Threatened

“The only constant is change.”

― Heraclitus, Greek philosopher

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The San Antonio Spurs miraculously landed the No. 1 pick in the draft lottery of 1997. David Robinson, an eight-year veteran had every reason to feel threatened when the team selected Tim Duncan with that magical first pick. In a superstar-driven league with relatively few 7-footers, San Antonio already had one and had just drafted another.

Not surprising to those who knew David, but very uncharacteristic to most other teams and players, David welcomed him with open arms. He was recently asked about that in an interview:

“I never felt threatened. When you have confidence in yourself, you just do what you know how to do and don’t worry about that stuff. I think time has really proven that my thought process was correct: When somebody like that comes in [to your organization], they can only enhance what you’re doing. They can only hurt you [if there’s resistance or tension]. It’s sort of like swimming. If you jump in the water and try to fight the water, you’re going to drown. The water needs to be your friend. That was how I felt with Tim coming in, that playing together was the best thing for both of us. I think we both understood that. It’s like any business: If you help the young guys who come in become better leaders, it’s only going to help your business. That’s what happened in San Antonio.

Tim was maybe the best thing that happened to me in my whole career. ..He helped me as an individual to grow up and be a better a player. He helped us achieve the long-term goals that we set, winning championships. And he helped us become the model franchise over a 25-year period. He was kind of that last piece of the puzzle. It’s honestly a no-brainer when you think about the synergy between the two of us and what it allowed us to accomplish.”

A few ingredients of this successful transaction:

• the existing talent had to be mature and confident in their own ability
• they had to be open to what they could gain and learn from a new team member of another generation
• since everyone was focused on long-term team goals (and not themselves) the new talent was welcomed with open arms

We love helping teams transition from owner-led to team-led…

• It is the path to better solutions, more ownership by the team, and freedom for the owner or executive leadership.
• It is the path to scalability and organizational sustainability beyond the owner.
• It is the only way a leader can truly find the margin to work on the business and not merely in it every day.

We have seen it happen successfully so many times now that we know how possible it is for every organization. We also know that if the existing leadership doesn’t embrace newcomers and change with maturity and confidence in themselves and their ability, it may not work.

What should be a beautiful and invigorating transition becomes a war.

And there are always casualties in war.

Consider

• Are you ready to do an owner-to-team transition?
• Are your leaders confident and secure enough to invite others into the organization or leadership? Are you?
• Is your desire for freedom and margin great enough to undertake this incredibly transformative journey?

Tension

“Maturity is achieved when a person accepts life as full of tension.”

- Joshua Lieberman

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Do you ever feel stuck? Trapped? Pushed into a corner? Caught between a rock and a hard place? (insert your favorite similar expression here)

Often, the reason that leaders feel this way is related to the attitude they find in some of their most valuable team members. In extreme contrast to that idea, we watched a video the other day with several groups of leaders about the culture of the San Antonio Spurs. They said, despite what most professional franchises experience, they will not be…

“Held hostage by the talent.” 

Have you ever felt that way? I certainly have and have watched it play out over and over again in other companies. One of the things we’ve discovered is that there is a healthy tension necessary when it comes to employees. They need to understand two things:

1. I am valuable, respected, and they need and want my contribution on the team.
2. I am replaceable.

Before you react too strongly to that second idea, give me a little time to explain.

• 1 without 2 - can result in a sense of entitlement and an unrealistic understanding of value
• 2 without 1 - often results in a reluctant and under-appreciated employee, afraid to make decisions and lacking in motivation

It is holding those two ideas in tension that produces the best result for them and for their employer.

I worked for years as an investment manager over a large bond portfolio. I was very good at what I did. I was highly motivated to contribute and consistently bringing incremental value. However, I approached every counter-party relationship with the understanding that there were people smarter and better at what we were mutually doing and I always had something to learn. I knew…

1.  I was valuable, respected, and they needed and wanted my contribution.
2.  I was replaceable.

In a world where the size of one’s portfolio often correlated with the size of their ego, holding those two things in proper tension produced the best result for me and the bank.

One important caveat to holding this in proper tension: management must never hold the fact that someone is replaceable over their head. Things get out of balance when management makes someone feel like they are replaceable and not valuable.

A little hope. I have dealt with dozens of owners that thought they had irreplaceable employees.  In most cases, the employee was feeling the fear the employer was carrying. When this happens, the employer is actually contributing to the problem. If you are feeling trapped by the talent, stop.

In every case I can remember where this type of employee left…

• The team got closer and stronger once they were gone
• The cultural air cleared
• A replacement is always found (often perceived to be better)

Affirm all your team members and make them feel valuable. Don’t let them hold you hostage.  Help them find the necessary balance to be a healthy contributing team member. Deal with the situation when they can’t seem to get there.

Consider

• Do you have any employees that you feel are irreplaceable?
• Do they know it?  Is there anything in the way they work that would confirm they feel this way?
• How have you contributed to this problem?  What is it costing you in morale, anxiousness, etc.?
• What do you need to do in order to establish a more proper tension?

Noisy

“Yet the news about him spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”

- Luke, the Apostle

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It is really noisy out there and seems to be getting noisier all the time.  The average American spends a little over 2 hours a day on social media and an average of 35.4 hours a week watching television. That is about 7 hours a day between those two activities or 50 hours a week!

It is amazing that anything gets done around here.

There is also this imperative attached to all that consumption. We are supposed to be aware and care about just about everything. To be “enlightened” or be “human”, we need to have empathy for all causes, all issues, and all pain, equally.

But if we care about everything, we don’t care about anything…well.

If we care about everyone, we don’t care about anyone…well.

Reality is that we are all placed here to care about a particular subset of all those things. We all have finite amounts of time, resources, abilities, and heart. We can’t take care of everything, but the world’s increasing encouragement to be equally concerned about all of it often results in chaos, overwhelm, discouragement, and well...noise.

The one perfect person, Jesus, was sent to model what “right” is supposed to look like. He would roll into town with his crew, do some ministry to a very select few (sometimes one) and then disappear. When he had gotten the attention of the crowd and there was so much opportunity to do more, he would often withdraw.

How does that fit with our Western sensibility that more is better?

He was so connected to the Father, so clear on what his unique assignment was, that he simply did the few things he was supposed to do and went back to the source to get further instructions.

Increasingly, we are spending a lot of time quieting the noise and bringing necessary clarity and peace to leaders. We are aggressively integrating these powerful tools:

• Essentialism - do less things, better
• Ideal week - organizing you week more powerfully
• Boundaries - setting clear boundaries & protecting them
• White Space - from Julie Funt, carving out essential moments throughout your day
• Purpose - for your life and your organization - the plumb line of all plumb lines
• Core Values - the strategic anchors and filter for everything you do
• Strategic Initiatives - You can’t do everything...so what is most essential?

