5minutesORLess

Leaders Out of Nowhere

On the road of blogging on leadership, life interrupted me.  I was driving back from a training session in Sandpoint, Idaho when I came on a horrible head-on collision that had happened only a few seconds before.  It was a horrific scence.  A baby had been thrown out of a SUV and the mother and a passenger were pinned inside.  Almost immediately a fire started under the SUV that could not be put out no matter how hard we tried.  It would take 20 minutes for fire trucks to arrive.  Every door had been jammed due to the impact.  As the flames began to reach into the interior both the driver and the passenger were removed through the side windows.  The baby was fine.  The mother is fighting for her life and the passenger died on the way to the hospital.  The other vehicle was a pickup truck driven by an intoxicated man who had his license suspended in 1986 and had 60 subsequent arrests for driving without a license or driving while intoxicated.  He will survive his injuries.

So what does that horrific scene have to do with leadership?  It was heartening to see over a dozen people disregard their own safety and comfort and risk their lives for another by trying to save two people destined to be burned alive.  

An essential quality for leadership is bravery--the willingness to sacrifice your own personal safety for another.  There is no such thing as a cowardly leader.  I did not see managers around that SUV that evening.  Only leaders.  I was proud to have been shoulder to shoulder with over a dozen leaders, many of whom had no idea they had it in them.

Greater love has no one than this: to (be willing to) lay down one's life for one's friends.  John 15:13 (parenthesis, mine)

On Becoming a Leader--Warren Bennis--Leaders and Managers

Leaders and Managers

Warren Bennis, in his book, On Becoming a Leader, says, "I tend to think of the differences between leaders and managers as the differences between those who master the context and those who surrender to it." (p. 39)   He goes on to say, "No leader sets out to be a leader.  People set out to live their lives, expressing themselves fully.  When that expression is of value, they become leaders."  (p. 104)  I would add that when people fail to meet the mark of a leader, to master the context, as Bennis describes, they become managers.  Ouch!  This is not a 'dis on managers, per se.  People can be and are very effective managers and serve in many capacities as a supervisor, a lead or a group manager.  That's not what I'm referring to.  It's the attitude of manager, not the function that is the problem.  Check out the attached file contrasting the differences between managing and leading.  There is a huge difference and it is all in attitude, not function.  Download Contrast of Managers and Leader 

A leader without the discipline of a manager introduces more chaos than direction.  However a manager without the capacity to positively influence others to take risks, challenge conventional thinking, to push the rules and not be satisfied with compliance is a person way too comfortable with keeping order rather than pushing the ministry envelope.

One of my favorite memories is the reaction of a dear friend and pastor whom I've had the privilege of coaching/mentoring.  Early in our relationship I was talking about the distinctions between managing and leading ministry when a sobering thought coalesced  in his mind.  Like Macauley Caulkin in the movie, Home Alone, he put his hands on his cheeks and exclaimed, "Good grief, I'm a freaking manager."

Managing is not bad, it's just that left to itself the ministry is neat but has no future.  Left to itself ministry management degrades to being merely a custodian of ritual.

What is the difference between the attitude of a spiritual leader and that of a ministry manager?  As Bennis has pointed out and as I've illustrated in previous posts, it is about having a distinctive voice speaking a clear vision for the future.  The voice of the manager speaks to what must be done.  The voice of a leader speaks to what can be done.  Leadership is about a passion for what could be rather than than a manager's intention to achieve planning mileposts and program goals.  It is about leaders who have the courage and conviction to do the right things rather than simply to do things right.  And finally, for the leader, it is truly about pushing the envelope; getting people to take risky stretches of faith and to get those who follow to begin to wonder, "what if."  The manager does his or her job well when risk is minimized, not enhanced; when people complete their planning goals and mileposts and stay on track.  Leaders do their job well when the discipline of managing chaos is present and from that base of stability future vision is implemented.

You may have gained a misimpression.  It sounds like the worst thing you would want to be is a manager.  That couldn't be further from the truth.  Managing is the hygiene of ministry and organizational process.  Without it there is chaos, conflict and wasted resources.   Every effective leader MUST be a disciplined manager.  Where the problem lies is in having an ATTITUDE of a manager while thinking and acting as if you are a leader.  It is about attitude, not actions.

Question for Reflection  When I feel I've been successful is it because I met my goals and the plans of the ministry (usually measured in "nickles and noggins"--money and attendance) or is it because lives have been changed for the better because of my influence and the efforts of my team?

On Becoming a Leader--Warren Bennis Four Ingredients-Passion

2. Passion  Bennis previously talked about four essential competencies—1. engaging others by creating a shared meaning, 2. having a distinctive voice, 3. having integrity, and 4. having adaptive capacity.  He now adds to that with four ingredients that constitute an effective leader.  The first is a guiding vision.  The second is passion.

In 1965  there was a movie about Michelangelo and the painting of the Sistine Chapel.  Charlton Heston was Michelangelo and Rex Harrison played Pope Julius II.  It was titled “The Agony and the Ecstasy.”  It took Michelangelo 4 years to complete the ceiling fresco and there were many days when Michelangelo went head to head with the Pope over how the painting as envisioned by the artist would satisfy the personal and practical needs of the owner.  So it is with passion.  Passion usually isn't always pretty as the possessor of the passion struggles between the ideal and the "deal."  But in the end, a person with a guiding vision and no passion is merely a dreamer--perhaps like the priests of Jerusalem in Ezekiel's time, "Indeed, to them you are nothing more than one who sings love songs with a beautiful voice and plays an instrument well, for they hear your words but do not put them into practice." (Ezekiel 33:32) 

Passion personalizes the dream and makes it happen in the midst of adversity and struggle.  There was, no doubt, many a day when Michelangelo didn't want to argue with Pope Julius or work the plaster and paint of a 12,000 square feet work of art.  But something drove him back each day.  It was the passion to make a dream become real--so real that five hundred years later people wait in lines for half a day for a fifteen minute view of a magnificent work of art.

So it is with passion.  Not merely enthusiasm or excitement or a positive attitude.  It is a drive that comes from deep within that if left unfulfilled will leave the person feeling anxious, restless and longing for the opportunity to see the work completed. 

A person with a guiding vision but no passion is merely a dreamer.  When it comes to leadership, people will inevitably follow someone who can articulate a compelling vision and then act that vision out with an intensity of commitment and clarity.  They have become “one tune Willies”—single minded and intensely focused on the message.   Much of what they say and write contains the thoughts, ideas and plans of that vision. 

Passion is not limited to enthusiasm, charismic elocution and emotional transparency.  Passion is more often communicated through the leader’s willingness to take selfless risk, displaying courage and bravery, even facing the possibility of arrest, imprisonment, torture and execution for a crime committed by others so that they would not have to endure the same punishment.  Through the ages this has been known as the “passion” of Christ; a passion not of enthusiasm and charismic titillation, but rather of virtue and purposed focus of living out the vision.

A leader with passion wakes in the morning thinking about the vision. During the day a leader incorporates the vision as a frame of reference in most of what is done, whether directly related to ministry or not.  Going to bed at night the leader prepares to dream about the vision as well.  A little over focused?  Not when passion has taken over a life.  Passion is vision plus inspiration.  Perhaps even a magnificent obsession with all the agony and ecstacy.

Questions for Reflection:  How does passion evidence itself in your ministry?  By you?  By others?  How do you distinguish true passion from intense manipulation?

Next Post:  Four Ingredients-Integrity