You might be saying, “but you don’t know my team” or “you don’t know the knuckleheads that work for me", but I do.  

I know that the people you are overseeing doing those things, know more about "those things" than you do.  

I know they see things you don’t see.  

I know they experience implications of decisions you don’t realize.

I know they are a likely repository of untapped good ideas and thoughts that you crucially need to hear.

When we talk about conflict, we are talking about ideological differences and not destructive fighting or personal attacks.  Productive conflict and open engagement produce the best answers in the shortest amount of time.  

That feels a little bit counterintuitive, doesn’t it?

But no conflict results in poor solutions.

Unhealthy conflict results in no solutions.

Healthy conflict produces the best solutions.

We actually encourage the leaders we work with to “mine” for conflict.  They liken that to “looking for trouble”.  Who wants to do that?!  You should, if you want to find the best solutions in the quickest way possible.

If you're building that foundation of trust we talked about last time, it should pave the way for earning the right to have healthy conflict and the best results.

Consider

• Do you typically have all the right answers?
• Does your team feel comfortable disagreeing with you?
• Are your team members able to get behind the decisions made, even when they disagree with them?
• How much is it costing you to not be mining for conflict and finding better solutions?

Trust

“If you could get all the people in an organization rowing in the same direction, you could dominate any industry, in any market, against any competition, at any time.”

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Based on what most of my career taught me, I would have told you that healthy teams were as rare as the unicorns that many leaders are hoping to find.  I have come to believe that organizational health is not only possible, but it is also the greatest determination of long-term success. Having seen teams fight for and find that elusive prize, I now believe you can get most of a team rowing in the same direction.

But that is not the case for most.  In fact, there is an often-quoted study from the Gallup folks that says:

• 30% of employees are actively engaged (rowing forward)

• 52% of employees are not engaged (along for the ride)

• 18% of employees are actively disengaged (rowing in the opposite direction)

For every three employees rowing the company forward, the average company has two rowing against that momentum! 

Ever tried to row a canoe with more than two people with oars in the water?  Not only is gaining momentum a problem but even going in a straight line is difficult.  We wrote about this drag on productivity last year.

Patrick Lencioni’s groundbreaking work on organizational health not only identified that organizational health is the greatest determination of long-term success, but that there are Five Dysfunctions of a Team:

1. Absence of trust

2. Fear of conflict

3. Lack of commitment

4. Avoidance of accountability

5. Inattention to results

Let’s tackle that first one.  This is all about feeling comfortable with being vulnerable.  It starts with it being modeled by senior leadership and then spreads like wildfire once it gets started in an organization. 

(If you or your organization struggles with the idea of vulnerability, I would join the other 32 million folks who have watched Brene Brown’s incredible TEDx talk on the subject.)

We’ve been taught all our lives that winning is the only worthwhile destination.  We fought for the best grades, to get into the right colleges, and then to get plumb jobs.  Not being the best was not tolerated.  Failure was never an option.  No wonder no one seems to be comfortable asking for help or admitting their vulnerabilities. 

The problem is that trust is at the root of all collaboration.  It is not only the source matter of beautiful and comprehensive solutions but the health that keeps all those rowers pulling in the same direction.  It is where real success and momentum are found.

It is not likely any more comfortable for you than it is for your team, but it can be learned.  It is a barren field that can be cultivated.  It starts with your vulnerability and willingness to ask for help.  To share the simple reality that you don’t have it all figured out and no one else does either.  It requires you to be more interested in getting the best solution and making others feel successful than being right.

It is rare.

It is free.

It is a key to your company’s success this year.

Consider

• Do you always have the right answer or the final say?

• Are you comfortable showing vulnerability?

• Is your company a place where people really trust one another?  Where they can admit that they need help?

• What is it costing you in engagement and momentum to be living with this absence of trust?

Accident

“Responsibility equals accountability equals ownership.  

A sense of ownership is the most powerful weapon

a team or organization can have.”  

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In the last 50 years, the car crash death rate has dropped by nearly 80 percent. And one of the main reasons for that drop has to do with “accident report forms”. These are very specific forms that policeman and other first responders use to diagram the accident, document weather conditions, and identify the accident’s primary cause.

All that information is fed into the “Fatality Analysis Reporting System”. The data is available to anyone and often used by car companies, safety advocates, insurers, and regulators who comb the data looking to understand the patterns in how fatalities occur in car accidents and how to minimize them in the future.

It's working.

An improvement of 80% doesn’t happen by accident.

I’ve worked with a small replacement contractor in the area who does something very similar.  Mistakes, discontent customers, and negative reviews used to set off alarms and the owner’s blood pressure.  You likely have a similar reaction to those things happening with your customers.

They chose not to (over)react, but to respond.

The process instituted was to excavate and understand what happened every time this type of thing occurred.  A subset of the installation side of the house would assemble within 24 hours of learning of the problem and issue a report to the owner.  

They answered questions like:

• What happened?
• Where did the breakdown in customer expectations or confidence occur?
• Was the primary culprit sales expectations, scheduling, installation, etc.?
• How do we make it better for the client?
• What did we learn from the experience?
• How do we make sure this doesn’t happen again?
• What policies and procedures can ensure it doesn’t?

They enjoy very high levels of customer satisfaction and the kind of referral opportunities you would expect.

When you excavate an accident or problem for who is to blame, everybody gets defensive and “lawyer’s up” to protect themselves.  When you excavate a mistake or problem to understand, learn from, and improve - you empower and grow your people.