It is not only the integration of these tools, but the worldview that surrounds them that is so essential. As a co-heir of the Kingdom with a unique and finite set of gifting, ability, and resources, you have to be really clear about what you are doing and the reasons that are motivating all those good things.

You can drown yourself in good and miss what is truly great.

The world is increasingly and noisily vying for your attention…and winning. Being really clear and having the tools to find and hold that clarity has never been more valuable. It is increasingly more valuable with each passing day.

Consider

• What are you supposed to be focused on with your life?  What about this year?  This quarter?  This week? Today?
• What were you created to address, solve, cure?
• What purpose does your organization exist for other than to make money and survive?
• Is your life getting quieter despite all the noise, or increasing as the noise around you continues to rise?

Imposter

“Impostor syndrome is a concept describing individuals who are marked by an inability to internalize their accomplishments and a persistent fear of being exposed as a 'fraud'.”

 - Wikipedia

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When I was getting certified as a StoryBrand Guide last year, we were taught that every person carries a set of problems or fears.  If you are going to get their attention in an increasingly noisy world, you are going to need to identify and speak to all of them.  The three problems are:

External - physical, financial, relational, etc.

Internal - doubts, fears, insecurities, etc.

Philosophical - right and wrong, good vs evil, your values vs competitors, etc.

External problems are usually pretty clear. It is the real and obvious festering challenge staring you right in the face. And the philosophical is usually pretty easy to get to as well.  There is usually some overarching injustice they would like to set right. Some sense of a lack of fairness that they would like to change.

But the internal problem was a little more challenging to identify. An author I love has been talking about the way men “pose” or pretend for almost two decades. He says that most of us are seeking an answer to a great question:

Do I have what it takes?  Am I a real man?

When we discussed the internal problem with StoryBrand, they said something very similar. 

The internal problem is asking questions like:

• Am I going to fail?
• Is our business on the brink of failure?
• Am I going to screw this up?

-and-

• Do I have what it takes?

I smiled when we got to that last one.  Not only because I had heard that very specific internal question identified before, but because I know it to be very true for almost everyone.  Even some of the most successful and accomplished people I know are driven to that success by the desire to answer that question that they aren’t really sure about.

The acknowledgment of that isn’t a sign of weakness, but one of humility and honesty.  We live in an overwhelming, chaotic, and way overcorrected world. The ease of comparison, the need to perform, and the pressure to keep up with other’s success is overwhelming.

In a nutshell, we all have internal fears or problems. 

Oh, and by the way, so does everyone who works for you and every client or potential client of yours. Understanding their internal fear is not only the path to showing great empathy for them, but the path to a growing and sustainable business. Understanding your own fears will help you keep from making the wrong decisions. Understanding others will make you a more successful leader and business person.

Not only is the "imposter syndrome" alive and well, it is on the rise. Increasingly, people are working overtime to make sure their superhero image seems impenetrable, but inside it is a whole other story.  

We search for solutions to our external problems, but we make “buy” decisions based on who it feels like understands our internal and philosophical problems and speaks to them.  Understanding this is the only way to differentiate your business and survive in a very noisy world.

Consider

• Do you know what your internal fears or problems are? (Notice that I didn’t ask if you had internal fears or problems.)
• Do you know what your employees or customer’s internal problem is?
• Do you feel like you are missing out on additional business or effectiveness in your leadership because you don’t know?

Confirmation

“Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses. It is a type of cognitive bias and a systematic error of inductive reasoning.”

- Wikipedia

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Turns out that it is also my go-to bias.  Apparently, I am not alone.  Whether it is regarding politics, sports, religion, etc., most people tend to gravitate toward the channels of information that affirm what they already believe. Confirmations of this bias are:

People shopping doctors to get the diagnosis they want.

Leaders surrounding themselves with “yes” men or women.

My partners and I meet quarterly to plan, check progress, and determine where we need to change things. We also periodically do an exercise we share with all our clients. We have everyone offer encouragement around what they appreciate about one another and constructive areas for improvement in the ways they might improve.  

Yikes!

That is what we and many others have said…until they actually do the exercise.  It produces tremendous trust, accountability, and growth, for everyone. It becomes one of the favorite experiences of all our clients.

The last few times we did this exercise, the strongest affirmation I received was around my ability to very quickly size up a situation and discern causes and solutions. They also graciously say that I am typically 99% right. 

It is something our clients really appreciate about me.

While it is something glorious and valuable, it is also where a real problem can develop.  Conversely, they say one of the most challenging things about me is that since I typically get to the right answers so quickly, I am not very open to hearing contrary opinions or ideas.  

I simply seek confirmation for what I already believe I know to be true.

The one great challenge they identify is the shadow of one of the great gifts. It is almost always that way. Instead of broadening and richening my perspective, my focus starts to narrow. Instead of more powerfully seeing the value in the other doors available, my desire to confirm just drives me blindly toward the single door.

It shrouds the value of my gifting.

Hearing that consistently from people I trust and know care about me, is softening the bias. It still operates, but I have a much better awareness now of both the value and the challenge that it brings. In this one particular area…

I am not where I want to be, but I am no longer who I used to be.

Like an apprentice swordsman, I am not only learning how to handle the weapon better, but the blade is also sharpening in the process. In every great comic book, there is a hero and a villain.  The only difference is that one of them is using their gifting and power for good while the other is using it for evil.

I am learning through the coaching of my fellow team members to use my gifting for more good than evil.

Consider

• Do you know what your superpowers are? What your greatest contribution to the team is?
• On the contrary, do you know what is most challenging about having you on the team?
• Do you have people around you that you trust enough to tell you the hard things and hold you accountable?  That is the foundation for all good coaching.

Shadow

“Shadow is the obstruction of light. Shadows appear to me to be of supreme importance in perspective, because, without them opaque and solid bodies will be ill defined…”

- Leonardo da Vinci

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Shadow is not the opposite of light, but a result of the obstruction of light.  This has become a powerful component of our coaching and understanding of both the best and worst things in the leaders we work with.

Lencioni’s TableGroup talks about strengths and weaknesses of leaders. In order to become a better leader, we need to be aware of what we offer that is of highest contribution and do more of that. We also need to be aware of how the weight of our leadership is most challenging to others, and do less of that.

E-Myth taught us a deeper and much more contextual understanding of the same concept. They taught us about shadow and light. What is great about a leader, when focused in the right way, is the benefit of the team and company. When that great ability is driven by the wrong motive, it becomes a detriment to the team.

