Learning Your Strengths

I’ve blogged here about Strengthsfinder 2.0. I love that book, and I love what it does for people, especially leaders. Well, I’ve just finished its sister book, Strengths Based Leadership, which I also loved. I will do a review of that at another time. What I really want to talk about is this: Gallup released some data in Strengths Based Leadership that I think we can all pay attention to. It’s not strictly related to Christian Leadership, but I think that the stats that I’m about to quote say it all.


Gallup reports that people experience a significant gain in self-confidence after taking a Strengthsfinder test and learning more about their strengths. I don’t think this should come as a surprise. Knowing what you’re good at and being freed up to do it are confidence boosting bits of information. But there’s more:

In 2008, University of Florida released a 25 year study about confidence and work. Here’s a few of the highlights.

People between the ages of 14 and 22 who had more self confidence were making about 3,500 dollars more than their peers in 1979.

These same people saw dramatic increases in their income each passing year.

Those people with higher self-confidence had fewer health problems in 2004 than in 1979 25 years later.

Gallup Polling that has been released suggests that having the opportunity to learn about your strengths has the same effect as the gain in self-confidence. People 15-23 who learned about their strengths were reporting “significantly higher” job satisfaction levels 25 years later.

So what does this mean for us? I don’t know. To my knowledge, there hasn’t been any longitudinal studies on Christian leaders and how Strengths Test and the resulting self-Confidence affects them. I have my guesses though.

I cannot imagine that it would be anything short of revolutionary in the life of a Christian young person to know what strengths God built into them. We are always testing for spiritual gifts, which is very important, so why don’t we test to know how God put us together in other ways?

Imagine the possibilities if we had a generation of Christian leaders who knew both their Spiritual Gifts and their God-given Strengths. What would they be capable of? What difference would it make in their personal lives? How much less burn-out would we have?

I can’t answer these questions (right now), but I am convinced, now more than ever, of the need to test and teach students about their strengths. In fact, I don’t know why every student in the world shouldn’t be taking a Strengths evaluation. I think it’s that important.

Question: What has your experience with Strengths testing been? How has it affected young people you know?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

Haiti-Do Something

This week I'm going to put a pause to the normal leadership stuff and talk about ideas that have been coming in for helping the people of Haiti.  My prayer is that we can share some ideas and by communicating help the people of Haiti better.
My prayer in all of this is that the church rise up as one and flood the nation of Haiti with food, water, shelter, support, rebuilding effort, workers, and of course, the gospel.
One idea that came to me yesterday really caught my attention:  A benefit concert.  I expect that at anytime, the worldwide music community will start having benefit concerts for the people of Haiti.  Why can't we do the same?  Surely in your community there are some bands and a central location that you could use to put on a benefit concert. 
 As for me, I love the idea.  After talking with my leadership development team last night, we decided to start putting it together.  It's going to take some work.  In fact, it's going to take a lot of work.  But it's worth it.  I'll let you know what organization we will partner with to get the proceeds to Haiti. 
In the meantime, share some of your ideas with me.   Let me know what you're up to to help the people of Haiti, and how your leadership team is getting involved.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Don't Pretend It's Working

Have you ever become so stretched in your personal and professional life that you let things slide? Of course you probably have, and so have I. Many times we become so busy, and therefore caught up, that we will let programs or curriculum continue long after they have stopped being effective.
When our consciousness begins to nag at us about it, we justify ourselves by thinking that maybe the students can glean something from it, no matter how terrible it is. This is not good thinking, so think again.
If we continue using a program or curriculum that isn’t working, our students will not so slowly lose respect for us. Here’s why:
1. They know it’s not working, and they know you know that it’s not working. You’re not fooling anyone.
2. If you use something that isn’t working, they are going to assume that you don’t care. And if you don’t care, neither do they.
3. You aren’t modeling responsible leadership when you allow a failing program or curriculum to continue. You aren’t being a leader, and they know it.
Don’t turn a blind eye when things aren’t working. It only aggravates the problem. Be responsible, be the leader, and set things right. Walk your leadership students through why you are changing things up. Help them to understand the process and the reason. They will learn a lot more from that process than they will if you let a dying program linger.
Question: Have You Ever Found Yourself Nursing an Ailing Program? How Did You Finally Put Things Right?
Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,
Matt