Our goal should be for them to take ownership and responsibility.

When they can own the problem without fear and defensiveness, they can also own the solution.  The more they take ownership at all levels, the less problems we have to deal with.  

It is the path to constant improvement…whether we are talking about auto accidents or the issues you face every day in your business.

Consider

• Are your employees afraid of you?
• When problems occur, do they brace for impact or move toward solutions to the problem?
• Do you have processes and procedures in place to help encourage ownership?
• Is the way you are handling problems actually encouraging more of the same?

Restoring

“It is for freedom that Christ set us free.”  

- Paul, to the church in Galatia

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When did running your business cease to be fun?

When did it quit feeling like a grand adventure in entrepreneurship and just become a job?

When did your business start feeling like it owned you instead of the other way around?

When did the things you used to love to do quit being very much fun to do?

I don’t know a single business person who started their own business because they wanted to live in frustration, pressure, and overwhelm.  

But an alarming number of them do.

Watching my father’s struggle with running his own business and counting the years that it likely took from his life, has changed the course of mine.  I am spending most of my time trying to prevent more of that same.

I have come to realize that most entrepreneurs got into business for fun, freedom, and the ability to do things differently or better than they saw them being done.  In fact, some of my favorite stories are business origin stories.  (There is even a podcast called “How I Built This” that offers hundreds of them.)  Part of our process in working with corporate teams is to have them walk through the timeline of the company’s history.  Nothing is more powerful than an individual or organization’s story.

Those stories are full of hope, adventure, excitement, and the desire for change.  They’re also full of a lot of challenges and redemption.  One of our first tasks is to help excavate all those hopes and expectations that were around at the outset of their entrepreneurial adventure.  To glean all we can from the story of how they got started and then mine their story to recover learned lessons, core values, and important ideas.  With all of that really clear, we start working to reclaim everything.

At SummitTrek, our purpose is…

…restoring leaders and organizations to their original intended purpose through coaching.

That statement means a couple of things to us:

1. There was a hope and an expectation you had for your business when you started it…we want to restore that original intended purpose.
2. We believe that God made us co-heirs of his Kingdom.  We are responsible for the lives and livelihood of the people entrusted to our care through our businesses…we want to restore that original intended purpose as well.

We just finished a two-day offsite to plan for 2018.

• we worked on organizational health as a team
• celebrated all the success of our clients from 2017
• noted some challenges we need to address in the coming year
• built plans to address them so that we arrive at the end of 2018 on purpose

But if I had to sum up what we did at our offsite at a very high level, I would simply say that we spent two days figuring out how to more powerfully fulfill our purpose to restore leaders to their original intended purpose through coaching.  Everything we focused on was about doing that even better with the people we already know, and figuring out how to bring it to more people.

From each restored story of a growing library of them, our conviction and desire to do more of the same increases.  We pray that 2018 is a year of reclamation for you.  Of remembering why you got into business in the first place.  Of recovering the fun, freedom, and adventure you first hoped for.  That is our deepest desire for all of you.  It is why we exist.

Consider

• Are you having a hard time remembering why you ever got into business in the first place?
• Does all the excitement and inertia of that season seem like a different lifetime at this point?
• What is it costing you to not be operating with the momentum of enjoying your work?

Bootstrap

boot·strap

ˈbo͞otˌstrap/

verb

1.  get (oneself or something) into or out of a situation using existing resources. "The company is bootstrapping itself out of a marred financial past.”

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There is a pattern we’ve noticed with business owners.  All of them are facing one form of challenge or another and they are typically looking at solutions that are external to their companies…primarily from two common areas.

We say, however, that the solutions to most company problems come from three key areas:

People

Technology

Process

Most companies tend to lean toward the first two and overlook the third. They believe that hiring (or replacing) an employee with the right new hire or buying (or replacing) some existing technology or systems with something new and shinier will solve the problem.  Said another way, if they only had the person or thing they don’t currently have, they think everything would be okay.

We also noticed some unintended consequences of this kind of thinking: 

• Current team members come to believe that they are the problem.
• They believe the owner wishes he had other employees than them.
• They don’t believe they have the tools (or technology) they really need to be successful.
• They believe that there is a unicorn out there that will magically solve all of the company’s problems.

All of those are losing or hopeless propositions.

The reality is that there is often a much easier and less costly solution found in simply changing company processes.  You might be able to solve the problem without allocating the capital outlay associated with a new hire, the displacing of one, or the purchase of new technologies.  

Often, simply reorganizing people or the way they do things can yield powerful results.  Often the technologies or tools we already have, are not being utilized to their fullest potential.  Having a third party learn your challenges, understand who does what and how, and then help determine solutions from existing resources, may be a far quicker and less disruptive path than any of the things we more naturally look towards.

At the end of the day, bootstrapping is about finding a solution to a problem utilizing the existing resources you already have lying around.  Like taking broken pieces of tile and rearranging them into a mosaic piece of art.

You might already have the right pieces in place.

Solving your biggest challenges (that likely yields the greatest financial return on investment) may be closer than you think.  You may already have the right team and the right technologies to get the results you desire, they just may need to be refocused, reorganized, and put to work in a different way.

All the broken tile you believe you are housing may just be waiting to be organized into something more beautiful and profoundly more valuable.