• A smart and creative thinker can crowd out the contribution of others.
• An articulate and clear speaking leader can silence others.
• A gifted problem solver can limit others' desire to help solve things on their own.

One of my light and shadow challenges, in the words of others, is that I am confident, verbally articulate, and can frame thoughts and ideas well. They also say that it makes them feel like what they have to contribute isn’t of any value. That’s terrible and the furthest thing from my desire, but an understood consequence of my gifting. 

Does that make sense?

The understanding that shadow is merely the obscuring of light has taken our understanding of strengths and weaknesses to a whole new level. There is power in that understanding and a greater ability to enhance the strengths and minimize the weaknesses of the leaders we serve.

But that wasn’t the end of our journey on these concepts.

When we applied a spiritual or Kingdom lens to the discussion, the clarity of light and shadow started to take on real power and importance.  Our primary role in the Kingdom is to bring glory to the Father and we do that in very particular and unique ways that no other creature can.

To offer your strengths, unique ability, or gifting, is really to offer the glory that was intended from our lives to draw attention to the nature and goodness of our God. To not offer the glory that each of us carries, is to shroud the glory of God....to limit what is beautiful, unique, and profound about His character.

The deliverable of helping leaders understand their strengths/weaknesses or light/shadow is really helping them glorify God better.  

How great is that?

“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”

— Paul, to the church in Corinth

Consider

• Are you aware of what your strength, light, or glory is?
• Are you aware of what is challenging about you, your shadow, or what shrouded glory looks like in your life?
• How much time are you spending on the right side of that ledger?
• How much is it costing you, your team, and your family when you are not?

Curate

cu·rate

ˌkyo͝oˈrāt,ˈkyo͝oˌrāt/

verb

1. select, organize, and look after the items in (a collection or exhibition).

2. select, organize, and present, typically using professional or expert knowledge.

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I used to have the largest partially or completely unread Christian book collection in the world. I had a pretty sizable one in the area of business and leadership as well. I am sure some of you can relate.

There were many.

A subset of them were scanned.

An even smaller subset were actually read.

Almost none of them were actually applied to my life or business and produced much measurable change.

I could say the same for the some of the coaching things I had tried and the podcasts and conferences that I enjoyed.

Like many of you, I wanted things to change. 

The next greatest book, the most popular podcasts, different coaching methodologies, or the latest greatest speaker, each held the prospect of being the magic pill that was going to change everything.  The problem was that nothing ever seemed to change…and the longer this went on, the frustration and disappointment were both increasing.

As a managing partner at Deloitte, my partner had gotten too far away from the client. He was managing the people who worked with the people that he most enjoyed interacting with. He wanted to bring similar transformation to smaller businesses that people spent millions to get through his former practice.

The model didn’t exist. But over several years, we curated the information, processes, and procedures from dozens of sources to produce a simple and logical “roadmap” for business transformation that does exactly that. We pull from a variety of sources:

• Our coaching certifications & other practices - E-Myth, Hudson, Patterson, PMP, TableGroup, EOS, etc.
• Best author/speakers - Lencioni, Collins, Maxwell, Pink, Stanley, Drucker, Peters, etc.
• Best business podcasts - How I Built This, Entrepreneur on Fire, TED Radio Hour, Storybrand, Andy Stanley Leadership, etc.
• 50 years of combined leadership and business consulting experience from our banking and consulting careers.
• We also spend a lot of time curating the best new phenomena in terms of business strategy and growth - like Storybrand, Essentialism, Referral Engine, Giftology, etc.

Our experience so far is that it replaces that never-ending cycle of feeling like you aren’t learning, growing, or keeping up with the latest and greatest the business world seems to offer…with a simple, methodical path toward real transformation in your life and business.

Our clients with thousands of employees are on the same exact path that our smallest sole proprietor is on…with similar results.  The things we do hands-on for and with our largest clients, we are providing in a scalable and simply executable format for our smallest executive board members.

“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.  My time with them is a “sacred space” where I am challenged and encouraged by people who know me, care about me, and are genuinely interested in my success.”  

                       - Jason Casey

Curating is typically associated with the arts, but if curating business content keeps producing these kinds of results I am happy to call us a team of curators.

Consider

• Do you feel like you are falling behind?  Not keeping up with all the latest things you should?
• Do you feel like you aren’t really experiencing the kind of change in your life or business that you’d hoped?
• Do you think it is time to quit feeling so frustrated by your lack of results and have someone else help curate some real change for you?

Lump

“I am a sentimental guy, and occasionally, that lump in my throat when I speak has stopped my tongue from working.”

- Arnold Palmer

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Somewhere along the way, I learned that showing any kind of emotion was a sign of weakness.  An indication that I didn’t have appropriate control over my emotions.  That one brick wrestled loose might bring the whole wall down.  But diving deeply into my faith, building an intimate marriage, and parenting six kids, tapped me into that well-hidden reservoir.

One of the unique things about our family culture is that we host regular family movie nights.  Finding movies that meet our standards for good storytelling, redemptive perspective, and production quality, but that aren’t too assaulting to the more conservative and faith-based values we carry, is challenging.

Our children have learned that mom and I are increasingly comfortable with showing the emotions we’re feeling. When either the kids or I get a lump in our throat, we know that turning to mom will likely find tears. Being of similar heart and mind means that whatever we are deeply feeling is felt by the others.

We’re finding something similar playing out in our client interactions. Restoration and transformation are very close to the heart of God. They are part of our heartbeat as well. When we hear a client talk about the change they are experiencing or the victory and success they are finding, the lump in my throat or the one in another team members is typically met by the others.

We’ve even caught one another, in the middle of a group interaction with a leadership team, trying to hold back more obvious displays of emotion. One lump in the throat matching another. I no longer see this as a sign of weakness, but an incredible confirmation of how deeply we feel about the success of the people we are humbled to serve as coaches.

We actively cultivate the expression of success and celebration. 

Most leaders we know are so painfully aware of their challenges and difficulties that they can’t see most of the glory that is unfolding all around them. As they celebrate and feel the pride of their accomplishments, it provides momentum, encouragement, and inspiration to others and themselves. 

It is the necessary fuel required for the next leg of their journeys.

We want to teach them to celebrate their team’s success the same way we are celebrating theirs.  To experience their own deep-seated emotion for their team’s success that we are experiencing for them.

Consider

• Are you comfortable with feeling and expressing emotion?  (We continually encourage leaders to show their teams the depths of their passion and conviction.)
• Who helps you celebrate your success? 
• Who challenges you to do the same for your team?  (Ironically, the most affordable form of motivation is also the most effective. Sadly, it is incredibly rare in most businesses.)