Get into the Personal

As we are teaching our students how to be biblical leaders, we must keep in mind that as their mentors and teachers, we need to be careful not to neglect their personal lives.
The following quote from a Tony Morgan blog has haunted me this week, and I hope it haunts you as well:
“At the end of Brian’s message today, he invited people to come forward for prayer and anointing. I was one of a number of pastors and elders who were available to pray with folks.
The experience impacted me. It reminded me that the people that walk through the doors of our church every Sunday may look okay on the outside, but many are dealing with some tough stuff on the inside. Addictions. Marriages collapsing. Kid’s heading in a wrong direction. Medical challenges. Financial crisis. Lack of purpose.”
Our students are human beings, not information repositories. We often (I often) make the mistake of filling them full of knowledge and practice and scripture and all of those wonderful things without attending to their needs.
Big Mistake.
The student who is going through a personal crisis (and we all do) is not going to be able to concentrate on how to be a leader.
The student who just had a fight with her mom is not going to be on her “A” game.
Remember that you are more than a teacher to these students. You are a pastor, a mentor, a guide. You are sometimes the person that they trust the most with spiritual matters. Don’t neglect them by treating them like robots.
Leaders are people too.
In the Trenches,
Matt

More Than Motivation

What are we offering our students?
Are we offering them a spiritual pep talk and sending them out into the world?
How’s that going?
At first, they need a refill every week, so they come back. Sooner or later, they realize that what you’re offering them doesn’t and can’t last, so they stop coming. That’s the problem with motivation. Motivation brought on by emotional pep talks is extremely satisfying in the moment, but as the experience fades, so does the motivation.
So what are you offering your students?
We have to offer something more than motivation.
We have to give our students something to stand on, so they don’t have to come to you for motivation. Jesus gives life, He gives them the Holy Spirit, and He gives them purpose. When you understand your purpose, you don’t need motivation so much. When you have the Holy Spirit, He’s there to help when you start to slow down.
Our job isn’t to give motivation. It’s to lay the foundation of Christian Leadership Principles and to help them discover their purpose. It’s to go on the journey with them and help them make sense of it, but not to motivate them. This does lead to them not needing us so much, but it’s not us they’re supposed to lean on, it’s Jesus.
When we offer our leadership students motivation, this is what we get:
1. Students are dependent on us.
2. Students lose interest quickly.
3. Students looking to external motivation, and not to the Holy Spirit’s prompting.

Knock off the self-help stuff and give them something they can use.
In the Trenches,
Matt

How To Destroy a Leadership Team in One Easy Step

Want to destroy a leadership team in a hurry? Here’s how: Don’t get to know your students. It’s that easy. Don’t learn anything more than their names. who needs to know more than that anyway?
Okay, you do. You need to know a lot more than just their names. Your leadership development team is going to hinge on intentional relationship building. If you want your team to be cohesive, meaningful, and fruitful, you must get involved in the lives of your students.
What drives them? What scares them? What are they truly passionate about? What can’t they stand? These are all things that you want to know; and that they want to share. This isn’t a shallow relationship, this is the real thing. Know them.
I know that this is risky. It involves emotional involvement. Emotional involvement means possible (probable) hurt. It comes with the territory. Get used to it. Remember, these relationships are there to build leadership principles on, not for your emotional health.
If you want to connect, if you want to have real impact on the lives of your leadership team, cultivate real relationships with your students. Be real with them and insist they be real with you. You’ll find that as you do, your group will begin to operate as a real team. And that’s when the real learning starts.
In the Trenches,
Matt