Consider

• Do you normally assume that your problems would be solved with the “right” new hire or the “right” technology?
• Do you think that there is a possibility that just reorganizing and repurposing what you already have might solve your problems?
• Who is helping you make better decisions?  (a mentor, spouse, coach, group of other business leaders, mature leadership team?)

Stuck

“Forget about what’s happened;

    don’t keep going over old history.

Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new.

    It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it?

There it is! I’m making a road through the desert,

    rivers in the badlands.”  

- Isaiah

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In the movie Groundhog Day, the weatherman Phil Connors (Bill Murray) experiences his own version of hell.  He wakes up in Puxatawny, Pennsylvania stuck in repeatedly reliving the same Groundhog Day celebration that he thought was well below his station the first time.  

Day after day.  The same day.  

He first manipulates the situation and then allows the experience of doing repeated do-overs to change his life.

Virtually everyone is stuck in one arena of their life or another.  Things don’t really seem to change year to year, month to month, or week to week.  Sometimes we reach a point of feeling so stuck (and tired of being stuck) that we actually resolve to do something about it.  Jerry McGwire says either we break down or we break through.

When we reach the end of our rope…

When we get caught between a rock and a hard place…

When all hope is lost…

When we’re sick and tired of being sick and tired…

...we've often finally reached the place where real change can occur.

Usually, all we can do is muster enough inertia and courage to make some minor adjustments.  But Jack Welch says, 

“Minor adjustments don’t produce lasting changes.”

When you’re really stuck, you need to really do something about it.

We say:

1. Realize or acknowledge that you are stuck.
2. Come to a point of being motivated to do something about it.
3. Be willing to let someone come alongside you to coach you out of being so stuck.

It is hard enough to acknowledge we are stuck, but it also requires that we be willing to do something about it.  Real change is likely going to require some sort of launching experience, then an experienced guide to get you to where you want to go.

Almost everything I do to produce real change starts with a jump start:

• Corporate Coaching - we conduct Strategic Enterprise retreats (pre-work and then an intensive 2 day) with leadership teams to establish a new baseline and commitment to a different future.
• Executive Coaching - we have all of our executive board clients go through a Lifeplan experience to set a new compass for their lives in every arena.
• Men’s ministry - avocationally, I help conduct 4-day “boot camps” to aggressively reorient men with the Alamo Band of Brothers.

This is the time of year where many of us decide we want to arrive somewhere at end the of next year on purpose.  Sadly, we often only make minor changes when our desire is to find major course adjustments.

There are millions of books and hundreds of business cards full of guides who can help you aggressively make changes to your current reality.  We are merely one of those options. 

So pull one of those cards out of your stack.

Take a flyer from that bulletin board of options.

Pull that book off your shelf.

Respond to that e-mail, blog, or podcast inquiry.

Jump start your journey if you want to realize substantive change.  Make this the year that you really change things.  But by all means, get someone else to help you with the journey.  Chances of you getting there will go up exponentially if you get a little help.

We’re launching another executive board in January.

We’re going to add 1-2 corporate clients to our portfolio in 2018.

We’ve got a Lifeplan scheduled for April.

Every other coaching organization has their version of similar things.  Make this the year you get tired enough of the way things are…

…to get unstuck.

“We suffered from the inability to execute on a steady stream of really good ideas.  Now, we have clear initiatives and a process to mark our progress while accomplishing the most important things.  We are being more proactive and doing things less haphazardly or reactionary. We’ve gone from an unclear and uncertain future to a clear plan and structure for many years to come.” 

- Erik

Consider

• Are you stuck? 
• Are you tired enough of being stuck to actually get someone to help you do something about it?
• Are you open to having someone else come alongside you to coach you and/or your team?
• Is this the year where you are going to make the changes that help you arrive at somewhere on purpose in 2018?

Hear

“He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”  

- Jesus

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Turns out that Jesus says this a lot…even from what would have to be an exasperated heart.  The life everyone is looking for is staring them in the face.  What they have all longed for has arrived.  The reality is, however, that most of us are so comfortable in the familiarity of our frustration and pain, that even the real hope of change gets overlooked.

You can’t scream loudly enough to be heard

by ears not ready to hear.

One of the many coaching methodologies we have been trained in taught us something super helpful.  We are not only applying it as a filter for which clients we engage, but it has also become our filter for ministry commitments and even personal relationships.  It states that a person changing is not possible unless these three conditions apply:

• They are in pain.  (They are discontent, things aren’t going the way they hoped, etc.)
• They are motivated to change.  (Many of us have gotten so familiar with the disappointment we are experiencing that we’ve almost made an agreement with its’ inevitability.  We’ve lost the desire to do something about it.)
• They are coachable.  (They are actually open to someone coming alongside them.  Literally having ears to hear.)

With a happy and relatively healthy marriage that has produced six children, we are often pursued for marriage/parenting advice.  

After 15 years of walking in a powerfully transformative men & women’s ministry message, we are frequently sought after for one-on-one conversations.  

But we have come to realize that very few people…

…actually have ears to hear.

Some of those marriages have reached a point of enough pain… 

that they are no longer motivated to do something about it… 

and are so dug in on their opinions about who is to blame…

that change is virtually impossible.

Many of the leaders we encounter are frustrated and overwhelmed.   They seem like they are open to doing whatever it takes to get their teams and companies healthier.  But in our experience, it is a pretty rare class of individuals that truly are.  We have walked away from numerous coaching opportunities that didn’t pass that simple three question test above.

