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2018 Leadership Summit – 10 Leadership Quotes from Danny Meyer

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. This year, there is a shadow hanging over the summit as I outlined here, but I’m still trusting that it will have some incredibly helpful content, just like in past years. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The third session featured a talk by Danny Meyer, Restaurateur; TIME Magazine’s “100 Most Influential People.” His talk focused on creating a customer-focused culture, which churches can always grow in.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. There’s nothing worse than wasting your life on something you don’t want to do.
  2. The road to success is paved with mistakes well handled.
  3. To get anywhere worthwhile is to listen to the people on the front lines.
  4. The places with the best service will last the longest.
  5. Service means doing what you said you would do.
  6. Hospitality is how you make someone feel while delivering service.
  7. The shelf life of innovation is 2 minutes.
  8. Companies thrive by doing the thoughtful things. Thoughtful is thinking and feeling.
  9. If we know how to make you feel better than the next guy, you’ll come back.
  10. Once a mistake is made, you can’t erase it. The only thing you can do is write a great next chapter.
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2018 Leadership Summit – 26 Leadership Quotes from Carla Harris

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. This year, there is a shadow hanging over the summit as I outlined here, but I’m still trusting that it will have some incredibly helpful content, just like in past years. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The third session featured a talk from Carla Harris, who is the Vice Chairman, Managing Director and Senior Client Advisor at Morgan Stanley. She talked about how to achieve your potential and become the leader you were created to be. She used the word leader (Leverage, Efficiency, Authenticity, Decisive, Engagement, Risk taker) to show what makes an impactful leader.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. Leverage: powerful, impactful leaders know there is not a monopoly on intelligence.
  2. Someone on your team has the access or experience that you need.
  3. If people think there will be retribution for making a mistake, no one will give you an out of the box idea.
  4. A leaders job is to create an environment where people want to contribute.
  5. Leadership is a journey from execution to empowerment.
  6. Efficiency: If you are an influential, impactful leader, you must be clear about what success looks like.
  7. If you aren’t clear about what success looks like, you will create a tremendous amount of frustration.
  8. Productivity goes down when things aren’t clear.
  9. If you aren’t clear on what’s next, you must be clear on what success looks like.
  10. If it doesn’t work this time, it informs your next success.
  11. Authenticity: this is the heart of your power and the heart of influential leadership.
  12. No one else can be you.
  13. Most people are not comfortable in their own skin, so when they see someone who is, they gravitate towards you.
  14. The easiest way to penetrate a relationship is to bring your authentic self to the table.
  15. Your authenticity is your distinct competitive advantage.
  16. To be authentic, you have to know who you are and what you bring to the table.
  17. Decisiveness and diversity: the price of inaction is greater than the cost of making a mistake.
  18. At the end of the day, your team is depending on you as the leader to make a decision.
  19. Part of your task as a leader is to make a decision, even in the face of incomplete information.
  20. If you need a lot of ideas (and you do to succeed), you need a lot of perspectives and experiences in the room.
  21. Engagement: you must be engaged with your people and understand what makes people motivated to win. What engages your staff?
  22. Everyone on your team wants to be seen and heard.
  23. Risk taker: leaders must be comfortable taking risks.
  24. The way you differentiate yourself is by taking risks.
  25. Fear has no place in your success equation.
  26. The thing that makes a leader stand out is courage. This is what holds all these words together.
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2018 Leadership Summit – 20 Leadership Quotes from Strive Masiyiwa

