Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus (By Jeff Bethke)

The gospel in 4 minutes - Brilliant!

12 Requirements for Powerful Empowerment

Yet another outstanding post by Dan Rockwell

Permission-askers don’t feel powerful. Permission-giving keeps people in line and subservient.
Power hungry leaders create disempowering cultures. Do the people around you feel powerful?

The person giving permission is the person in control.

Empowerment is gibberish until people believe it’s safe to act without permission.
The proof of empowerment is the absence of meddlesome intervention.

Empowerment elevates the status of others.

Empowered not disconnected:

Empowered team members need access and connection to leadership, not control.
Successful empowerment is collaborative, not isolated. Updates are more important when team members are empowered. Leaders need to keep their finger on the pulse of organizational life.
Employees who balk at giving updates are siloed, kingdom builders. Empowerment isn’t permission to do whatever you want. Help people connect:

1. Paint the big picture.
2. Show them where they fit in.
3. Expect alignment with organizational mission.

3 enemies of empowerment:

1. Frequent interventions.
2. Foggy goals.
3. Fearful leaders.

12 requirements for powerful empowerment:

1. Confident leaders who elevate others. The people at the top have the most power to make people feel safe. Fearful workers reflect controlling leaders.
2. Frequent feedback given in small doses.
3. Clear boundaries. Transparency regarding nonnegotiable policies, for example.
4. Predictable responses to failure.
5. Structures that protect against catastrophic failure.
6. Reluctant intervention from leadership.
7. Team members who know and leverage their strengths and weaknesses.
8. Shared values. Strongly aligned values are the foundation of trustworthy empowerment. Never give power to those who don’t share your values.
9. Clear vision. Empowerment is chaos apart from clear vision.
10. Short-term goals that provide daily direction.
11. Shared and agreed upon accountability.
12. Taking responsibility as well as authority. Empowered people own and fix their own screw ups. Running to mommy-leader to make everything OK reinforces helplessness.

What are the enemies of empowerment?
What must be in place for team members to feel powerful?

Leaders work through issues others just complain abou

 This is an excellent leadership post from Dan Rockwell!!

Most leadership conversations involve:

1. Someone needing something.
2. Tensions between team mates.
3. Pressure from stakeholders.
4. Opportunities waiting to be seized.
5. Resources that are inadequate.

17 ways to face tomorrow’s challenges:

1. Look for bottom up movement. Where does the team want to go? Take people where they want to go – within the confines of mission, vision, and values.
2. Welcome the frustrations of others as expression of their passion. Explore don’t ignore frustration.
3. Avoid solving problems for people. Leaders who solve-for spawn dependency.
4. Declare your heart. Lower the harsh exterior and let everyone see you care deeply.
5. Spend time with core contributors. Understand their passions. Fuel their fire.
6. Eliminate hindrances and roadblocks. Make success easier.
7. Give permission, authority, and support.
8. Don’t talk about anything you aren’t going to do something about.
9. Remember that some people need to talk. Listen and ask, “What can we do?”
10. Explore and develop your plans with mentors, trusted colleagues, coaches, and advisers.
11. Open your mind. You’ve formed opinions based on partial information.
12. Relax. Avoid the tendency to slip into unproductive strategies like pressuring people.
13. Make short-term decision that facilitate forward movement now. (Keep long-term vision in mind.)
14. Smile when the next problem rises up. Turn problems into opportunities.
15. Encourage key contributors. The people on your team hear problems and face pressures all the time, too.
16. Invite others to compensate for your weaknesses.
17. Identify wins. Celebrate when they happen.

Most importantly, bring yourself to the challenges with forward-facing optimism. You don’t have to be an exuberant cheerleader. But, you have to believe you can make things better.

Which strategies are most relevant for you as you prepare to face a new week?

An inspiring story of forgiveness

How to Be Yourself, not Someone Else

Awesome post by by Rick Warren

“But who are you, my friend, to talk back to God? A clay pot does not ask the man who made it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” (Romans 9:20 TEV)  Since God knows what’s best for us, we should gratefully accept the way he has fashioned us. The Bible says, “But who are you, my friend, to talk back to God? A clay pot does not ask the man who made it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” (Romans 9:20 TEV) Your shape was sovereignly determined by God for his purpose, so you shouldn’t resent it or reject it. Instead of trying to reshape yourself to be like someone else, you should celebrate the shape God has given only to you. “Christ has given each of us special abilities — whatever he wants us to have out of his rich storehouse of gifts” (Ephesians 4:7 LB). Part of accepting your shape is recognizing your limitations. Nobody is good at everything, and no one is called to be everything. We all have defined roles. Paul understood that his calling was not to accomplish everything or please everyone but to focus only on the particular ministry God had shaped him for (Galatians 2:7-8). He said, “We will boast only about what has happened within the boundaries of the world God has given us, which includes our working with you” (2 Corinthians 10:13 NLT). The word “boundaries” refers to the fact that God assigns each of us a field or sphere of service. Your shape determines your specialty. When we try to overextend our ministry reach beyond what God shaped us for, we experience stress. Just as each runner in a race is given a different lane to run in, we must individually “run with patience the particular race that God has set before us” (Hebrews 12:1 LB). Don’t be envious of the runner in the lane next to you; just focus on finishing your race. God wants you to enjoy using the shape he has given you. The Bible says, “Pay careful attention to your own work, for then you will get the satisfaction of a job well done, and you won’t need to compare yourself to anyone else” (Galatians 6:4 NLT). Satan will try to steal the joy of service from you in a couple of ways: by tempting you to compare your ministry with others, and by tempting you to conform your ministry to the expectations of others. Both are deadly traps that will distract you from serving in the ways God intended. Whenever you lose your joy in ministry, start by considering if either one of these temptations is the cause. Talk It Over Why do you think it’s so easy to compare ourselves to others, even in ministry? How does doing so affect our service and the Body of Christ? How has God shaped you for ministry? What are some of the limitations to your shape? How do you know what God’s expectations are for you in your particular ministry? What do you think they are?

How to Ignite Fire

A Great post by Dan Rockwell.

The first job of leadership is catching a glimpse of who you are. Leaders who don’t know who they are end up defined by others and pushed around by position or title.

Don’t lose yourself.

Don’t get your hopes up. There’s no quick and easy way to figure out who you are. There’s no shortcut or conclusion either.

Freedom:

When you know and accept who you are:

1. Jobs don’t define you.
2. Arrogance doesn’t blind you.
3. Expectations from others don’t master you.

Through the fog:

Glimpses of the real you appear in the fog when you reflect on your strengths, weaknesses, joys, and frustrations.

Self-reflection:

Skills, strategies, and methods are machines punching out widgets until “you” bring them to life.
I found a three step self-reflection exercise in, “Lead Positive,” to help you find fire.

Step 1:
Complete this sentence, “When I am at my best, I am a leader who is ________.”

Now, complete the sentence four more times.

Step 2:
Complete, “If I were an even more effective leader, I would be ________.”

Other-reflection:

You’re blind to who you really are. Others help you see. That’s why you need step three.

Step 3:
Ask one or two of your colleagues to reflect on you and complete steps one and two with you in mind.

When (your name) is at his/her best, he/she is a leader who is ________.

If (your name) were an even more effective leader, he/she would be ________.

Fire:

Fire ignites when you bringing your true self to challenges and opportunities. Boredom dominates when you lose yourself to position, expediency, and expectation.

Leaders who bring themselves to challenges and opportunities engage in effortless effort.