We are interested in investing in real change.

We won’t commit to work together if we don’t feel like it is possible.

We can’t afford to waste your money or our time.

We really see our coaching ability as a Kingdom resource.

If this were just a J-O-B to us, where maximizing short term revenue was our gain, we would take anybody’s money... but not if we are going to approach this work like a calling.  If we are going to view this work as our unique contribution to the Kingdom, other rules apply.

We only have so many hours in our days.

We only have so many clients we can invest in.

If real change isn’t possible, we simply don’t have the time.

I used to be a little perplexed about how I seemed to have endless resources of time and energy for some (companies, couples, individuals) and little or no patience or time for others.  When I learned this litmus test above, it all started to make sense.  

One of my core values is “restoration”.  I have unbelievable reserves of energy, passion, and commitment to things where a person, marriage, or company is really ready and open to change.  I have gotten really comfortable with where I feel led to commit my time, energy, and good heart…and where I don’t.

I am privileged to invest in hundreds of men (through ministry).

In dozens of leaders and their companies (through SummitTrek).

I am deeply encouraged by the growing community of leaders who have ears to hear and are hearing.  I do my best to not be too discouraged about the rest, bless them, and move on.

Consider

• Do you have ears to hear?
• Are you hearing and making changes accordingly?
• Are you ready to invest the time, resources, and heart in the ways that will actually result in you ending the year in a different place than you started?

Improved

"Enlarge the place of your tent; Stretch out the curtains of your dwellings, spare not; Lengthen your cords And strengthen your pegs.” 

- Isaiah

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My father was an incredible man.  He carried all those values like integrity, selflessness, working hard, and doing the right things that our world seems to be in such short supply of.  I miss him a lot.  But, I am also becoming more aware that sometimes, holding onto the old ways can be crippling.

He was very resistant to change.

When desktop computers arrived on the scene, he, like many others, thought it was a fad.  He believed that they would never replace the need for using service bureaus like his that could harness the power of mainframe computing for others' needs.  He went from a robust business with lots of employees and customers too far less of each.  Eventually, the only obvious choice was to close his doors.

He didn’t pivot when the world changed.  The world needed something uniquely better and improved.

Blockbuster found a similar fate.  I could list many others.  Netflix found a uniquely better idea regarding organizing a library of movies that we could all rent.  But they didn’t stop there.  When digital delivery and access changed dramatically, they pivoted again from their uniquely better idea into something completely different.

I often get asked how our executive board experience is different than others (TAB, YPO, C12, Vistage, etc.). The reality is that they are all uniquely better in some ways and have particular things that they do really well.  So did we, but we were finding so much momentum and success in our corporate coaching that we actually thought about dropping our executive board practice a couple of years ago.

Does the world really need another one of these?

Before we walked away, we went through a process called “Lean Canvas.”  It is used more in the tech world, but it is essentially designed to test the hypothesis of a business idea.  It forces you to look at the real experience of people using a particular product or service and what things they would most value in a new one.

The 125 business owners we surveyed told us they were finding great camaraderie and reams of great information from their executive board experiences.  One of the areas they seemed to struggle in, however, was in finding the application of that information and real, measurable changes in their teams and businesses.  They also weren’t doing very well at finding life/work/faith balance.  

The world doesn't need a very similar, but slightly different version of anything.  But if we could provide an alternative and address the challenges business owners weren't finding a solution for, it might be worth pursuing.

We dissected what was working so well with our corporate clients and re-engineered the executive board experience.  Real measurable change in our client companies and strong integration of life/work/faith is something we do well and would be our new true north for our boards.  

We just finished our first year with business owners and the results were better than we could have possibly imagined.  We are uniquely better at achieving the results we worked so hard to realize for our clients.  Real measurable change and great life/work/faith balance.

And we’ve also realized a few things:

• We’re not for everybody.
• Not everybody wants what they say they really want.
• Being really selective and staying small has helped ensure the best experience for all of us.

Our clients are saying some pretty incredible things.  Their experience and success is what matters to me most.  My first core value happens to also be the same as one held by our coaching practice.  It also is the major theme of the gospel…

Restoration.

If they aren’t finding what they are most longing for, we are failing.  But we've been humbled by what they’re saying:

“I now know more about my strengths and what my unique role is to play.  The company is operating with a much stronger sense of ownership and unity.  Everybody is shifting into much more focused roles and we have more momentum than we have ever had before.” 

- Jason

“It is not that I didn’t know some of the things we’ve worked on, I just didn’t have the ability to implement them.  We wouldn’t have gotten to where we are without them.  Now we are getting there and faster and with fewer mistakes than I would have imagined.” 

- Jim

“We suffered from the inability to execute on a steady stream of really good ideas.  Now, we have clear initiatives and a process to mark our progress while accomplishing the most important things.  We are being more proactive and doing things less haphazardly or reactionary. We’ve gone from an unclear and uncertain future to a clear plan and structure for many years to come.”  

- Erik

Consider

• Are you finding the things you are looking for from the things you are investing in?
• Are you finding real measurable change in your teams?
• Ready to finally do something about that?
• What is another year of no measurable change going to cost you?

If restoration to what you always hoped for in your business is your true north…

If real measurable change in your team and business is your stated desire…

If real work/life/faith balance is your great hope…

…we’d love to visit.  We're assembling our next table of business owners and executives looking for the same to start in the new year.

Number

“You can’t manage what you don’t measure."  