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The second session featured an interview Strive Masiyiwa, who is the founder of Econet (one of Africa’s largest telecommunications companies), will help us learn what it means to be a leader who perseveres to fight for the future of our world. This was an inspiring interview.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. Too many people think they run into failure that they’re done.
  2. Vision is what we hold onto.
  3. If we’re doing what God is calling us to, we are not losing anything.
  4. Cultures matter when we grow a business or organization.
  5. Multiculturalism begins with the way we think and thinking differently.
  6. Values are universal. Just because you have differences doesn’t mean you can’t embrace and work together across cultures and differences.
  7. You haven’t been to a country until you have been in the home of someone who lives there.
  8. If your business or vision solves a problem, people will seek it out.
  9. If you want to be a success, find a human need and reach out and solve it.
  10. Meeting a need changes the way people see themselves and changes the way they live.
  11. We’re raising kids to not only think for themselves but think for us as parents.
  12. You can mentor all you want but if you don’t model it, I won’t see.
  13. A dream often dies when it is shared with people who have not seen what you see.
  14. Building anything always takes longer than you think.
  15. A great vision is only as good as your ability to deliver daily wins.
  16. Consistency is the bridge to each short-term win that finally leads to the great vision.
  17. If you know how to do things you will always have a job. If you know why you, you will always be the leader.
  18. Your people must believe in you.
  19. The best of our people are volunteers, whether we pay them or not.
  20. If you want to know who someone is, watch how they treat people they don’t need.
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2018 Leadership Summit – 11 Leadership Quotes from T.D. Jakes

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The second session featured a talk from one of the best communicators, T.D. Jakes.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. You want a vision that brings out the best in you.
  2. A vision should sound ridiculous until you do it.
  3. If you don’t believe in anything crazy, you will never find out what you could be.
  4. You think something you can’t tell anyone because it’s so big. Something beyond your means. Takes you out of your comfort zone and scares you to death.
  5. Too many people have to see their way clear before they get started.
  6. It doesn’t matter where you start, it matters where you finish.
  7. Visions start in small places.
  8. Sometimes you build the idea in the wrong place. Visions need the right wind.
  9. So much of what we learn is about winning but what stimulates growth is losing.
  10. What did you learn from your last failure and how has it prepared you to soar?
  11. To believe that something is possible is what makes greatness.
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2018 Leadership Summit – 14 Leadership Quotes from Juliet Funt

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. This year, there is a shadow hanging over the summit as I outlined here, but I’m still trusting that it will have some incredibly helpful content, just like in past years. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The second session featured a talk by Juliet Funt, who spoke last year.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. Casualness makes us comfortable.
  2. When people are casual, you acquiesce to all sorts of unfortunate things.
  3. The casualness of unnecessary work is killing us. This leads to companies falling into overload.
  4. The seeds of problems in a company are conformity, compulsivity, and control.
  5. Conformity
  6. The whitespace 50/50 rule: Anything that bothers you at work is 50% your fault until you have asked for what you want.
  7. Compulsivity
  8. The yellow list: This is with everyone you work with and ask, does this need to be sent right now? If it doesn’t, you add this to your yellow list.
  9. Control
  10. The more we have our fingers in everything, the slower we’ll move.
  11. 2nd tier delegation: First tier delegation is people you give things to you that you trust implicitly. You don’t give the same respect and trust to the second tier, but you have to. You build first tier delegation by delegating to the second tier.
  12. Compliance is when everyone says yes because no one knows how to say no.
  13. At some point, the only thing left in people’s minds is your legacy.
  14. Legacy is a story yet to be written but you hold the pen.
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2018 Leadership Summit – 16 Leadership Quotes from Angela Ahrendts

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The first session featured a talk from Angela Ahrendts, who is the Senior V.P. of Retail for Apple. Her talk focused on how empathy is an essential quality for leadership.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. Values are the foundation of everything you are.
  2. Core values that are our strengths make us valuable to others.
  3. The higher you go as a leader, the more important it is to connect and over communicate.
  4. A leader needs to walk slowly through the crowd.
  5. A morning routine is incredibly important in the life of a leader.
  6. In hiring, look for a we kind of person instead of a me kind of person.
  7. It’s not about hiring great individuals but how they fit into the team.
  8. Brands are bigger than cultures.
  9. Simple things about branding: know why you’re doing it (the deeper purpose behind something), that why needs to become a core value of the company.
  10. Every team and organization should always know if they are doing what they set out to do.
  11. Motivating people: to move people you have to be able to understand them.
  12. You can teach people anything but you can’t teach people to care.
  13. Leaders need to focus on what people feel from them.
  14. Look people in the eye.
  15. Talk to people. Celebrate people. Thank people.
  16. Ask: what would I want people to say to me?
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2018 Leadership Summit – 32 Leadership Quotes from Craig Groeschel

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Every year, my team and I attend the leadership summit. This year, there is a shadow hanging over the summit as I outlined here, but I’m still trusting that it will have some incredibly helpful content, just like in past years. To capture what I’m learning and to help you grow as a leader, I always share my notes from each session, so be sure to check back after each session and bookmark them for future use.

