January 2010
Leadership Development Ideas - “Developing Emerging Leaders-When Leaders are at their best"
(Reflections from "Courageous Leadership" by Bill Hybels)
When faced with the challenge of building and resourcing a ministry, Bill Hybels learned a number of ‘truths’ about leading a team ministry. Through trial successes and errors, Hybels learned that there are a number of qualities that he believes Jesus used when developing His disciples. This is good stuff:
- The first necessary quality is ‘Influence:’ Leadership, at its core, is about influence. Potential leaders always have a natural ability to influence others. Even if they have no conscious intention of leading people, they automatically exert influence. Look for these people when developing your team of leaders.
- The second quality is ‘Character:’ Lots of people with influence lack the character to use that influence constructively-or Christianly. Once Hybels identified a person with influence, he asked himself if they had the honesty, the humility, the stability, the teachability, and the integrity to steward that influence well. A sincere walk with God, a yieldedness to the Holy Spirit, and a commitment to the authority of God’s word are essential character qualities in a leader of men.
- The third quality is ‘People Skills:’ According to Hybels, this includes sensitivity to the thoughts and feelings of others, and the ability to listen-and he means really listen-to the ideas of others. He looks for people who genuinely care for other people and who view others as more than a means to an end.
- The fourth quality is ‘Drive:’ Hybels looks for ‘action-oriented’ people who are comfortable taking initiative. He is not looking for ‘fifty watt bulbs.’ He’s looking for hundred watt bulbs that will burn all night long if need be-that’s drive, people who have so much energy that they energize others without even trying.
- The fifth quality is ‘Intelligence:’ Hybels doesn’t necessarily mean high I.Q. scores, or a sheepskin from an Ivy League university. He looks for people with street smarts, with the kind of mental savvy required to process lots of information, sift through it, consider all the options, and generally make the right decision. He looks for people with an eager, curious mind-intellectual elasticity-who can learn and grow over the long haul.
These five leadership indicators-influence, character, relational skills, drive and intelligence-do not form an exhaustive list, but they provide a good framework for an initial evaluation when recruiting and evaluating leaders. Once identified, he starts figuring out ways to get those folks in his orbit so he can get to know them better and verify his initial observations. If they have the ‘right stuff,’ he does his best to get them on a developmental track as soon as possible. That’s how he develops his leadership team.
Read the other articles in this issue:
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