Thursday, October 05, 2006

Schroeder on Leadership

Blogger John Schroeder has some interesting stuff to say about leadership. Even if you don't agree with everything he says in his post, Leadership Decides, it's worth the reading. A sampling:
We no longer take people places, we figure out where they are going and organize it a bit and call that leadership. That's a whole lot easier, maybe even more egalitarian, but I am not sure it rises to the level of true leadership.
Isaiah records that the Judean people of his time told the prophets, "“Do not prophesy to us what is right; speak to us smooth things, prophesy illusions..." (Isaiah 30:10).

People of every generation and place--including me--would rather hear what we want to hear from our leaders. Far more than what we need to hear. And so, alleged leaders--whether in the Church, politics, or other fields--parrot our preferences back to us and everybody feels warm and fuzzy and nothing of substance happens.

Leadership isn't always a popularity contest. Leaders risk failure. They're unafraid of failure. As more than one person has said, they're more focused on the rewards of success than on the penalties of failure. And when I refer to success, I'm not talking about having the fattest wallet, the most votes, the glitziest house, the biggest trophy, or the largest church. For a leader, as for all of us, success must mean doing the right thing at the right time. That entails huge risk. The leader sees the goal to be attained as worth the risk.

Read John's entire post.

1 comment:

John Schroeder said...

Thanks Mark. You'll be missed at GBC.