Tag: momentum

When Mistakes Are Not Mistakes, pt 2

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We’ve all been there–the frustration of leading. You pour hours into a project or event or relationship, only to experience sub-par results. Or you have to make a decision in the moment, only to realize later you made the wrong choice. Anyone who has been in a leadership role can identify.

Today, we continue looking at a few mistakes we make in leadership, that even though they feel like a colossal failure in the moment, they are actually not mistakes. (You can read the first post by clicking here.)

Investing in Relationships

Human relationships are hard. There are nuances that vary wildly from relationship to relationship. There are often unexpressed expectations that go unmet. And more often than we would like, those relationships do not end the way we wish they would.

Part of our role as a leader is to invest in relationships. In ministry, we invest in people in whom we see potential or promise. So we spend time getting to know them, encouraging them, leading them, trying to help them grow. And occasionally, we watch our investment dwindle away as they begin making poor choices and slipping away.

At the end of the day, when those relationships have slipped away, we feel like we wasted our time, but I would argue it was not a waste of time. We cannot control people. Everyone has free will. But any time we learn to invest in someone, we are providing the opportunity for them to better themselves. Any time we spend investing in people is time well spent.

The real mistake in relationships, however, is not building them at all. If we find ourselves deciding beforehand a student (or anyone in general) will not benefit from the investment of our time, we play a dangerous game.

One final note, beware of trying to relationally invest in a disinterested person. I have built relationships with students early on, only to have them distance themselves later. Find the balance between mourning the relationship (and trying to mend it) and obsessing about the lost relationship. Remain emotionally available, but realize the energy you may be spending trying to rebuild could be spent elsewhere.

People are surprising. You cannot know their hearts until you get to know them, and vice versa. Spend time investing in relationships this week, and be not discouraged.

 

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When Mistakes Are Not Mistakes, pt 1

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We’ve all been there–the frustration of leading. You pour hours into a project or event, only to experience sub-par results. Or you have to make a decision in the moment, only to realize later you made the wrong choice. Anyone who has been in a leadership role can identify.

Today, we are looking at a few mistakes we make in leadership, that even though they feel like a colossal failure in the moment, they are actually not mistakes.

Making the Wrong Decision.

You will never know how to make the right decision if you never make the wrong one. This concept seems simple enough, but being wrong stings. No one likes to make mistakes. Doesn’t a mistake mean we failed? Not exactly.

A mistake means you made a decision. Decision making requires experience. You gain experience by making decisions, and evaluate the right decision by understanding the wrong decision. So, in the end, making the wrong decision almost always leads to a step in the right direction.

The test here, interestingly enough, boils down to how soon you realize you made the wrong decision, and your response from that time forward.

The bottom line is making the wrong decision is a necessary part of leadership. We will never know or grow if we never make mistakes.

The real mistake is making the same mistake, repeatedly. If we make a decision in the moment, and fail to realize it is the wrong decision after the fact, we will make the same decision the next time. Failing to learn and adapt means we fail to lead effectively.

So, as I ask so often, what mistakes are you making and learning from? What mistakes are you making and not learning from? What needs to shift or change this week so you can move forward and grow your leadership influence.

Be sure to come back next week, as we talk about a couple more mistakes that aren’t mistakes. Or you can subscribe and get the next posts in your email inbox the day they post!

The Failure of Leadership

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Do you ever feel like a failure?

Over the past week I have had a couple people make mention of my leadership skillfulness (my word, not theirs). At the moment, however, I feel like a leadership failure.

The ministry here has a hit an interesting spot, and one I am having a difficult time assessing. But, in the process of assessing and diagnosing, I came to a realization: the failure of leadership is not leading poorly, it is not leading at all.

Let me drill down and put it another way. Making mistakes is not the failure of leadership; the failure of leadership is failing to develop others.

Let’s agree for the moment the 3 Questions give us a framework not only for developing other leaders, but for developing as leaders ourselves. After all, the power of the 3 questions comes from answering the 3rd question–“who can I get to help”.

Every organization (a youth ministry, for example) experiences life stages. Some organizations are in their infancy when the world is new and everything is exciting. Other organizations are in retirement, enjoying the fruit of their labor. Still others are adolescents, dealing with the emotional roller coaster of development, learning how to make right decisions by making wrong ones. But every organization changes, and will not look the same in the future.

As a leader, we have to ask ourselves, how are we adjusting to the current life stage? As a parent, I cannot relate to my 7 year old the way I did when she was 2. It takes time, discernment, and action to adjust and move forward.

