It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)
Greetings to you!
Each week I send out a short leadership blog that's called "Tuesday at 2:00pm". The purpose of this is simply to provide a brief thought on leadership that you can read and think about in just a few minutes. I send it out every week at 2:00pm (PST) and encourage you to make an appointment with yourself to pause and think about the thing I'm writing about.
Russ...
LEADERSHIP QUOTE:
"The servant leader shares power, puts the needs of others first and helps people develop and perform as highly as possible." Robert K. Greenleaf
What does this stir up? Either write me HERE or comment at the end of the blog post HERE.
A LITTLE BIT DEEPER:
Today I'm finishing a number of weeks looking at SERVANT LEADERSHIP. You can see past blog posts on leadership and a variety of topics HERE.
When we started this series, I introduced you to Robert K. Greenleaf, who has been defined as the first person to articulate the theory of servant leadership.
I really like 2 of his other quotes because they are so simple. Greenleaf says:
"The servant leader is servant first."
and
"Good leaders must first become good servants."
Greenleaf wrote a number of papers that were pretty counter-cultural in the era of "big companies, big leaders". His simple message to leaders to focus on serving first as the highest priority.
Greenleaf also acknowledged that Jesus modeled this kind of leadership, but that the idea of servant leadership is for everyone. It's not a faith-driven theory, but an effective leadership principle that should affect people in all aspects of leadership.
Greenleaf died in 1990, having impacted leadership models for all time. The epitaph on his tombstone reads:
"Potentially a good plumber; ruined by sophisticated education."
How are the principles of servant leadership evident in your life and in your leadership?
DEEPER STILL:
This past week I had the privilege to hang-out with 56 other men in our 18th Annual Leader Mundial Global Summit. What a rich time of learning together, challenging each other and enjoying the fruit of our community.
We focused this year on "The Qualities of a Leader", but early on in the week, the idea of humility surfaced and this became a theme for us throughout our days together.
We talked about it, we learned from each other, we pushed each other and we spent time searching our own hearts.
As I think about Servant Leadership, I believe that many of us don't lead as servants because we haven't developed humility in our lives and leadership.
We are leaders who feel:
Entitled, because we've "earned it".
Powerful, because of the position we've assumed.
Authority, because we have learned to lead from the top down.
Responsible, because performance & outcomes are the focus.
Driven, to reach goals no matter the cost.
We're trapped because not only is this how we were taught to lead, but this is what we believe will push us towards ultimate success.
Jesus modeled it differently. In Matthew 20:28 we are reminded:
"...Whoever wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. This is what the Son of Man has done: He came to serve, not be served -
and then to give away his life..."
What is keeping you from making humility evident in your life and leadership?
Things I'm Reading, Listening To and Watching This Week:
Robert K. Greenleafs Biography, the father of modern Servant Leadership.
I enjoyed listening to Tom Petty's 1994 album Wildflowers this week. Really good music from the legend.
Greenleafs classic book, The Servant as Leader and 2 books from our Leader Mundial Summit: Humility by Andrew Murray and Anonymous by Alicia Britt Chole.
I've been using an online journal app for the past year and I'm enjoying the discovery of some new features and tools. Check out The Day One App.
I finally finished Mark Greaney's 13th book in the Gray Man series, The Chaos Agent. It's been a long series... only to be left hanging. Waiting for #14!