The Window and The Mirror
Filed under: Core Values, Leadership Callling, Personal Development, Servant Leader
I have always been an Alabama football fan since the days of Coach Bryant. One of the things I always appreciated about him was when we lost a game he always took the responsibility in the press conference and never cast blame toward the players or officials.
According to Jim Collins in his best seller Good to Great all great leaders do the very same thing. His team noticed this pattern in all of the very successful leaders and they called it the window and the mirror effect.
All great leaders would look out the window and give credit to other people and not themselves when things were going well. At the same time, they would look in the mirror to assume responsibility for failure and never blame bad luck or someone else when things went poorly.
The comparison companies did just the opposite. These leaders would look out the window to blame someone or something when they experienced negative results. When they did get it right they would look admiringly in the mirror and take all the credit with great fanfare.
We all need to apply this lesson on a personal level. It is always easy to justify our bad behavior when we can use what someone else said or did to hurt us as an excuse. Assuming personal responsibility for our attitudes, words and actions is the first major step in becoming a leader who is driven by character and not by the fading recognition of the crowd.
Leadership Demands Courage
Filed under: Core Values, Leadership Callling, Personal Development, Servant Leader
A legend from India tells about a mouse who was terrified of cats until a magician agreed to transform him into a cat. That resolved his fear until he met a dog, so the magician changed him into a dog. The mouse-turned-cat-turned-dog was content until he met a tiger—so , once again, the magician changed him into what he feared.
But when the tiger came complaining that he had met a hunter, the magician refused to help. “I will make you into a mouse again, for though you have the body of a tiger, you still have the heart of a mouse.”
Courage is defined as the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger and pain without fear. In the economic environment we find ourselves in today there are many things that we could choose to fear.
What we desperately need today are leaders who possess the character to make the hard calls that will help us move through this crisis and into a brighter future. In this day when the pace of change seems to be moving at the speed of light there will seem to be a new danger around every corner.
When Jim Collins describes the type of leaders that led their organization to greatness they possessed two key qualities. They are individuals with extreme personal humility and an unwavering resolve to do whatever must be done to produce the best long term results, no matter how difficult.
Great leaders are certainly human but on the inside they possess the heart of a lion and not of a mouse.
Definition of Balanced Life
Filed under: Family Ministry, Leadership Callling, Life Balance, Marriage, Parenting, Personal Development, Time Management
All of us feel like we have too many things to do and not enough time to do them. We have priorities in many different areas: our career, family, relationships, entertainment, faith and own personal life. We also fulfill many roles as employees, fathers, husbands, wives, mothers, and friends just to name a few.
Somehow we have developed this concept that true happiness and success comes when all of these areas and roles are in perfect balance. It is as if they all have equal percentages of our time, energy and passion.
Realistically we all know that is an impossible goal to accomplish. Our career alone demands a ever growing disproportionate amount of our time and if you have a newborn child in your house all bets are off including time to sleep.
To me a balanced life means that all of these areas as well as our different roles will constantly be changing in the amount of resources they demand. The critical factor is not to let anything that is important in your life be totally neglected to the point that you are now failing in that area because all of the other things have drained you to the point you have nothing left to give.
When you reach that point and we all do from time to time we must reprioritize our lives so that everything important gets its slot on our calendars. This will mean that something else will have to get less or be eliminated all together.
Believe it or not sometimes we need to not go to the new latest and greatest parenting conference and just stay at home and play with our children. Life can be crazy and its demands will change with each new day.
When you have the character and courage to assume the responsibility of leading your total life you will make sure that nothing major falls through the cracks. Enjoy your day!!
Dan Greer
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