So, if the failure of leadership is failing to develop others, when your ministry or organization moves from one stage to the next, the question to ask is not how do we keep things the same, but what does our ministry look like now?

For you, whatever life stage your ministry or organization is in, how are you adjusting? What needs to change? What needs to stay the same?

3 Ways to Overcome Mistakes

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Over the course of the summer I was able to sit down with student leaders from different churches and help them grow in their concept of what leadership looks like. One week, over our time together, we had two people share a similar message: leaders make mistakes.

Today, I want you to hear the same message: Leaders make mistakes. You will make mistakes.

The challenge in leadership is not avoiding mistakes, but what we do when we realize we have made a mistake. Here are three steps to help your mistakes lead you to growth.

(1) Know You Made a Mistake.

For some of us, this may be the most challenging step. Maybe the mistake you made grew more out of a reaction to a decision you made or something you said. Maybe your mistake was a planning mistake, or it had something to do with a choice you made along the way.

No matter what, until you realize you made a mistake, you cannot move forward and learn from it. This is where key voices play an integral role. Having people around you whom you can trust to say what they think you may not want to hear makes all the difference in the world.

Years ago, I served a church and enjoyed a strong relationship with my pastor at the time. We had an important meeting with another church leader one afternoon, and it ended poorly. Later that day he and I came together and I was able to share my opinion on where the meeting went south. Because of the relationship we had, we were able to work through the situation and move forward.

(2) Own Your Mistake

If you want to grow as a leader, please understand you are not infallible. You will make mistakes. What’s worse is that sometimes the people around you will know you made a mistake long before you know it. But, once you realize a mistake has been made, what you do next is paramount.

When you make a mistake, never be afraid to admit it. I would advise against wearing your mistake as a badge of honor, but also don’t treat it like a toothache–if I ignore it long enough, it’ll go away or I’ll die.

When someone in authority over me makes a mistake and admits it, more often than not I respond with a higher level of respect for them. I had a high school basketball coach who tried to get us ready for a game by showing us the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan. He wanted us to know we were only playing a game, and the game should be fun, but the desired outcome is not what he hoped. Instead, we played poorly. Later, when reminiscing about his decision, he admitted to me he made the wrong choice in trying to motivate us that way, and I respected him for his honesty.

Own your mistake. Take responsibility for it. Apologize when necessary. But most importantly, once you own your mistake…

(3) Correct it for the Next Time

Very few people enjoy stubbing their toe on the same support beam in the same spot of their house. They either move into a new house or change how they walk around. Actually, can I say no one enjoys stubbing their toe?

Now we get into the nitty gritty of leadership. The leader who makes the same mistake over and over eventually drives away the people he or she is leading. After all, very few people enjoy following someone who is unwilling to learn or to grow.

If you, however, can learn from your mistakes, you become someone who adds value to the lives around you. Then, over time, you slowly begin to make fewer and fewer mistakes. But it does take time, and lots of it.

 

The bottom line is this: if you want to grow as a leader, you have to learn from your mistakes. So, are you learning from your mistakes? Are you making changes? Or are you repeating the same action over and over and hoping something (or someone else) changes in the process? Learn from your mistakes and see what happens.

 

Routines vs Ruts, pt 3

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So far, I have posted twice about Routines vs Ruts. Click here to read part 1 and part 2.

Today, let’s get back to basics: expanding your leadership influence.

Would you care to hear a secret? The people you lead can probably identify your ruts long before you can.

Some ruts are secrets, but some are not.

Routines can serve to give us energy, but ruts drain us. When we are drained, people around us notice. When we lose focus, people around us notice.

Sure, you can fool some people, but the ones who know you can spot the struggle.

So, let me ask you: what would the people around you identify as a rut you’re currently fighting through? Seriously think about it.

Now, ask yourself: is this truly a rut in my leadership?

A while back I wrote about the redundancy of leadership. The more I think about it, the more I realize that redundancy does not bother me the way it bothers other people. I do not mind the mundane nature of some tasks. In fact, I find energy in the redundancy. But that’s a post for another day.

The danger of embracing redundancy is simple: redundancy can dig a rut, too.

In my own leadership, there are areas where the redundancy of leadership has actually become a rut. Maybe the same is true for you?

So, what your next step? Identify the rut and choose a course of action–stick it through and wait for the terrain to change, or steer hard to one side and see what breaks loose.

Either one may not work the way you expect, but at least now you know you’re in a rut.

Lead well today.

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