The first session featured a talk from Craig Groeschel. He is the Senior Pastor of Life.Church and the author of many books. His session was on what it looks like to be a leader that people love to follow.

The following are some takeaways:

  1. When the leader gets better, everyone gets better.
  2. Leadership is never about title and position, it is about trust and influence.
  3. Leaders are given great power and must wield that for the good of others.
  4. Leaders can make excuses or make a difference, but they can’t make both.
  5. A humble leader can learn from anybody.
  6. The two areas a leader needs to grow in is leadership (where are you taking me) and emotional intelligence (how are you treating me).
  7. There’s a difference between a leader who is popular and one who is respected.
  8. You will never be respected if you are only trying to be respected.
  9. The 3 feelings you will have under great and trusted leadership: you feel valued, inspired, and empowered.
  10. Leaders need a heart to care.
  11. You will never be a leader that people love to follow if you don’t love people.
  12. An essential part of being a leader is I notice, You matter.
  13. Appreciate more than you think you should. Then double it.
  14. Leaders need a passion to inspire. 
  15. There is a difference between inspiration and motivation.
  16. Motivation is about pushing people to do something they don’t want to do.
  17. Inspiring is pulling out of them what is already inside of them.
  18. Inspired employees are twice as productive as employees who call themselves satisfied.
  19. Following through is inspiring.
  20. The most important quality is a centered leader. A centered leader is secure, stable, confident, not easily distracted or swayed, fully engaged.
  21. A centered leader is guided by values, driven by purpose.
  22. All you need as a leader to inspire people is 1 or 2 developed strengths.
  23. Leaders need a willingness to empower.
  24. The best leaders unleash higher performance through empowerment, not command and control.
  25. You can have control or growth, but you can’t have both.
  26. If you delegate tasks, you’re creating followers. If we delegate authority, we are creating leaders.
  27. We do this as leaders by making the decisions that only we can make.
  28. The fewer decisions you are making, the better you are as a leader.
  29. The strength of an organization is reflected by how deep into it people have the ability to say yes.
  30. The best way to find out if you trust someone is to trust them.
  31. If you don’t trust your team, you are either too controlling or you have the wrong people.
  32. Leaders need the courage to be real, vulnerable, stand up with humility and take risks even when you’re scared. 
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Bill Hybels, Leadership and Finishing Well

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I’ve debated whether or not to say anything about Bill Hybels and Willow Creek, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like sharing what is running through my head and heart, and some thoughts for leaders. Others have written a lot on what happened, why it happened and what Willow should do. I’ll do some of that, but talk about my perspective.

For context, I interned with the WCA in the summer of 2001. It was one of the highlights of my life (one reason is I got engaged that summer). I had a 2-hour commute each day, and Willow had an audio library you could check out talks and sermons. I was wading into the waters of church planting and leadership at the time, so during that summer I listened to every Leadership Summit talk I could and many sermons by Hybels and John Ortberg to learn from them.

I was a sponge that summer.

When I first started reading the reports and accusations about Hybels this spring, my heart sunk.

I’ve never met Bill Hybels, but from a distance, he had an enormous impact on me. His passion for the church, evangelism, was convicting to me as a young leader. All those came to the surface even more on Sunday when the NY Times article came out.

First, I’m sad. I can’t imagine the pain and heartache all those women have walked through as they have bravely stepped forward to share their story. Is their evidence it is all true? I don’t know, but it seems overwhelming that it is. As a pastor, I’ve sat across from enough victims to see the devastation they are walking through and have walked through. I also can’t imagine what Bill Hybels family is walking through at this moment. It is easy for us to forget the family and those around someone like Bill Hybels at this moment. They didn’t choose this. They weren’t a part of this and yet, they will feel the ripple effects of the choices of one man and those choices will be etched into everyone’s lives forever. It’s sad when you think about the influence Willow Creek has had and how that tarnishes Jesus in our culture and world. Yes, I know and believe that all things are being redeemed and are redeemable, but this is the reality for these families and this church. Granted, as others have pointed out, the church has not made wise choices during this situation.