- W. Edwards Deming

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One of my current favorite leaders comes from more of a ministry than a business background.  He is an incredibly capable leader who runs a very successful business.  It has been a beautiful thing to watch him embrace best business practices and apply them with vigor.

In the last 11 months he has:

• built a leadership team
• started a meeting rhythm
• established core values and purpose
• worked on a future vision
• solved strategic and tactical issues
• redefined crucial positions
• restructured his company
• positioned his company to follow up the incredible performance of this year with an even better one next year.

He hit a little bit of a roadblock, however, when we got to measuring the company’s progress and success.  We worked with him and other leaders to define KPIs (key performance indicators), put together a dashboard, and try to define one key win number for the team.  He was dubious about the benefit of doing any of this.

When we met this morning, he said that he reluctantly chose one number to focus the team on and measure.  

He said,

“I’m shocked at how powerful that one number has been!”

Once the team began to discuss the number and determine each area’s contribution to achieving the target for the number, it began to change everything.

• a sense of ownership
• business focus
• marketing
• sales
• etc.

In order to achieve the desired level of success on this singular number, virtually every aspect of the company is going to need to change.  

So simple.

So beautiful.

So powerful.

Most companies we talk to have reams of numbers and pages of standard reports, but asking two simple questions really clarifies the understanding and benefit of all those numbers:

• How is your company doing?
• How do you know?

Meaning, what numbers confirm your success or failure?  If I asked your key leadership would they answer the same?  

Ideally, just a few of the right key numbers will tell you what is really going on.  The numbers will often contradict the gut feel of a leader.  Sometimes things are actually far better or far worse than a leader imagines from a point of almost pure conjecture.

In the movie “Moneyball” Peter Brand says that baseball is medieval.  It relies on sight and a whole manner of other biases and rules of thumb to determine future superstars.  It is an inefficient and largely inaccurate way of doing things.  He goes on to say:

“It's about getting things down to one number. Using stats to reread them, we'll find the value of players that nobody else can see. People are overlooked for a variety of biased reasons and perceived flaws. Age, appearance, personality. Bill James and mathematics cut straight through that.”

Many of us who run businesses operate the same way.  We often rely on gut, conjecture, or a few numbers that don’t tell the entire story.  Getting to the right set of numbers (even the one right number) cuts through all that.  Focusing on the right number(s) can change everything.

Just ask my friend.  He’ll tell ya.

Consider

• How is your company doing?
• How do you know?
• Are you focusing on the right numbers?  Is your team focusing on the same?
• How much clarity, momentum, and success is not knowing, costing you?

Rhythm

“But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead.”  

- Paul to the church in Philippi

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Time to reset the typeface on our calendars for another year.  

We assume you have already cataloged all your successes for the year (hopefully with the input from your team), allowed yourself to feel some pride at what you have accomplished, and have a plan to celebrate and honor your teams for all their hard work.

One of the leaders we work with has already done that step and moved onto an even more challenging one…

…honoring every employee individually for their contribution!

Not only that, he is going to help them set their own goals for 2018, commit to helping them get there and jointly create a “commitment card" for them to review together throughout the year.

How good is that?

Honor what has happened in the past and then push on toward what lies ahead.

This is also the time of year where we encourage everyone to reset their calendars and block their essential meetings for the coming year.  One of the key ingredients to sustained organizational success is a healthy meeting rhythm.  We call it establishing a meeting governance with our clients.  How often you meet, who you meet with and the different agendas for each meeting are incredibly important.

Go ahead and block:

• next year’s annual meeting (2 days recommended)
• next year’s quarterly meeting (1 day recommended)
• monthly updates (1/2 day recommended)
• regular leadership meetings (60-90 minutes, 1-2 times a month)
• any seasonal or ad hoc meetings that are typically needed in the normal rhythm of the year

Block them for the entire year and lock them down.  Expect your leadership team to honor these meetings and work around them with other responsibilities, vacations, or travel.  You need to do that as well.

Most companies we encounter say that they don’t need formal meetings because their leaders talk all the time throughout the day.  We often offer them the same analogy…

Having formal and regular meetings is like a date night or a weekend getaway with your spouse versus the incidental ways you interact and talk daily about the vagaries of running a household.  It communicates a commitment to the others, it is room to breathe, a place to talk about more significant things, and think more strategically.  It is crucial and necessary.  

Whatever goals and strategic plans you have established for the coming year stand a much stronger likelihood of being accomplished if you meet regularly to mark progress, reset targets, and overcome obstacles.

Consider

• Do you have an established meeting rhythm for your leaders (or even your family)?
• Have you blocked those essential and crucial times for the coming year?
• If you don't currently have an established meeting rhythm, what is it costing you?
• What message is it sending your team (or even your spouse) that you haven’t allocated your time in this way?

Rock

"Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.  The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”

- Sermon on the Mount

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Jesus has just dropped some serious knowledge on these people.  It is not that he was saying anything inconsistent with all the teachings the people were following, but this time they heard and received it differently.  It goes on to say that the people were amazed because he taught as one who had authority and not as their regular teachers of the law did.  (We could write an entire book on those few sentences alone!)

What we encounter when we meet the very intentional business leaders we work with is people who largely know what needs to be done.  They are operating from a foundational faith that has clarified how they are supposed to operate. They have read, listened, joined, and attended enough things to know what they are supposed to be doing to change their businesses.