No

“And don’t say anything you don’t mean. This counsel is embedded deep in our traditions. You only make things worse when you lay down a smoke screen of pious talk, saying, ‘I’ll pray for you,’ and never doing it, or saying, ‘God be with you,’ and not meaning it. You don’t make your words true by embellishing them with religious lace. In making your speech sound more religious, it becomes less true. Just say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’"

- Matthew, the Apostle

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I’ve helped raise six children.  That is a lot of teaching others to quit saying “no”.  Pretty much every child goes through a season of this.  A recent study by Child Development says that the average 2-3 year-old argues with their parents 20-25 times per hour.

“Kids this age are realizing that they can assert themselves, and arguing with you is one way they gain confidence.”

— John Sargent, MD

Turns out that we don’t only break them of saying “no” during this season, we begin conditioning them to never be comfortable saying it again.  It is no surprise that most of us have a hard time with not agreeing to so many things.  We were taught that “no” was a bad word.  

An article from Psychology Today a couple of years ago, says that there are several primary reasons we aren’t comfortable with this:

• Fear of conflict
• Don’t want to disappoint or hurt someone
• Need for validation

None of those should surprise any of us.  We likely identify with one or all of them.

Matthew seems to call out the hypocrisy of people of faith saying things like “I’ll pray for you” when they don’t really mean it.  I was so guilty of that.  I am now trying to never automatically defer to those kinds of contrivances unless they are heartfelt and I am absolutely committed to follow through.

I am trying to make my yes be my yes.

We were recently talking with several tables of leaders about how clear Jesus was about the one thing he was called to do.  While he healed and spoke truth and life, he was constantly walking past the opportunity to do more “good” so that he could get alone, commune with the Father, and stay focused on the one “great” thing he was supposed to accomplish with his life.

“Good is the enemy of great.”

— Jim Collins

We spend a lot of time helping leaders get really clear on their personal “why” through our Lifeplan process and help their organizations find the same through our corporate coaching and executive boards.  We helped them determine what their “great” is so that they can say “no” to some of that “good”.  We have learned that leader clarity leads to organizational clarity.

We get them really clear on what they should say “yes” to and then teach them some great tools and processes for learning how to say “no”.  We help them identify the intersection of what they love most, what they are good at, and what makes the highest contribution.

We watched them sit together recently and…

...List everything they’ve said “yes” to.

...Count the time, cost and consequences of every one of them.

...Identify the ones they needed to eliminate.

...Create plans for how and when they will drop each of them.

So much freedom, life, and lightening of loads.  One leader said, “I have been holding on to this responsibility and burden for 7 years and knew I needed to let it go, but I couldn’t until today”.  How great is that?

Learning to say “no” is a crucial muscle that most of us rarely exercise.  It actually takes incredible strength and resolve to not agree to everything.  

For a toddler, it is an act of defiance from everything.  

For an adult, it is an act of defiance from the busyness that overwhelms everyone else around us. 

It is the pathway to freedom and doing what is truly “great” with a life or a company.

Consider

• Are you comfortable saying “no”?  Why or why not?
• What are the costs and consequences of you not saying “no” to more things?
• What would it feel like to eliminate some of the busyness and noise of all that “good”?
• How clear are you on the “great” you are created to fulfill through your life or organization?  What is that costing you?

Help

“Trust God from the bottom of your heart; don’t try to figure out everything on your own. Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; He’s the one who will keep you on track.”

- Proverbs

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Woke this morning at 3:45 with a favorite client as my primary preoccupation.  They found out yesterday that their biggest account that they built their budget around for 2018, just pushed the work they were doing for them out another 12 months.  We’re still in February and they have to completely start over on their plan for the year.  They are understandably concerned.

I know exactly what that feels like.  It tests nearly every conviction and core belief you have.  Going through a similar crisis a few years ago at the helm of a small company was one of the most challenging and transforming experiences of my career.  

While I wouldn’t wish that experience on anyone, 

I wouldn’t have changed what happened for anything.

I’m still spending the experiential currency from that season.

It is ripe for new thinking and opportunities, exploring boundaries, and marking new frontiers.  It requires a large measure of humility and an even larger one of faith.  This season of stretching and exploration will be one of the most defining of their company’s history.  They will not only be changed by the experience, but will be better for it.

Unlike many other’s that find themselves in this situation, they…

• enjoy a great reputation and respect for their work
• carry an enthusiastic customer base that they largely haven’t prospected for referrals
• have a mature understanding of their values, purpose, and ultimate value proposition
• are working toward a clear vision and are tackling the necessary goals/initiatives that will help them get there
• have lots of wise counsel around them to help them navigate the storm
• most importantly, are walking with God

They’ve already reached out for help.  That is a such a great sign of humility and openness.  And there are so many assurances I want to make, but the normal things that faith-based folks like us say in situations like these can feel so empty and contrived.  

So I won’t tell them, but I will tell you.

Walk with God.

Operate with humility.

Lean on Him.

Seek wise counsel.

Find a deeper level of faith.

Rest in hope that transcends understanding.

While a famous general said that the best-articulated battle plan doesn’t survive the first engagement, I have been up for hours working on one.  I can’t wait to wade into this challenge with these guys.

I’m ready to spend some more of that currency.

We’re going to get through this.  Time to determine next steps and get to work.  I can’t wait to tell you all about it on the other side.

Consider

• 100% guaranteed:  you will face challenges and difficulty this year.  Are you ready?
• Do you know who you are?  Are you methodically working toward a better future?
• Are you surrounded by wise counsel and the trusted advice of others?
• Do you have the humility to receive the counsel of others and the direction of your God?

Mastery

"God said, 'Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.' So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule.'"

- The Genesis Story

“And let them rule. Like a foreman runs a ranch or like a skipper runs his ship. Better still, like a king rules a kingdom, God appoints us as the governors of his domain. We were created to be the kings and queens of the earth (small k, small q). Hebrew scholar Robert Alter has looked long and hard at this passage, mining it for its riches. He says the idea of rule means 'a fierce exercise of mastery.' It is active, engaged, passionate. It is fierce.”  

- Excerpt from Waking the Dead

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Could you feel your heart stir as your read that?  Did it beat a bit faster and did you sit a little taller as your lungs filled with air?  Or, did it not register at all…as if it were written about anyone other than you?  Was it maybe a little disheartening knowing how different your day-to-day existence feels from that intended glory?

The Christian life isn’t so much about new things, but simply uncovering what is already true.  Jesus didn’t say, “Behold, I make new things”, he said…

"Behold, I make all things new."

