What It All Boils Down To

For the longest time, I struggled with the concept of leadership.  It always seemed like such a vague and subjective idea to me, and, because of this, I paid little attention to it's importance in my life.  All I knew was that I could identify a leader when I saw one, and that was enough for me.  In fact, it wasn't until the past couple of years that I began to truly understand what it meant to be a leader, and to see the importance of growing as a leader in all aspects of my life.  I've seen it change my relationships, my goals, my passions, and my life strategies.  And it's a big reason why I felt the need and desire to start this blog in the first place.

A little insight about myself: I am a man of few words.  I like getting to the point and don't feel the need to add a lot of fluff to what I need to say.  My wife can tell me a story, present a problem, or ask for advice in a 5 minute mini-speech, and I can respond (much to her chagrin) in a sentence or two.  My friends will tell you I'm not much for small talk.  I don't like listening to fluff either.  Listening to coaches speak about their teams drives me nuts because they rarely say anything of substance, instead choosing to just throw out a bunch of filler and cliches to appease reporters and fans.  And don't even get me started on political speeches.  When it comes right down to it, I really just don't like dancing around the subject of what needs to be said.  And that's how I felt, for many years, that leadership had been presented to me: as a bunch of fluff, with no real point.  I wanted to know the answer to the question: "In one word, what is leadership?"

I feel like John Maxwell gives that answer in the 2nd Law of The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership.  Here, he boils leadership down to one measure: influence.  The Law of Influence says that being a leader is all about the influence you have with others.  And when you think about it, this makes sense.  In order to lead, I need to influence.  I can't get someone to follow me if they don't care about what I do and say.  In a nutshell, our ability to lead is all about how much influence we have in people's everyday lives.

A fantastic example of this is UK basketball coach John Calipari.  The man is a master at 3 things: getting the best players to come to his school, getting them to buy into the team mentality, and preparing them for a professional basketball career.  That's what he's all about.  And he's a master at this because of his ability to influence these players and their families on so many levels.  Think about how many megastar recruiting classes he has had in his time here at UK.  Think about how sacrificially these megastars have played, seeking the betterment of the team instead of their stat line.  Think about how he has been able to help these kids make the right decision in regards to when they need to enter into the NBA.  It has required a remarkable amount of influence on Cal's part in making all these things happen, year in and year out, and the resulting success for the players and UK have been amazing.  Cal is a master of the Law of Influence.

So if we understand that leadership and influence go hand in hand, the follow up question is "How do I gain influence?".  It's a question that is not easily answered, and it's something that doesn't happen overnight.  It's taken Cal years of hard work to gain the considerable level of influence he holds over young basketball players.  And while it may not take you as long as it took Cal, it will take some time for you to be able to influence those around you.  That's just the nature of things.  In addition to time, there are a few key areas that John Maxwell suggests we need to grow in that produce influence, including our character, relationships, knowledge, intuition, experience, past success, and ability, all of which we will talk about going forward.

All in all, the take away is this: if you want to be a better leader, you need to grow your influence.  Spend some time thinking about those around you and the level of influence you have with them.  Is it where you want it to be?  If you want to lead well, you need people to listen when you speak, and to take notice when you act.  Work to increase your ability to influence, and you'll see your ability to lead grow along with it.

Source: John C. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 2007, Thomas Nelson.

Leadership Inequality

You've probably heard the phrase "All men are created equal" a thousand times since you were in grade school.  It's one of the principles that our country was built upon: that we all have a common bond in our humanity, and that, all in all, none of us are inherently better than the other.  It's a principle that we as a country believe and that God claims to be true as well.  Paul touches on the subject in Romans 3:23 when he says that we all fall short of God's standard, and that as a result we are all in the same boat because of our sin.  In the end, whatever our talents, our upbringing, our education, and no matter how hard we work, we are all equals in regards to our humanity.

But the same can't be said for leadership.

You might think me un-American for daring to say that all leaders aren't created equal.  But the truth is that they're not.  Some people are just going to be better leaders than others.  It's just the nature of how leadership works. We weren't all created with the same leadership abilities.  And while we need to be ok with that, that doesn't mean we sit back and stop our growth as a leader, because, as we discussed in the previous post, our effectiveness in our field of service is directly related to our level of leadership.  So we need to keep growing as a leader to be more effective as a person and as a team.

In his book The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, John Maxwell describes this phenomenon as the Law of the Lid.  It's the first of the 21 laws and a foundation that we have to take to heart if we want to grow in leadership.  Essentially, we all have a leadership "lid", a number that describes our leadership abilities.  This number describes how effective we can be as a leader.  It's a number that is not fixed; it can be raised or lowered, and it's determined by several factors, including natural talent, drive, experience, and others.  And it's an important concept to remember as we move forward in studying leadership.

So why is your "lid" so important?  Let me explain a little further.  Let's say these leadership "lids" can be measured on a scale from 1-10 (10 being the most ability, 1 the least).  If my current leadership lid is a 5, I will only be able to be an effective leader to those whose leadership lids are considered to be below a 5.  And that means I'll find it almost impossible to effectively lead those who have leadership lids of 5 or higher.  It's a tough concept to embrace, but it's true 99 times out of 100.  So what's my solution?  I've got to raise my lid.  I've got to work at getting to a 6 so I can lead more people effectively.

Now, in real life, we don't have a 1-10 scale telling us how good of a leader we are.  And there is no perfect 10 leader among mankind.  But the concept still remains: we need to strive to get better at leading others so that we can positively influence people that we may not have been able to influence before.  And we have to do that one step at a time.  We may never be a 10, and honestly, some of us will start to peak out at around a 7.  But that's doesn't excuse us from growing.

We see this principle in God's Word with The Parable Of The 3 Servants.  I won't cover the whole story, but the main idea is that a master leaves varying amounts of money to 3 of his servants while he is away on a trip, expecting them to do something productive with it.  2 of them go out and put the money to good use, investing it in hopes that it would grow.  But the third buries his money, hoping that his master would be happy that he merely held on to what he was given.  When the master returns, he was happy with the first 2 because, regardless of the amount of money they were given, they sought to grow the money for their master.  But he was furious with the servant who merely buried the money, because he had not "used well what he had been given".  In the master's eyes, it wasn't about how much they had been given, but what they did to grow what they had been given.

I wholeheartedly believe that this parable is applicable when we talk about our leadership ability.  You may be a 6 on the scale, and there is a 7 that God wants you to lead and influence, but it can only happen if you grow as a leader.  That's why the Law of the Lid is so crucial to understand an apply.

So, yeah, all leaders aren't created equal. Not all of us will be 10s, or 9s, or even 8s.  But the point of leadership is not about us and how awesome a leader we can become so we can brag about it and make ourselves feel better; it's about helping others advance to reach their God-given potential, and being faithful to build upon the God-given foundation of leadership we've been given.  And the first step of that process is committing to raising your "lid".  You've really already started because you're reading this blog, which means you are seeking to be a better leader.  As we go forward, we'll see how we can all raise our lids and be more effective leaders of what God has given us.


Source: John C. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 2007, Thomas Nelson.