Second, I’m angry and confused by it all. There is something that happens when someone you’ve looked up to (whether close up or from a distance) and that person loses their ministry and influence. When I read the NY Times article on Sunday, I was angry. It hit me a lot harder than I expected. I shared this with a friend, and he said, “That’s because you’re human and not a robot.” I’ve watched friends, inside and outside of the church, wreck their lives by the decisions they made. At first, I’m angry because I think, “how could you do that?” But then I look at my heart and know I could do it (and so could you). We are always one choice away from wrecking our lives.

Third, I’ve been asked if I’m still going to the summit this week. The answer is yes. I debated it. The reality is, it is still connected to Hybels, his shadow is enormous. I’m going to show up early to watch their announcement (although I wish they did it at the start instead of 15 minutes before the event starts) and I’m going to be praying they are courageous leaders at a leadership summit and do what is right. I also think that those who are speaking have a lot of wisdom to share and have a unique opportunity this week to cast a vision for the church with this hanging over the summit. We are, in many ways, watching a leadership case study unfold.

Now, for pastors and leaders.

Situations like this are opportunities to make us sit back to ask questions.

In his book Impact: Great Leadership Changes Everything by Tim Irwin, he says there are five steps to wrecking your life, or as he would say derailing your life. They are:

  1. Lack of self-awareness. When a person doesn’t know what could bring them down, they don’t know what their weaknesses are. Is it money, greed, power, sex, lust, a bigger house or car? What are they willing to trade their marriage, reputation, kids or future in for? If you don’t know that, you will be brought down.
  2. Arrogance or misguided confidence. when a person sees someone wreck their life and says, “That could never happen to me.” This is when a person sins once and says, “I already did it once, what is one more time?” They have supreme confidence they can stop whenever or take back control whenever they choose, or, that it won’t destroy their life.
  3. Missed warning signals. This might be close calls in getting caught, being late to work for staying up too late, conviction from the Holy Spirit that you push away or even evidence that you might get caught.
  4. Rationalization. This is when you start to say things like, “I deserve this.” Or, “This is my only vice.” Or, you blame someone else for your situation. “If my spouse was more attentive.” Or, “If I had a little more money we could get ahead.” Or, “My kids will understand when their older why I had to work as I did.”
  5. Derailment. Eventually, with enough time, enough rationalizations, you hit the wall and derail your life.
5 things we can learn from Willow Creek and Bill Hybels.

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As Irwin says, there are early warning signs. Those early warning signs show up early in our lives. They show up in our family of origin. I think leaders do themselves a disservice if they don’t dive into their stories. Understanding where they’ve come from, what is in their past, what has already gone before them, etc. Every leader should know what the thing that can bring them down is and how to guard against that.

I think in many ways, church leaders are at an important crossroads. We are becoming what many in our culture figured we were. For me, this has caused me to think anew about my boundaries, broken places I need to confess, digging into real friendships that will breathe life into me and hold me accountable. It has renewed a passion for finishing the call God has placed on my life. I hope that situations like this do the same for other leaders. So much is at stake, in our lives as leaders, our families, but for those, we lead and interact with.

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Making Time to Dream

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Remember when you were in your 20’s? You first got married? Just about to leave that job you hated and start your dream job? Your dream company?

You had all kinds of time to dream. You had so many plans, so many hopes, so many dreams.

But something happened.

Life.

Bills.

Health issues.

Responsibility.

Kids.

In-laws.

How do you recapture that?

If you lead a business or a church, your team needs you to make time to dream.

If you are married, your spouse needs for you to dream.

Let’s start at home first and then move on to your career.

To dream with your spouse is crucial. I would say one of the most important and life-giving things you can do.

Recently, Katie and I were in Colorado for a wedding she was photographing, and I was performing the wedding (the only time we’ve done the same wedding). During those days, we had several hours in the car, driving through the snow and mountains. This space gave us time to talk about what excited us right now about life, family, kids, our marriage, finances, goals, etc. It also allowed us to talk about where we want to be in 5 years (our daughter will be 18) and ten years from now (we’ll have four college-age kids).

Gulp!

This space and I need to emphasize this; dreaming happens in space, not in the crowdedness of life.