One of our first and most important tasks with the clients we serve is helping them identify the treasure they already possess.  Our culture teaches us to look elsewhere.  The thousands of marketing messages assaulting us every day are set on convincing us that happiness will be found in something other than who we are, what we have, or even who we are with.

Excavating a company’s story, identifying what is most unique and noble about their products/services, gleaning a more powerful purpose, and unifying a team around the uncompromising compass of a clear vision…is the foundation for uncovering the treasure in the field they already own.

And it all starts with an owner, a senior leader, or a leadership team, believing that there is an intended glory for not only their lives but the organizations they lead. If we will simply claim the original intended purpose for our lives, the collective glory possible from our combined efforts becomes much more realizable.

To lead with fierce mastery requires a deep level of ownership in the appointed task.  It means relying on ancient wisdom and tools. It is about standing in the authority and intended nobility of your life as a leader and co-heir of the Kingdom. It is about being passionate, engaged and fierce.

Consider

• Do you approach your leadership with the kind of vigor and passion discussed above?
• What is keeping you from stepping into the intended glory of your life?
• What is it costing those you love and lead to not be operating this way in your family or company?

Ideal

“First, we go figure out how to recognize a real team player, the kind of person who can easily build trust, engage in healthy conflict, make real commitments, hold people accountable, and focus on the team's results. Then, we stop hiring people who can't. Finally, we help the people who are acting like jackasses change their ways or move on to different companies.”  

- Patrick Lencioni

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Patrick Lencioni may be one of the most impactful business writers of our day.  While we draw on the wisdom of many in our coaching, he is probably more referenced than any other thought leader.  His Five Dysfunctions of a Team and Advantage are part of the holy canon of most business libraries.  His most recent book, The Ideal Team Player is no exception.

Patrick says that if your company is seriously committed to making teamwork a cultural reality, you need to have team members that possess three key virtues; humility, hunger, and people smarts.  While each person is likely stronger in one or more of these virtues than another, it is the intersection of these three virtues that produces an ideal team player.

No one is perfect.  These kinds of virtues are not hard-coded into anyone’s DNA.  Rather, these are developed and maintained over time through life experiences and choices at both home and at work.  You need team members that possess all three of these virtues if you are going to overcome the five dysfunctions of a team:

• absence of trust
• fear of conflict
• lack of commitment
• avoidance of accountability
• commitment to results

HUMBLE:  Great team players lack excessive ego or concerns about status.  Quick to point out the contributions of others, slow to see attention for their own.  It is the single greatest and most necessary attribute of being a team player.

HUNGRY:  These folks are always looking for more.  More things to do, more to learn, and more responsibility to take.  These are the folks that you never need to motivate, just steer and bridle from time to time.  Always looking for the next opportunity.

SMART:  In this context, smart simply refers to a person’s common sense about people.  Smart people are not only self-aware but very aware of those around them.  They tend to have good judgment and intuition, and understand the implications of words and actions.

As you were reading those definitions, you were probably already categorizing yourself or key members of your team. The consequences of not having one of the three virtues are obvious.  We’ve all worked with someone who is hungry, but not too humble or people smart.  Not a very friendly beast to be around for very long.

Rather than scoring his team members for each of the three virtues, Patrick has his team rank the virtues for themselves: best, next, & worse.  They are then asked to work on the virtue where they ranked lowest.  Someone who doesn’t possess some sense of all three is not going to last too long in a healthy organization, but we all likely have one or more of those virtues that we could use some work on.

Consider

• Do you think you have a healthy team?
• How would you rank your team in terms of these three virtues?  What do they need to work on most?
• How would you rank those virtues for yourself?  Which one do you need to work on most?

Mudita

Muditā

(Pāli and Sanskrit: मुदिता) means joy; especially sympathetic or vicarious joy.

1. the pleasure that comes from delighting in other people's well-being.

2. Mudita is a pure joy unadulterated by self-interest.  

Ex. When we can be happy for the joy that other people feel, it is called mudita.

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Anyone growing up in a divorced home, shipped from parent to parent, experiences a small taste of what it feels like to be orphaned and homeless.  Neither place you lay your head ever feels fully like home and both parent’s attention seems to be seduced by double the distractions.  I would never be so impertinent to suggest that growing up this way even closely compares to the horrors of orphanhood and homelessness, but there are some similarities nonetheless.

Doing life unanchored to a sense of home or stable family has all kinds of unexpected consequences.  You believe that you are meant to do life completely on your own and that you likely can’t depend on anyone for anything.  For me, that looked like incredible self-reliance and selfishness. 

My faith journey was a huge disruption to that system and each of my six subsequent children incrementally contributed to the dismantling as well.  But despite all that, most of the planets still orbited around me in my solar system.  Identifying what all that selfishness was rooted in and dealing with that deeply entrenched source, has opened a doorway to a lot of healing and a lot of restoration.

Can you imagine being married and having six kids with someone so focused on themselves and their own survival?

I’ve still got some work cut out for me, but as a guy I know named Morgan likes to say: "I am not the man I want to become, but I am no longer who I used to be."

Progress feels glacial at times but can also catch me completely by surprise.  2017 was a year of a lot of growth and progress with our clients.  Many were very kind to make sure that we knew as we ended one year and began this one, how thankful and overwhelmed they were by all the change.  Some actually marveling at how different life and work seemed to be from just 12 months prior.

I used to subsist on affirmation like this.  I built my life and feedback loops to make sure I had enough of this crucial ingredient to survive.  But it is starting to land with me in really different ways.  Their acknowledgment of our contribution, while deeply appreciated, isn’t what I am delighting in most. 

Uncommonly, I am finding incredible joy in their successes.  Pure joy unadulterated by self-interest.  I am enjoying their feelings of success and anything that they might say about me feels more like an afterthought.  I am genuinely delighting in their success and the life they are experiencing.

Whoever thought that personal restoration and a systematic path toward business transformation would result in this kind of deliverable?  

This year, we are digging harder and faster.  If this is the treasure to be found in the field, I want a whole lot more of it.  I am not so much interested in being toasted, but finding as many others as possible to toast.

Consider

• How much do you enjoy the success of others?
• Do you enjoy it as much as your own?
• Are you spending your energy and time on the kinds of things that will truly change your circumstances?
• Are you seeing the kind of results that you and others can both celebrate a year from now?

Defensive

He said to them, 'You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight."

