Leaders are vulnerable
My good friend Will Johnston attended Catalyst this year so you didn't have to! He has notes from each session here and they are worth the browse. Specifically he highlighted the talk by Patrick Lencioni about his new book Advantage. To save you time reading here is the gist.
My big take away: leaders are vulnerable. "When you have one person on the team who can't be vulnerable, it changes the entire dynamic of the team. We know this from sports, right? One guy in 50 on a football team can poison the team. If that's the case, what does that do for our leadership teams, our church teams?The only way we can get to vulnerable is if the leader goes first. It's a leap of faith folks, and it's not comfortable.I once worked with a leader who could not do this. He's famous and brilliant and intimidating. So no one on his team ever gave him feedback. So we did 360 reports, but he didn't want to share the results. So the head of HR got him to reluctantly share the results. So he went down the list and just asked around the table what everyone thought. And of course, they told him what he wanted to hear. So if I'm going to be a good consultant, I have to do something and risk losing the client. So I slide up next to the CEO and say, "But you guys were the only ones who filled this out." But only one guy spoke up. The rest cut his legs out from under him. That company circled the drain and was sold off for a fraction of the cost."
Be vulnerable. Lead well.
My big take away: leaders are vulnerable. "When you have one person on the team who can't be vulnerable, it changes the entire dynamic of the team. We know this from sports, right? One guy in 50 on a football team can poison the team. If that's the case, what does that do for our leadership teams, our church teams?The only way we can get to vulnerable is if the leader goes first. It's a leap of faith folks, and it's not comfortable.I once worked with a leader who could not do this. He's famous and brilliant and intimidating. So no one on his team ever gave him feedback. So we did 360 reports, but he didn't want to share the results. So the head of HR got him to reluctantly share the results. So he went down the list and just asked around the table what everyone thought. And of course, they told him what he wanted to hear. So if I'm going to be a good consultant, I have to do something and risk losing the client. So I slide up next to the CEO and say, "But you guys were the only ones who filled this out." But only one guy spoke up. The rest cut his legs out from under him. That company circled the drain and was sold off for a fraction of the cost."
Be vulnerable. Lead well.
Well said.
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