Month: March 2017

Failing to Plan…

As either Ben Franklin, or Robert Schuller or someone has said, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.” Over the weekend, I sat down for my weekly review and I realized that while 2017 is off to one of the best starts ever when it comes to what I’m accomplishing that matters as a leader, my biggest weakness is still planning. I have been through most of Michael Hyatt’s material, which I recommend fully, and yet the challenge for me is still to take the time each day to plan my work and work my plan. My morning routine has become established in nearly every area, but the area of planning the day. I start with prayer, Bible reading and exercise. Then when I ought to move to planning, something happens: my thought is what happens is I decide I “know” what I’m going to do today so I don’t need to plan.

The truth is I do know what I’m going to do most days, and yet knowing what I’m going to do and setting forth a plan to do it can be the difference between the knowing and the doing for me. When I have my planner in front of me and I set for the three things I’m going to do in a given day, the likelihood I will accomplish those three tasks is much higher, but there’s something even more important that I miss when I don’t get out the planner: I connect those three tasks to the goals on which they’re based. The reason you and I need to plan daily is to ensure what we do ties in to our over all goals for the day, week, month and year.

When Ben or Robert or whoever it was said, “Failing to plan is planning to fail,” the idea my have simply been to have a to do list for the day in order to accomplish more work, but it likely meant much more. Not only do we need a plan for the day, but a plan for the week, month, year and for our lives. That’s what moves us beyond time management to life management. That’s where failing to plan is truly planning to fail. I will certainly accomplish something today, whether I take the plan or not, but will I accomplish the few things that will leverage my leadership to the highest degree possible? That’s the question each of us as leaders need to ask ourselves before we plunge into a day without an effective plan. Yes, we are all “busy,” but busy with what?

As I’ve written so often here, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” We may live unexamined lives in many different ways. One of them is to go through a “full” day knocking items off our to do list, which may be a real or imagined list, and then discovering after weeks, or months of such activity, we have done a lot, but our leadership isn’t more effective and our organization isn’t farther along the path of becoming what it was created to be and do. Activity is no assurance of productivity. That’s why we need a plan for the day, week, month, year and for our lives. I’m writing this as much to remind myself as to remind you.

Here’s to leading better by taking the time to have a plan not only for today but for our lives–today!

What I Would Tell My Twenty Year Old Self – Part 3

In concluding our three part series on What I Would Tell My Twenty Year Old Self when it comes to leadership, I would tell myself, “Wherever you are, be all there!” I don’t remember who made this point to me a number of years ago, but it’s one I wish I had learned in my twenties. The point is if I am with my wife, I need to be with my wife. In that moment, I can’t be attending to something from work, or thinking about a personal development plan, or anything and do justice to that moment. With the advent of instant access social media, this idea of being all there is even more challenging, and perhaps even more necessary.

How many times have you attended a meeting and as someone is giving their presentation, a person or two, or even you are looking at the portable device on your lap for some information, or at a text? It’s impossible to fully attend what someone is saying or demonstrating while dividing our attention with a mobile device. While the human mind is amazing and can process information 2-3 times faster than another human can speak, thus always allowing for extra thinking while we are listening to someone also, if we are all there, we are using that extra time to formulate thoughts about the comments of the person, whether agreement or challenge or whatever. The truth is a timely placed question or challenge of a fact, offered appropriately, after someone has presented information honors them by showing we were fully in that moment with them.

Great leaders are the best multi-tackers, they are the best at affirming the value of those around the whether co-workers, fellow managers or leaders, family members or whomever. Giving our full attention to someone is one of the single, best ways to show them honor and that we value them. When we are all there with the a person in whatever situation it may be, it permits us to gain the best information, which every leader needs to make decisions; to give the highest value to the other, which every leader needs in order to develop the strongest relationships with them; and to make the best use of time, because we don’t have to go back and fill in blanks from the aspects of the conversation we missed because we weren’t fully attending to it.

While it may seem a minor matter to “be all there,” I have found it to be one of the most helpful aspects of any day in which I succeed in doing it. By being all there, wherever “there” may be, I enjoy those moments most, lead most effectively, and ultimately gain the most value from the time. One final thought: if you cannot “be all there” in a given situation, is it a place you ought to be in that moment? In other words, if you are distracted while being in a meeting, if something is so urgent or important in that moment that you are “somewhere else,” perhaps you need to be in that other place. What I’m saying is sometimes when we practice the habit of being all there over time, it helps us to set our priorities. If the person texting us is truly more important to our leadership in that moment than the meeting we’re sitting through, then we need to leave the meeting and get in front of that other person. Otherwise, we need to put away the electronic device and be all there, wherever there may be.

