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Iron Sharpens Iron – Learn From Your Team

By Business, Church Planting, Encouragement, Leadership, Organizational Leadership, Team Leadership

Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another. Proverbs 27:17

This verse has inspired me over the years, but recently I saw it in a different context for my life. One of the biggest mistakes I see leaders make is failing to learn from the people on their team. We tend to think the best ideas are outside our organization, so we learn from many sources, but many times the best ideas for the organization are already with us. I love to attend conferences, I read tons of books, I follow numerous blogs of great leaders, but the fact is God has surrounded me with great leaders with whom I work. I need to make sure I’m learning from them.

Here’s a gentle reminder…

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Take Time for Excellence

By Business, Change, Innovation, Leadership

Often it’s one revision…a second look…one additional opinion…that takes an idea or a project from “Okay” to noteworthy.

It happens for me when writing a sermon. If I take the time to finish, then sit on it 24 hours, then go back for one more critical look the message is always better than it was before.

Don’t rush excellence. There’s a balance between stalling too long and rushing through a decision.

Which do you lean towards…rushing through a project or stalling too long?

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Church Growth: When Size Matters

By Business, Change, Church, Church Planting, Leadership

Prior to entering ministry, my wife and I owned a small business. It was small in the sense of how economists measure businesses, but it was a big business to us. Whenever you have to make payroll for almost 40 people (including yourself)…that seems big. This was my second venture as an entrepreneur. The first was extremely successful, but this one was not. An opportunity came to sell and we quickly accepted. We learned tons of principles from that negative experience that still help us today, but it was a very challenging time for us personally.

Looking back on that experience, I realize one of the major problems we had being successful. There were hundreds of issues, including some of our own mistakes, but one aspect of our company and where we were in the market worked against us most. I discovered that….

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Organizational Tip: Give Permission to Be Spontaneous

By Business, Change, Innovation, Leadership, Organizational Leadership, Team Leadership

Recently I attended the Story Conference in Chicago. It was a two day conference for the creative-minded packed full of the best ideas available to communicate our story to the world. It was a well-planned and scripted time and Ben Arment, the conference founder, is to be commended for the event.

The greatest moment for me, however, happened…

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Positional Versus Relational Authority

By Business, Church Planting, Leadership, Organizational Leadership, Team Leadership

I was sitting with a staff member recently who presented me an idea. I had reservations about the idea instantly. It was actually a “red flag” idea and I knew it. I love ideas, however, and I’m consistently encouraging our staff to dream, take risks, and improve upon what we are doing. So I listened intently and we discussed the pros and cons of the idea. The next day this staff member came back to tell me he had thought about our discussion and had changed his mind and was going a different direction. I was thrilled with “his” decision.

In that instance I used relational authority….

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Leading Alone is Never a Good Idea

By Business, Christians, Church Planting, Encouragement, Leadership

If you are leading a team or organization, I have some simple advice for you. This is based on years of experience. I have been guilty of trying to lead on my own. I once had the false idea that I had to lead independent of others and that if I shared my struggles with other leaders, somehow I would be less of a leader. I felt like a sign of strength was to prove that I didn’t need help, but, as many of you know, this is never true for any leader.

Even still, I have been in organizations where there was no one on my team I felt I could confide in with a weakness. If this is your case, or especially if you are the only leader:

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Exploring Coaching Network Options: Help Please

By Business, Church Planting, Leadership, Life Plan

I’m exploring options…thinking through some ways that I can invest in the current and future leadership of the church. One of the most common themes these days among leaders I admire is to start a coaching network, basically as a way to “coach” a small group of leaders for a determined period of time. I’ve never been one to copy what everyone else is doing, but I don’t want to miss opportunities either.

So I’m curious…would you help me by answering a few questions?

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The Posture of Leadership

By Business, Church Planting, Innovation, Leadership, Organizational Leadership, Vision

It’s a strange phenomenon…I’ve seen people serve in leadership roles who I don’t even think are qualified to lead, yet they are leading and people are following. And, many times, they are achieving results…

The reason is not their abilities as much as the way they have positioned or presented themselves to a group of followers.

Here’s one principle of leadership:

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7 Hints for Working with Busy Leaders

By Business, Leadership

Busy leaders. You know them. I hesitated to call them “important” people, because frankly I think all of us are equally important, but these are the leaders who have influence in a certain area of expertise and you would love a chance to spend some time with them just to learn from them. Perhaps you need their assistance for a project or you just want to glean from their experience.

The problem is these leaders have limited time to spend beyond what they are currently doing. You already view their time as valuable to you. You want to make the best use of it that you can.

Here are a few pointers to help your interactions with these busy leaders:

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