TIRED...

I am way too tired to write much tonight... Crazy week - Leadership Summit. Teaching on Sunday and heading out of town again next week. You'll hear from me in a day or two when I can actually hold a thought for more than .544 seconds.

ADIOS

LEADERSHIP SUMMIT DAY 1

Wow - what a day... Great 1st day at The Leadership Summit.

Bill Hybels began the summit with 2 sessions. The first session was entitled, "The Leadership Test". He correlated the leadership of Jesus and His interaction with His disciples with leadership in the church and business realm.

The 5 tests, according to Hybels, are:

1. The "Bias Toward Action" Test

As a leader, go out of your way to create "test environments" for people. Find out who the "make it happen people" are in your organization.
Jesus knew how much "action" His life and mission would require, so He made it a priority to seek out action oriented leaders.

2. The "Can You Follow Directions" Test

BYSSIW = Because you say so, I will.
Does your prospetive leader have a cooperative attitude?

3. The "Who Deserves the Credit" Test

Obviously, God is the 1st to get the credit when something is successful. But so does the "team" - the group of committed leaders.
When we work on a team, we need to privately, publically and frequently give credit to those on the team.

4. The "Grander Vision" Test

Jesus challenged His disciples by offering them the opportunity to be a part of a "grander" vision - from fishers of fish to fishers of men!
As leaders (especially in the church arena) we need to continually challenge people to give what's left of their lives to the "grander" vision.

5. The "Will You Leave It" Test

This is the most expensive test!
Connecting with the "Grander Vision" will cause you to give up a lot - but God always gives it back... And then some!

Jim Collins lectured on being a "Level 5 Leader". You can read about that by clicking here.

Andy Stanley spoke on "Making Vision Stick".

You can check out pictures here.

More on Friday...

MY MONEY IN IRAQ?

It's a bright, sunshiny day here in Chi-town. In fact, for the sake of current convienience, it is a little too bright. I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Naperville and there is not a spot in this store where the sun is not beaming directly on my face. AHHHHHH! I guess it's a great way to get caffeinated and tanned in one shot.

Ok - I have a totally weird thought that I'm sure people everywhere have thought of. I was reading a story last night in Newsweek about Saddam Hussein's sons Odai and Qusay and the events surrounding their deaths. In the article, it was talking about how when they went through the home where they were staying at the time of their death, they found several million dollars. Some was Iraqi money (dinars) and then there was quite a bit of United States currency.

So here was my thought (and yes, I know it's totally dumb and I'm ashamed to even take up your time with this...): How many hands has that money passed through over the years and is it possible that in the 29 years of my existance that one of those dollars were at one time in my possession? Sorry - I know that's crazy and I will, for the sake of an excuse, blame this on ADD or something like that.

Gotta go - Leadership Summit will be starting in about 30 minutes. More updates later...

GET PAID TO GO TO CHURCH!

Check this out...

UPCOMING WEEK; LEADERSHIP SUMMIT

Wow! What a week this one will be... On Monday evenings (Mondays are my day off...) I usually sit down to review my week and "mentally" prepare my brain for what's coming.

The big "highlight" of my week will be on Thursday, Friday and Saturday when I (along w/ some of our staff) will be attending the Willow Creek Leadership Summit. We will be attending the "off-site" video feed at Community Christian Church in Naperville, IL.

The speakers at this conference are going to be FANTASTICO!

Bill Hybels - Senior Pastor @ Willow Creek Community Church here in Chicago (you know - that small little church in Barrington...)
Jim Collins - Author of the MUST READ BOOK Good to Great)
Karen Hughes - Ex-Presidential Advisor to Prez GW Bush
Andy Stanley Pastor of Northpoint Community Church in Atlanta - where I just visited for about the 5th time and must say that this church is one that every church leader needs to look at - tons of innovative/creative ideas in reaching the unchurched...)
Patrick Lencioni - author of The Five Temptations of a CEO (Great book!)

And a bunch more really top notch communicators/leaders...

So - stay tuned for updates on this conference. If any of you are going to be attending at the Community Christian location, let me know - it would be great to connect!

And in all seriousness - if you have not yet read, Good to Great by Jim Collins, YOU NEED TO! It is an absolutely fantastic book about being - yes...you guessed it - GREAT. The 'jist' of the book is that "good" is the enemy to "great" and too many people, businesses and organizations settle for good when greatness CAN be acheived. Very practical and probably one of the single most impactful leadership books I've ever read.

Goodnight and may the face of the Lord shine upon you and may the presence of the Holy One surround your bed as you dream in the Spirit. (I'm totally kidding...)

A FEW THOUGHTS ON LEADERSHIP & EMOTIONS

I am convinced that if there is anything that will hinder us from being long term, effective leaders it is the tendency that we often have to not keep a proper handle on our emotions.

There is no way around the fact that the role of leadership in our lives will bring with it "ups" and "downs". There will be days when we, as leaders, will feel excited, motivated, and optimistic.

Then, there will be those days when we feel completely out of our "element" and even question whether or not we are truly "called" to be a leader. There will be times that we look around us and say to ourselves, "I am the worst leader in this world - I am making no impact on the environment around me whatsoever!"

So with all that said, I truly believe that one of the things that will help us keep our emotions in "check" is to keep our eyes focused on the BIG PICTURE.

The tendency that most of us have is to hang out in a ditch. We either become negatively jolted by every bit of bad news or we have the tendency to jump over on the other side of the ditch and sometimes "over" celebrate accomplishments and get into this "everything's cool - let's just stop pushing now" mentality.

I think there has to be a balance in between the two. When I read and study successful business people, the one thing that I see over and over again is that those CEO's keep their eyes on the big picture - not on the wavering stock market or bad news that might come in on occassion. They don't ignore those things, but they also don't allow those "temporary" DISTRACTIONS (and let me tell you - that is exactly what they are - distractions...) to knock them off their path.

Speaking from the aspect of an organization that is in transition, I can say that one of the things that will continue to push us through to "success" is staying "die-hard" focused on what God wants us to do - no matter how bad it looks, no matter what people say, no matter what the 'market' says - but staying consistently focused on what we believe we are here to accomplish.

That means that, as a leader, not everyone will like you and me and there may be times that Newsweek will give us a downward pointed arrow. But then again, Newsweek can kiss my....

Can I get a big "amen"? Tell me your thoughts - I'll post them... happyweeble@hotmail.com

SH