The problem is that it is really difficult to put them into practice. 

The last thing we are suffering from is a lack of knowledge.

But like a business version of C.S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters, it seems that something is set against everything we try to do in the right direction.  Despite all we know that we must do, it is as if the whisper of our enemy is the perfect antidote to our best of intentions.  

Every step forward meets resistance:

• You can implement those new ideas next year.
• You can’t really change anything until you get all the right people around you.
• Make your business better?  You just need to survive!
• When the economy gets better, you can think about doing all those things to improve your business.
• All those concepts and ideas sound good in books, but they don’t work in the real world.
• You’re already doing all you can do.
• You don’t have time to establish culture, build a team, or craft and fulfill an inspired vision.
• You’re already doing enough just to listen, read, and attend things that intend the right things.  Most folks aren’t even doing that!

We always say that the right time to do the right thing…is as soon as possible.  

Right time for the right thing?  ASAP.

But it is easy to see why it doesn’t happen.  And in a sad and sobering confirmation, the 125 business leaders we surveyed said that all those conferences, books, podcasts, and executive board experiences they were partaking in, really weren’t doing much to change the course of their businesses as a result.

I was a little shocked by the results of our survey, but in another way, I wasn’t surprised.  So much is set against us building our businesses and lives upon a really firm foundation.

Those we surveyed told us what they were most looking for and not finding were:

• Integration of their personal, professional, and spiritual lives. 
• Real measurable change in their companies.

We mined the best practices from all the other great executive board experiences and integrated the successful roadmap we take every commercial client down to create a new way to do things.  Our one year experiment is yielding humbling results.

• teams have been established
• new directions have emerged
• companies are measurably changed from a year ago
• owners are operating with tremendously greater clarity and margin

This month we are sitting in a posture of thanksgiving with all our members and teaching them to take stock and then celebrate all that change with their teams.  How great is that?!

If you are tired of merely knowing all the right things to do, but are truly interested in putting them into practice, we should talk.  We still have a few spots available for our next group starting in January.  

Maybe it is time to try something different, because old Screwtape is still prowling like a roaring lion.

Consider

• Are you tired of arriving at the same place at the end of every year?
• Was 2017 another year of the best of intentions, but where very little of your hopes came to fruition?
• Are you really ready to put the things you know you should do, into practice?
• What needs to change in order to arrive at a different destination next year?

Millennial

“All employees want to feel valued, empowered, and engaged at work.  This is a fundamental need, not a generational issue.  You can think of Millennials as pushing for changes that all the generations want to see happen.”  

- Harvard Business Review

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I have been told that I have a gift of persuasion.  They say that when I point all my guns in the same direction…ideation, passion, strength, conviction, verbal acuity, etc…I can make a pretty compelling case for almost anything.  I am beginning to believe that I’ve lost whatever ability people thought I had.

I can’t seem to get anyone in my generation to change their opinion about “that” generation.

But to be fair to my generation, Millennials do seem to have a pretty daunting list of “wants”.  The Harvard Business Review recently summarized the following: 

Oh, is that all?  I can see why so many leaders get so incredulous.  But they now comprise over 50% of the workforce…and growing.

50%!

So, like it or not, we better change our attitudes about this generation.  Just because we see things differently, doesn’t mean we see them rightly and them completely in the wrong.  So, I have a couple of ideas on how to embrace this challenge:

1.  Mature your organization

I've regularly made the argument that if your workforce isn’t motivated, you don’t have a generational issue but a leadership one.  In the companies where we’ve seen…

• clear vision, values, and purpose established  
• a well crafted organizational design
• position agreements established for every team member where they understand the results expected, tasks to be performed, and the way they will be measured
• a clear roadmap for the employee and the company
• a consistent meeting model that ensures execution

…most of the issues leaders point to regarding this generation, are largely eliminated.  Maybe it is finally time to do the things that really mature your organization.  To get really serious about the essential things listed above that will address a multitude of problems, not the least of which is this one.

2.  Listen to them

Angela Ahrends took control of the tired and saggy Burberry in their 150th year in 2006.  As CEO, she increased sales from $2 to $7 billion and turned the company into a current and relevant international fashion brand.  She parlayed her success at Burberry to become the President of Retail for a little company called Apple in 2014.

She explained one of the secrets of her success in an interview at the Chick-fil-A Leadercast a few years ago.  She hired some more fashion-forward millennials into the brand and then cultivated their perspective and insight.

She formed strategic groups of them where she discussed the brand, product lines, and future vision for the company.  Having mined this valuable source of perspective, she took back that knowledge and understanding as an ambassador to the older generation of leadership to appropriate and execute.

She found incredible success by celebrating what each of the two primary generations brought to the table.

Now that is a revolutionary idea!

My generation likes to talk about finding the right seat on the bus for everyone, but seems to think that one whole generation shouldn’t be included along for the ride.  But like it or not, the millennial generation is now a majority of the workforce.  And ironically, getting them on the bus and comfortable, actually requires us becoming more of the kind of companies we should be becoming anyway.

At the end of the day, they are going to force us to grow, mature, and evolve.  Something none of us are really comfortable with. 

Consider

• Be honest.  Have you sort of written off this generation?
• How is that hurting your business and its’ future?
• Are you ready to address this challenge/opportunity in a more thoughtful and mature way?   [The future success of your company (and this country, really) hang in the balance.]