Here’s to leading better by being all there–today!

What I Would Tell My Twenty Year Old Self – Part 2

In continuing this week’s focus on what I would tell my twenty year old self about leadership, if I had the opportunity to go back and do it all again, today’s point is: Whatever You Are–Be All In! As a follower of Jesus, I’m reminded that in the Book of Revelation, Jesus told a church located in the city of Laodicea He preferred they would be either hot or cold, but because they were lukewarm and neither hot nor cold He was going to spit them out of His mouth. What a clear reminder Jesus offered: Go all in or be all out, but don’t go halfway.

I’m reminded of the saying I learned from many years of working with folks in recovery from alcohol and other drug addiction: Half measures availed nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked His protection and care with complete abandon. Halfway doesn’t get us there. Half in doesn’t move us to action. We must make a full commitment as leaders in order to be taken seriously and in order to move others to action. I’m not talking about passion alone, but I am talking about passion. Our hearts have to be motivated if our heads and bodies are to follow. That’s true of others’ heads and bodies as well.

Last night I had the opportunity to speak at the leadership academy of a larger church in the area. Over the past couple weeks, as I thought and prayed about what to say in a two hour talk, which would likely be a once in a lifetime opportunity, what would be the most helpful thing I could say? I made three points and the first one was be all in. I realized with the opportunity to speak to younger leaders, the question of what I would tell my twenty year old self was extremely relevant. They were for the most part twenty and thirty year olds. Therefore, my opportunity was to help them include intentionality in their leadership that I had sometimes missed. Being all in with what we are is so important.

What I missed when I was going through my twenties was a 100% all in commitment to being a pastor. I came to the ministry grudgingly. I didn’t want to be a pastor, but God called me to it. I said, “Yes,” to the call after five years of seeking to avoid it during my late teens and early twenties. Instead of embracing the vocation fully, I sort of half raised my hand in saying, “Yes.” I went to seminary, and did better than average, but not my best. I worked in a couple of churches as a student pastor and exceeded the churches’ expectations, but not my own. I was always wondering whether there was another opportunity, a better opportunity.

I realize you may not be a pastor, but if you’re a leader you can certainly identify with the idea of being all in or not in what you are, and I make a point of saying what you are rather than just what you do, because while leadership is something we do, being a leader is what we are. You may be a CEO or a teacher, or a parent, and those are all tasks we do, but they are something we are, before they are something we do, at least they ought to be if we’re all in. If I had it all to do over again, if I could go back to my twenties and relive that decade, I would be all in. What a difference it would have made if I had woken up daily and taken discipline seriously every day (see yesterday’s post), and jumped into being a pastor with both feet rather than wondering whether I ought to have been a lawyer or a chiropractor or a doctor or a… so many other possibilities.

I’m not saying that in the best of scenarios we don’t at times think about the grass being greener on the other side of the fence. I’m saying if we invest our lives leading on the side of the fence we find ourselves, we will be so much more productive, effective and at the end of the day so much happier. I’ve always experienced happiness as a by-product rather than a destination. I find myself being happy when I’m all in with just about anything. Whether it’s my work, or a relationship, or even watching a television program investing myself fully makes the experience more enjoyable and I feel happier as a result.

So what about you? Are you all in right now in whatever area or areas you lead? Do you wake up fully invested in whatever it is you are called or have chosen to be? What single step would it take for you to be more fully invested, to be all in? These are vital questions, because while we don’t get to be our twenty year old self again, unless you happen to be in your twenties right now, we can be the best self we are right now, by being all in. If we can’t be all in then we ought to get out and jump into something else. I know that’s a post for another day, but the one action that has made the biggest difference in my being all in was to take a great step of faith (which some would call a great step of stupid) and leave a comfortable position with an assured future to step out in total uncertainty to follow what I was sure God was calling me to do, and to do it at the age of 41 when I had the responsibility of a wife and young family in addition to myself.

Being all in isn’t always a safe situation, but it provides motivation, clarity and a call to action that being lukewarm will never provide. If your leadership is in a rut, perhaps it’s time to ask yourself some of the tough questions in the previous paragraph and get back to being all in.

Here’s to leading better by being all in–today!