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Luke is telling the story about one of the interactions Jesus had with the Pharisees.  Outside of sin, the only thing that Jesus repeatedly railed against and seemed to unilaterally hate was legalism and its’ practitioners.  Anyone that tried to justify themselves through adherence to some strict set of rules, but didn’t operate from a truly transformed heart, seemed to really infuriate Him.  Samuel says it this way:

“People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

If you keep people at enough of a distance, it is possible to have them not see the real you… for a while.  Those we live with (our families) and those we work with (who get us 40+ hours a week) will eventually see the real person inside.  It doesn’t matter how hard we work to keep appearances up, God always knows our true heart and unfortunately, for most of us, everybody else eventually does as well.

As leaders, we get the privilege (or curse, really) of not really having to appropriate the authentic thoughts of others.  We can choose to isolate ourselves both practically (in an office or through absence or availability) or philosophically (not being open to criticism or challenge).  Completely unchecked, all of us are capable of all manner of despicable things.  Look at history, unchecked power goes in terrifying directions.

Were the notorious villains of history truly evil people or just people whose unquestioned power took them to really evil places?

One of the great barometers for whether or not we are operating from a transformed heart, open to change and in the process of ongoing transformation, is how well we receive criticism.  Are we truly confident enough in the validation we have received from the Father and present enough with others to receive the challenging input of the effect we have on them?

I am a recovering legalist.  My legalism taught me to operate with a lot of false humility… to offer "just enough" of a thin veil of transparency and the appearance of being humble.  I thought it would keep everyone far enough away where they couldn’t see the true person inside.  It didn’t work for very long.  The reality is that law-based faith is really born of deep insecurity.  The law is simply the veil we apply to keep others from the truth about who we really are.

One of the surest signs that we are operating this way is whether or not we are defensive. Defensiveness puts us in the position of advocating for ourselves, not God.  It is amazing how thin-skinned we can get when we are extending a lot of energy to convince others of something you and they both know isn’t true.  At the root, defensiveness basically says that what I want you to believe about me is more important than what you or even God thinks about me.  Like it or not, those closest to us, the ones we love and lead, see the truth.

Consider

• How defensive are you?
• Do you regularly receive input on both the beneficial and challenging impact of your leadership?
• When is the last time you honestly asked someone about the effect you have on them?  Did you make meaningful and obvious changes based on their input?

Restore

And once you live a good story, you get a taste for a kind of meaning in life, and you can’t go back to being normal; you can’t go back to meaningless scenes stitched together by the forgettable thread of wasted time.

— Donald Miller

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My family genealogy tells me that my great-grandparents helped settle the Nordheim/Yorktown area of Texas in the latter part of the 1800’s. They were hearty folks who worked the land in that area for many years.  My grandparents migrated to the budding metropolis of Floresville, TX and opened a family grocery.  My dad’s life rotated around the family business, but...

When my grandmother got old and slow, so did the business. 

And soon after her death, the business died as well.

Out of the experience of my father’s childhood, he took his two degrees and launched out from his first job at Celanese Corporation to start his own business.  He was the hardest working man I ever saw, often grabbing a little sleep on a coach at his office during his all-night work sessions. Even on our weekend custody visits, we got little time with him as he slept most of Saturday to catch up from his exhausting week.  Despite working really hard in his business…

When my father got old and slow, so did his business.

And when he got very sick and died, it died as well.

His redemptive perspective for me was to suggest I go get a good job with a good company and work there the rest of my life.  I really did try to honor his wishes.  Twenty-two years in corporate America, however, mostly spent managing money for a large bank, left me feeling trapped and frustrated.

After a LifePlan retreat made it incontrovertible that I could not continue to sit at a desk in front of a bank of screens managing money, a friend’s offer to help him come run his business felt more like providence than an opportunity to partner with him.  We built a team leadership structure, got clear on vision/values, and moved the company toward a newly imagined future.  Others heard about what we were doing there and opportunities to accomplish similar things at other small businesses (that seemed to have all the same issues and frustrations) ensued.

My current business partners and I started coaching another company several years ago.  The company is now moving toward a much bigger, clearer, and more efficient future.  Their leader is truly a different man.  Always a great man, he is now operating with extraordinary confidence and clarity.  He called me recently to say that an icebreaker at a business gathering posited this question:

“If you could go to any age in your life and stay there the rest of your life, what age would you choose?”

There were a variety of answers, but he was the singular one who chose his current age.  He said he had never been more confident in his leadership role, the plan for his company moving forward, or the incredible future they were going to realize.  He was also enjoying (not unrelated in my experience) the best season in his home life as father/husband.  He graciously provided attribution for all that to the work we had done with him organizationally and as a leader.

Him calling to tell me that hit me deeper than I could have imagined.  Deep beyond deep, there is something far more foundational driving the work I am now doing.  The reason I am so invigorated to do the work that I now do with dozens of businesses has everything to do with…

restoration.

My father died far too young, his body beaten down by stress, worry, and exhaustion.  Somewhere in my subconscious, I always wished that he had not been so alone in his work.  That he had worked with partners or a leadership team, had a clear vision, a solid plan, and had imagined a bigger and better future.  He deserved better than he got.  Owning his own company took decades off his life.

Just like every other small business owner I have encountered, he started his own business for freedom, margin, and the opportunity to have more control of his life. And almost like every other small business owner I know, the business dictated his life and owned him. He was looking for freedom and found the opposite.

Interesting that Jesus sums up his entire earthly ministry by stating healing and freedom as his clear mission in Isaiah 61.  Jesus came to restore everything to what it was originally intended to be.  Freedom and restoration are the clear and powerful deliverables of the gospel.  Ironically, just like most business owners, we have largely realized the opposite (another post for another day!).

Freedom is the cry of all our hearts.

The reason I am so passionate about the work we are doing with so many leaders and their organizations is that it somehow redeems the story of one.

Consider

• Is your current age the one you would choose to stay at forever if you had to choose?
• Would you describe your life as one of freedom?
• Are you clear about who you are and where you are going?

Echo

Cacophony

[kuh-kof-uh-nee]

noun, plural cacophonies.

1. harsh discordance of sound; dissonance

2. a discordant and meaningless mixture of sounds

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One of the favorite films of my children’s earlier years is a Disney film called Brother Bear.  It is full of talking animals, Indian mysticism, and a diverse group of characters finding and appreciating their authentic identity.

Two characters with really no other role in the movie than to be comic relief, are a couple of rams. They not only endlessly slam their racks together but also believe that the echo from their screaming “shut up” across a canyon is actually the answer of another animal.  Idiotic, right?  Fits for a children’s movie.

Sadly, I found I was living a very similar experience.  As an institutional investor for many years, deeply saturating myself in the news and numerous economic tea leaves is how I formed an opinion that allowed me to outperform (hopefully) the market.  It was part of my job to immerse myself in what everyone was saying.