Dreaming happens in space, not the crowdedness of life.

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We don’t want to coast through the next ten years or fly through them and get ready to hit our 50’s and wonder what happened.

Now, you might be thinking, “I can’t tell my spouse what I dream about.”

First, you should be able to.

Second, we often keep our dreams to ourselves because we are afraid of rejection, be laughed at or told that can’t happen.

If that’s the case, set some ground rules. Things like: no making fun or laughing, no dream is off limits (at this point), etc.

Just dreaming out loud together.

If you could do anything, go anywhere, see anything, what would it be?

If you looked back on the last 5, 10, 20, 30 years of your life and had no regrets, what things did you do?

If you looked back on the last 5, 10, 20, 30 years of your life and had no regrets, what things did you do?

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Now, in your career, this is just as important; especially if you are a lead pastor or the boss.

Your team and church need you to dream.

Again, this takes time. It will not happen in between meetings but will come from intentional time away.

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How to Set Goals as a Church Staff

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It’s Tuesday, and the whirlwind of this past Sunday is still blowing through your church office. There are people to call, meetings to attend, to schedule, to prepare for, counseling to done, sermons and lessons to write.

Why?

Sunday is coming, and people have needs. They are struggling in their marriage, with finances, their kids, career direction.

For most leaders in churches, merely surviving the week is a goal.

How to get out of the whirlwind of church ministry.

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That isn’t what we signed up to do.

There has to be a way to get your head out of the clouds, above the whirlwind and see what is happening and work on the right things. 

But how?

How to see ahead for your church.

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For our church staff, we’ve tried a variety of ways to make this happen.

We’ve created annual plans but found that it was hard to forecast a year out. We still look at a year out, as you’ll see in a minute, but we do that year out by making 90-day goals.

How to make 90-day goals for your church staff.

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First, we sit down as a team and list out every area in our church. Someone around the table should have responsibility for a category you discuss. This list needs to include every area. Some examples: kids ministry, students, first impressions, worship service, social media, preaching, staff, etc.

Then, taking one at a time everyone shares what is right, wrong, missing and confusing in each area. (hat tip to a mentor of mine Brian Jones for coming up with these four categories). The right part is essential because this is a chance to brag on the person who leads it and the team involved with this, to celebrate what God is doing. If it is hard to think of what is right in an area, maybe ask, what doesn’t need to be fixed right now instead.

Once you have your list of what is missing, wrong or confused (and there will be some overlap between those lists), the person who leads that area puts dates next to them. Are these issues that need to be worked on or fixed in the next 90 days, six months or 12+ months from now?

Then, I meet with each person individually to go over them. This step is vital for a couple of reasons: the lead pastor can often see things that others can’t regarding importance. The person leading an area can see things that are important that the lead pastor can’t.

The ones that are 90-day goals, we create OKR’s for each one. So, let’s say (a common one), we need to increase our kid’s ministry volunteer team by 20 people over the next 90 days (that’s the objective). What will 3-5 key results (the KR’s) need to happen so that we increase the team by 20 people? Those KR’s need to be measurable.

Then, once those plans are in place, you share them on your church staff. You give weekly or monthly updates, which also creates accountability. Why share them in a staff meeting? Every lead pastor knows that people are more likely to fail privately to you, than publicly to a group.

How to create accountability for your church staff.

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Doing this every 90 days helps to clarify what needs to be accomplished in the next 90 days, what goals we are all shooting for, but also keeps in front of us, what is coming up (remember we still have the ones with 12 months next to them).

Some of you are thinking, how long does this take?

When you first start, this will be a half a day laying out what is right, wrong, missing and confused.

Those 4 hours are not only incredibly helpful but energizing. Our team laughs, cries and celebrates what God is doing. We pray together for each area and what God has in store.

Those 4 hours are worth the investment.

It especially helps your staff members who are not natural dreamers or vision casters or who don’t naturally set goals.

It also helps fight against one of the frustrations many pastors experience, and that is disunity or a loss of momentum. Many times, disunity and a loss of momentum are not intentional; it’s just that everyone works on what they think is most important.

One of the most important jobs of a lead pastor is to say what is most important right now.

One of the most important jobs of a lead pastor is to say what is most important right now.

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