Story

"Because that's what we storytellers do. We restore order with imagination. We instill hope again and again and again. So, trust me, Mrs. Travers. Let me prove it to you. I give you my word."  

- Walt Disney, Saving Mr. Banks

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My partner Paul talks about the “art of the possible”.  At our LifePlan weekends we talk about how despite your beginning, you can craft a different ending.  Our corporate coaching roadmap helps teams imagine a more inspired future and then craft a simple plan to achieve that destination.

The biblical narrative has restoration as its’ major theme.  The whole point of the gospel is that everything that is separated, broken, or disenfranchised, will be mended, restored, and reconciled.

The rest of the story is intended to be glorious.

But it’s interesting that despite how much desire there is for change and how ripe the opportunity seems, most people’s experiences have them resigning themselves more to the improbability of change.

In the movie Saving Mr. Banks, it turns that out that P.L. Travers' story about Mary Poppins is autobiographical and deeply personal.  She is reluctant to turn over her “beloved Mary” to the trivializing that she expects from Disney.  Once Walt realizes that her story was born of tragedy, the deeply flawed and tragic figure of her father, he finds tremendous compassion for the difficult Miss Travers.

Walt shows her the empathy that only one who has experienced similar tragedy can offer.  He offers to help her write a more glorious ending to her story, to her father’s story.   He asks that she “give it to him” and that she “can trust him” and that he won’t disappoint her.  In regard to her father, he tells her:

(He) will be honored. 

(He) will be redeemed. 

(He) and all he stands for will be saved. 

Now, maybe not in life, but in imagination. 

Because that's what we storytellers do. We restore order with imagination. We instill hope again and again and again. So, trust me, Mrs. Travers. Let me prove it to you. I give you my word.

When I watched this film again with my children, I had a huge lump in my throat.  I heard the voice of the Father in Walt Disney.  I was overwhelmed with the heart of the Father for all of us…His desire to rewrite our endings with restoration, healing, and hope.  What could be a more beautiful hope or desire for those that you care most about?

I was also reminded of the deep heart I have for all our clients.  Our “true north” with all of them is a more inspired future:

• Clarity and understanding of the unique role they were created to play as leaders.  Simple steps toward finding that life.
• Clarity and understanding of the unique nature and role their businesses can play in making the world a better place while finding their every success.

You really can find the life you desire.  The one intended for you when you came into this world.  Your company really can get there from here.  Let’s grab a keyboard and write a better story.

Trust me.

Let me prove it to you.

I give you my word.

Consider

• Are you more focused on the probability or improbability of change?
• What has life taught you to believe about that possibility?
• Are you up to rallying your hope and expectation one more time to find real change?
• How can I help?

Go

[Chorus]

Hey

We're never gonna go if we don't go now

You're never gonna know if you don't find out

You're never going back, never turning around

You're never gonna go if don't go now

You're never gonna grow if you don't grow now

You're never gonna know if you don't find out

You're never going back, never turning around

You're never gonna go if you don't go now

- “Go Now" from Sing Street, by Adam Levine

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We spend a lot of time trying to convince people that restoration is available to them.  The company you've always wanted, can be yours.  The life you were once inspired to find, is still available.  

• Getting clarity on the future you desire, 

• creating a clear plan to get there,

• and believing that your hope can become a reality...

...can almost make them an inevitability.

We are curators of an incredible set of tools to help leaders and their companies find the same.  Once they step onto the roadmap we have available for both, everything shifts from possibility to probability.

In order to carry the level of conviction we need to convince others of that probability, we rest on three pillars:

First, we have to hold tightly to a very strong Biblical worldview.  We have to believe that the promises of God and the restoration of all things aren't just good ideas, but our spiritual heritage and our right.

Secondly, we rest in the proof of so many stories of changed lives and restored companies.  If there isn’t evidence to support your convictions about the things you are doing, you are largely living in delusion and fantasy.

And finally, we are students of redemptive stories.  We source the biblical narrative, great books, history, and even the restoration we find in almost every great movie.

You know that every great movie is sourcing its’ story from ours, right?

There is only one great story, and it is ours.  Almost every book, story or movie you’ve ever loved is essentially sourcing the great story of our rescue and restoration that the gospel holds.  And like anything else, the subjective fixation that emerges when you focus has us finding it everywhere.  Even in the most unlikely of places.

The movie Sing Street is about…

• Brokenness and restoration.
• Hopelessness and great hope.
• Coming of age and overcoming.
• Damage and healing.

It is an Irish film that is one part a John Hughes film, one part High School Musical, and another part Sandlot.

In a world full of fear, disappointment, and tragedy - we all need to drink a little more from the fountain of life, joy, and the hope that restoration brings.  We have never more desperately needed that than in these most desperate of times.

Okay, Sing Street is a little gritty and I wouldn’t have the little ones in the room for the showing, but agreeing with the hope of restoration is essential fuel for leadership toward organizational change.  When it comes to hope, you had better be full of it with a tapped out reserve tank as well.  The times are challenging and that vector is tilting straight up.

Watching the culminating scene of this movie with the song quoted above playing, makes me want to “go” as well.  

It makes me want to launch out all on God.  

It makes me want to head for higher ground.

It makes me want to risk more.

And encourage others to join me.

It helps give me the necessary fuel to help inspire others to find the same.