As we migrated from the public trust we found in national news from relatively few media outlets to an ocean of online sources, the news became increasingly opinionated and shaped for consumption.  We no longer looked unblinking at the national news but winked toward the brand and flavor that echoed what we most wanted to hear.

I increasingly listened to only the things that affirmed my strongest opinion and became incredulous that anyone could believe anything different.  I dug my heels in and the dissenting voices did the same.  As the 2008 election crescendoed, my echo chamber had convinced me that everything I believed was 100% right and what the others believed was just as wrong. As the cacophony of voices hit their shrill climax... 

I turned it all off.  

My sense of frustration, fear, and lack of patience were all finding their peak as well.  The discordant and meaningless mixture of sounds started to feel like noise.  We were standing on opposite sides of the canyon, immersed in our own echo chambers, shouting at each other with the only result being more dissonance.  Neither was being heard by the other and no one was having their opinion altered, even in the slightest.

The biggest casualty of this war seemed to be a loss of hope: the most essential ingredient for change.

So why are we talking about this in a leadership post?  Because the best leaders I know, don’t live in echo chambers.

They:

• surround themselves with truth tellers
• mine for hidden conflict and disagreement
• do 360 reviews
• ask for honest feedback (both good and bad) and take it seriously

We encourage companies, teams, and individual leaders to mine for truth from one another.  To not only appreciate and celebrate more, but also speak honestly about their challenges.  We help them mine for truth, candidly deal with problems, agree to decisions, and then drive accountability into their culture.

We are seeing hope, commitment, and momentum rise.  We are seeing clarity and unanimity despite the noise.  There is no currency in living in an echo chamber (for cartoon rams or for business leaders).  

While it is not always easy to factor the feedback of others into your decision making, it is way easier than trying to get buy-in and execution from a team that has no ownership or investment in the decision they are being asked to execute.

Consider

• Do you have people in your life who don’t agree with you on everything?
• Do you openly encourage dissenting opinions or perspectives in your personal or professional life?
• Is soliciting open feedback “baked into” your meeting agendas and overall meeting governance?
• Do you think unspoken differences of opinion are affecting the quality of the decisions you are making?  The level of buy-in of your team members?

Yes

“May you drop (the things that consume you) in the pursuit of a simple, disciplined, focused life in which you pursue a few things God has for you.  And may you be like Jesus, able to say no, because you’ve already said yes.”

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There is a great inspirational video that talks about the sense of overwhelm that most of us live in and contrasts it with the life of Jesus.  The church has co-opted our Western culture sensibility that says doing more is always better.  The more hours I spend in ministry to others and the more people I interact with, the better.

Ironically, Jesus, our example of how we are to live as men and women, took a completely different tack.  He said…

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

That doesn’t sound like the way most Christians I know live, especially the ones involved in ministry.  Exhausted, overwhelmed, and tired seem to be the most prevalent adjectives I hear from them.  I often hear the well-intentioned desire to do more out of the great need that exists.  In my own life, I have had to acknowledge the hubris implied in thinking that everything that needs to be done somehow requires my participation.

The reality is that Jesus’ ministry looked a lot more like spending the majority of time on two basic things:

• meeting with and training a small group of leaders

• time with the Father

Of course, there were speaking engagements on the side of mountains and gatherings seaside, but those didn’t seem to be the defining elements of his weekly schedule.  In fact, the predetermined places most people publicly spoke on the kind of things he taught, he largely stayed away from.

Paul seems to echo these ideas when he is writing to the church in Ephesus:

“So be careful how you live; be mindful of your steps. Don’t run around like idiots as the rest of the world does. Instead, walk as the wise!  Make the most of every living and breathing moment because these are evil times.  So understand and be confident in God’s will, and don’t live thoughtlessly.”

One of the best selling business books of the last few years has become a phenomenon: Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown.  I am not surprised.  Greg says disruptive things like:

“You cannot overestimate the unimportance of virtually everything.”

“If you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will.”

“Essentialism is not about how to get more things done; it is about how to get the right things done.”

We are weaving these principles in everything we do and everything we coach.  The disciplined pursuit of less is not about avoiding responsibility, 

• It is about being more responsible about the right things and forgetting everything else.  
• It is about grooming a team that can groom others in an incredible multiplier effect.  
• It is about taking more time away to be still, get real quiet, and get really clear about what we are supposed to say “yes” to so that it gets really easy to say “no” to all the rest.

Since we coach from a Kingdom perspective, it is about getting away to get really clear about the assignments He has given us so that we can get comfortable shucking all the rest.

It is uncommon.

It is holy.

It is essential.

Consider

• Are you tired and burned out?
• Are you clear about all the things you are saying “yes” to and how that simultaneously means you are saying “no” to a myriad of other things?
• How much ti me are you spending in thoughtful contemplation of what you should be doing?
• How much of how you spend your time is clear, focused, and about the assignment you have been given by Him?

Know

“Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of those rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. I am haunted by waters.” 

- Norm McLean

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These iconic closing lines from A River Runs Through It are some of the most haunting in a film.  It is nearly matched by the opening line of the book by the same name…

“In our family, there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing.”

One of my other favorite books by Norm McLean is the story of the U.S. Forest Service’s elite airborne firefighters, the Smokejumpers, and the Mann Gulch fire of 1949.  The book, Young Men and Fire is a tale of courage, determination, and the undaunted fearlessness of youth.  It is also a story of tragedy.

In a third listening on audio book, a line jumped out at me that I hadn’t recalled from a previous listen or reading.  They were referring to the foreman (the designated leader of the Smokejumpers) and his relationship with the men he led:

“He did not know them by name, they only knew him by his.”

There is no hint of accusation in the way Norm references this, but the mortality rate of these “jumpers” might hold a clue as to why their leader didn’t want to know them any more personally than he did.

When I heard it, my mind immediately went to one of my favorite leaders of a small business.  While it is not uncommon for leaders to not know the names of their team members, this one, in particular, seems to know everyone's.  He told me recently, however, that knowing them all by name wasn’t enough.

He wanted to know them better.  He asked a person on the administrative side of the business, to comb the employee files and get him the names of their spouses and the names of all their children. He wants to learn those as well. As his team is maturing and taking over the leadership of the company in more substantial ways, he is using some of his bandwidth to engage and know his team members even further.

He told me recently that in one of these conversations a new employee was remarking what an incredible place it was to work and how much he was enjoying the experience so far.  This leader said,

“You haven’t seen anything yet.”

This great leader who has created this incredible company is just getting started.  His team has envisioned a transcendent future, and through clear strategic initiatives, a clear organizational plan, and the ownership of a newly formed leadership team, they are going to get there.

They are not where they want to be, 

but they are no longer who they used to be.

The thoughtful, intentional leadership of one, will get them where they need to go.  Knowing all their names is just the tip of the iceberg.  You haven’t seen anything yet.

Consider

• Do you know the people that work for you?
• Why or why not?  (The answer to that question might speak volumes about intentionality, overwhelm, or desire.)
• Do you know about their life beyond work; their families, hopes, and dreams?
• If you think it would be valuable to know them better, what is one step you can take in that direction?

Father

“It would have been better not to have known Him, than to have learned Him wrong.”

- George MacDonald

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The reality is that the first thing we understood about our true Father, came from how we knew our earthly one. If God is the same “yesterday, today, and forever,” then the fact that we all seem to know Him differently must point to the unique experience we have had with Him and our particular perspective of Him. MacDonald and many others believe that how we knew our father (or other significant male role model in our early life) was the greatest determinant of that perspective.

There is obviously a little of a chicken-or-egg conundrum here. How we know Him determines our experience with Him and vice versa. But the unique way we “learned” Him and know Him seems to be less the particular issue that MacDonald is picking at here. He is fundamentally addressing the fact that learning Him wrong is worse than not knowing Him at all. Learned behaviors are hard to break, especially the ones that come to us earliest when we are in the most formative stages of life and imprinting seems to run most deep.

I LEARNED FAMILY WRONG.

My childhood was so fragmented and my parents' marriage so completely broken that I was left with no other choice than to seek out a completely new model for my life and marriage. It was so obviously wrong that what I “learned” was that I would have to choose a completely different path. I read every book I could get my hands on about what a healthy marriage and family should look like and sought out mentoring from the best examples I could find. And yet, despite how wrong I knew my experience of family was and how fervently I wanted to write a different story with mine, some of those practices, beliefs, and ideas still turned up in my marriage and parenting. Imprinting from our childhood runs powerful and deep.

MY FATHER WAS A GOOD AND KIND MAN, BUT HE WAS NOT JESUS.

Turns out that the way we “learned” the Father not only affects the way we view Him and our relationship with Him, but also the posture we carry in our approach to life.  The “orphan spirit” we find in many senior leaders is closely aligned with the entrepreneurial spirit required for launching into life and uncertainty on their own.  One is the shadow effect of the other.  It can also affect our submission to authority and the way we wield our own authority.

WE WERE CREATED FOR RECONCILIATION AND RESTORATION.

The iconic final scene in the movie Field of Dreams so beautifully illustrates the reconnecting of a son with his father, that it has powerfully affected many men’s lives.  So many men, in fact, that Dwier Brown who played John Kinsella and is reunited with his son Ray (played by Kevin Costner) wrote a book about all the stories people told him.  The owners of that Iowa cornfield tell stories of men that show up on that baseball diamond alone, walk the field, and are sometimes even seen crying their eyes out on hands and knees. That longing to be reconciled to the father is defining.

WHAT WE REALLY DESIRE IS TO BE CONNECTED TO OUR HEAVENLY FATHER.

A good friend of mine had a distant and absent father.  The lone exception to that experience was when the two of them were hunting.  For those few days a year on that lease, he had his father's undivided and complete attention.  It may not surprise you that as an adult man, it is at that same place where that man feels closest to and best able to hear from his true Father.

Whenever he most needs to hear from the Father, you will find him, journal in hand on the tailgate of his truck, sitting just outside the hunting lease.  Expecting and finding Him there.

He knows the Father the way he “learned” the father.  It is the same for all of us.

Consider

• How did you learn the Father?
• Did you enjoy your father’s delight, approval, and attention?
• Are you reaching beyond the example of your father to find your true one?
• What is learning Him wrong costing you?

Unique

“When you're introduced to a man, you are meeting the collective experience of every day he has lived from the first to the last.”

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We are all a by-product of the lives we have lived up to this point.  I left a very dysfunctional home and decided to take a path 180 degrees from everything I had ever known up to the point of my salvation in college.  It wasn’t until I was married that I realized that the muscle memory of my life experiences would inexplicably and without intention, show up in my everyday life.

One of the beautiful opportunities of our walk with God is that all of those experiences, even the worst ones, can be redeemed.  As they are redeemed, they are monetized into a currency that allows us to live more powerfully and have a greater impact on others.

“Every past experience is preparation for some future opportunity. God doesn’t just redeem our souls. He also redeems our experiences. And not just the good ones. He redeems the bad ones too, especially the bad ones. How? By cultivating character, developing gifts, and teaching lessons that cannot be learned any other way.”

— Mark Batterson

All of those redeemed experiences are actually the most valuable assets you bring to the table.  It is also what is of greatest value in all of your employees. I have a younger friend who was contemplating taking a project management job.  He was weighing the decision and rightly noted that there were things he liked about the job and things he didn’t.  There were things about the guy who had the job previously and how he did the job that he didn’t agree with.

I told him about the Position Agreements we work on with our clients and the Results Statements that shape each one of them.  What is most important is that a particular result is required from each position.  Ideally, if it is the right person, you want them bringing unique and inspired ideas to how they accomplish the task at hand from their vast and unique experiences.

I told him that I don’t know anything about building multi-million dollar custom homes, but if I had that kind of job, I would accomplish the essential things associated with that task, but add in what was unique and powerful about my particular perspective and experience.  I would probably start with their story and ask a lot of questions. 

• I would create a timeline of every house they lived in.
• Did they have a fort or playhouse growing up?  What was that like?
• What was their first home?  What do they remember fondly about it?
• Did you have any friends whose house you loved?  What did you love about it?
• Where did you live next?
• What was the first house you purchased?  What was it like?  What did you love most about it?  What made you decide to buy it?
• What do you want the culture of the house to be?
• When you dream of the future, who is gathered in the house, what room are you in and what are you doing?  Do you see everyone inside or outside of the house?

Understanding the answers to those questions are essential if the home is going to meet their expectations at the highest level.  If it is going to address the deep longing in their life, it will have to source the experience they have had in terms of homes and living and provide the hope of the life and experience with people they dream of finding.

But that’s just me.

Every one of us, everyone you employ, has something unique and valuable to offer in terms of how they would accomplish a task. 

The necessary step is to agree with the fact that there is more than one way… my way… to get something done well.  There is likely a much better way.

Consider

• Do you bring what is unique about your life and story to the tasks in front of you?
• Have you done any work in terms of finding the redemptive perspective on the experiences of your life?  We do that at Lifeplan. 
• Have you permissioned those you love and lead to bring their unique nature and perspective to the tasks in front of them?