Consider

• Where are you stuck?
• What destination do you need to chart a course toward?
• What journey do you know that you need to go on?
• Are you surrounding your life with the biblical narrative, redemptive experiences, and even great movies that offer the prospect of restoration?  (Hint…it is in most of the movies you love.  We’ve had a lot of people chiding us for a list of good ones.  Look for that soon!)

Transfer

"Give your burdens to the LORD, and he will take care of you. He will not permit the godly to slip and fall."  

- A Psalm of David

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I heard yet another story of a significant spiritual leader falling last week.  I am embarrassed to say that there was a season in my life where the failures and mistakes of others almost brought me joy.  My legalism had me trying to hold to an impossible standard that actually curated more brokenness…in me and in others.  The fall of others, in some twisted way, made me feel better about myself.

In this season, however, I just felt incredible empathy.  With his leadership over thousands of disenfranchised children and the intense opposition and warfare he faces on a daily basis, I wasn’t really surprised.  I am grieving what he did and the consequences it will bring, but I am brokenhearted for the man as well.

I interact with so many leaders.  The intense sense of responsibility, the incredible pressure, and the vulnerability and isolation that senior leadership almost inevitably brings, is an incredible burden to bear.  If the folks sitting in the cubicles really knew all that came with the corner office, I don’t think nearly as many of them would really want the job.

We shouldn’t be surprised when leaders fall, we should be surprised that it doesn’t happen more often.  It should also inspire and invigorate us to come alongside, empathize, and help shoulder the load.

It is also the thing that motivates us so deeply about owner-to-team conversions.  The latest numbers say that 12,000,000 “small” businesses will need to experience some kind of transfer in the next 10 years. 

• Owner to team.
• Owner to the next generation of the family.
• Owner to outside ownership.

Regardless of which way they are going to transfer, they all need to take a very similar journey.

So, there is a practical need to figure out the next step for millions of business owners, but I am probably more concerned about the philosophical one.  Unless we help leaders transfer the weight of their leadership to both their God and a broader team, we are going to see an increasing number of leaders fall in these desperate and challenging times.

The good thing is that making this kind of conversion is really simple…it just isn’t easy.

There is a logical, tried and true path.  It starts with an invitation, which leads to the transfer of responsibility and authority, and ends with measurable change.  The transformation from everything as it is to everything that it could become.

Are you at the place where making an owner-to-team conversion is important from either a practical or philosophical perspective?  If so, let me know if you’d like to talk.

Consider

• Are you aware of the weight of the immense responsibility you are carrying?
• Who is helping shoulder that load?
• Are you able to hand it over to God or a group of capable leaders in your organization?
• How are you medicating all that pressure and pain?
• What does the inevitability of that responsibility look like if you don’t transfer some of what you are carrying?

Permission

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do.  So throw off the bowlines.  Sail away from the safe harbor.  Catch the trade winds in your sails.  Explore.  Dream.  Discover."  

- Mark Twain

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Leaving college and going back home felt like the last chapters of my life were unfolding.  My five years in Waco had been punctuated by a rebirthing both spiritually and relationally.  The hallmark of returning to where I came from seemed like the end to both.  

Of course, it wasn’t. But it took me a while to figure that out.

I had a few lifelines:

• a job that became a career
• a girl that would become my wife
• a ministry that turned into a lifestyle
• sailing

While the first three are a little more obvious, crewing for a family that raced J class boats on Wednesday nights brought adventure, joy, and untethered me from the shore that seemed to embody so much of what I had spent my life trying to escape.  There was a level of freedom and permission into life that felt life saving at the time.

Untethered from the shore, but deeply connected to the Father.

While I do have a couple of friends who are capable sailors, I’ve spent very little time on the deck of a sailboat since.  But ten years ago, an e-mail crashed the shore of my inbox and became another rescue that I didn’t know I needed.

A man who is involved in a similar men’s ministry as mine was chartering a boat to sail from Cay to Cay off the coast of Belize.  I opened the e-mail and rejected it immediately.  Surely it had come to me by mistake.  I forwarded it to a couple of friends and indicated that I had received their invitation by accident.

How could something this life-giving and joy-inducing possibly be intended for me?  I couldn’t bear to look at the picture of the boat for more than a few seconds.

That tells you a lot about the condition of my heart at the time.

It tells you a lot about my worldview.

It reveals so much of what I misunderstood about the heart of God.

But, I was given permission into that piece of life abundant by both my God and my wife and it changed my life in ways I couldn’t have imagined.  As I was being permission’d so profoundly, I was learning to permission others to find the same.  Now, I am finding that almost every person I encounter is secretly yearning for someone to offer them the same…

• To do more of the things they love
• To pursue an audacious dream
• To love boldly
• To risk
• To lead more generously and nobly
• To take more chances

As we learn to trust the heart of God for us, to feel His permission into the much more abundant life, it gives us the currency to inspire the same in others.

YOU CAN DO THIS.

NOW IS THE TIME.

LET’S GET STARTED.

Live and lead boldly.  Love those you employ; parent audaciously.  Believe that the Father wants good and glorious things for you and them.  Know that He delights in your delight.  Risk everything.

“…throw off the bowlines.  Sail away from the safe harbor.  Catch the trade winds in your sails.  Explore.  Dream.  Discover.”

Consider

• What deep desire are you holding onto?
• What injustice do you want to make right?
• What is a bold move toward a changed life or reconciliation that you need to take?
• What is so inspiring and invigorating to you that you almost can’t allow yourself to think about it? 
• What does that say about your worldview and your understanding of the heart of God towards you?