Every person has a sphere of influence. Your sphere of influence is the place or places where you exercise a measure of leadership. Leadership requires two key roles: being a leader, and being a manager. In short, we call this the leader manager. Here’s how the two roles break down:
Manager: A person who concentrates more on work than on people. Managers operate within established patterns and practices. They get the job done by directing and guiding the work of others within the limits of those practices.
Leader: A person who concentrates more on people than on work. Leaders move people outside of traditional limits and enable them to move into new areas of activity and achievement. They do this through relationship rather than direct control.
Again, it’s important to note that good leadership requires both skillsets. However, as you reach higher levels of leadership, leader qualities will need to outweigh manager qualities. You learn to work on your business more than you work in your business.
This blog post and corresponding episodes of The WealthBuilders Podcast covers five tips to become a better leader manager. They are:
1. Be Aware
2. Be a Thermostat, not a Thermometer
3. Cultivate Quality Communication
4. Focus on Personal Development
5. Serve Your Way to Promotion
5 Tips to Become a Better Leader Manager
1. Be Aware
Self-Awareness
Psychologists Shelley Duval and Robert Wicklund defined self-awareness as follows:
“Self-awareness is the ability to focus on yourself and how your actions, thoughts, or emotions do or don’t align with your internal standards. If you’re highly self-aware, you can objectively evaluate yourself, manage your emotions, align your behavior with your values, and understand correctly how others perceive you.”
Self-awareness starts with learning where you are personally. From there, you can begin to navigate how you may be affecting others around you. A great way to grow self-awareness is to cultivate your capacity as a learner. Lifelong learners are more aware of the world in general, and that inevitably leads to a contextualized self-awareness. Becoming a life-long learner can start with the simple discipline of reading at least one new book per month. Pick material that will move you forward in the direction of your goals.
Awareness of Others
As a leader manager, it’s important to be self-aware about how you’re relating to others. Evaluate your relationships. Are there any areas where you need to be more present or potentially apologize?
Awareness of others starts with listening. It is more than simply paying attention to words. Eighty-five percent of communication is nonverbal, so learn how to read body language as well. God gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason. We should listen twice as often as we speak.
There are two ways people tend to listen. One way is to listen so that you can consider a response. However, it’s even more important to learn how to listen for learning purposes. Take a break from analyzing your next move and recognize that everyone can teach you something.
As you listen, learn how to have perspective on people and situations without passing judgement. Jesus said “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.” (Matthew 7:1) The minute you judge someone, you pigeonhole them. It’s very difficult to get them out of that slot in your mind, and it limits your perspective on how God may want to use that person or situation. When I was younger, I would become offended every time someone disagreed with me. A mentor showed me that what I was really doing was passing judgement in my heart. If you’re going to lead a team, you can’t be blind, but you can’t be judgmental, either.
2. Be a Thermostat, not a Thermometer
Thermostats set the temperature whereas thermometers only record it. As a leader manager, you can’t let your circumstances lower your temperature. That’s a choice that only you can make. You control the atmosphere of the room.
When you’re the thermostat, there has to be a degree of relatability between you and those you’re leading. You won’t be able to set culture if people don’t feel like they can identify with you. As Theodore Roosevelt said, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”
Here’s a real practical way to show you care. Find something the people or person you are leading likes to talk about, and then talk to them about it! People like to talk about themselves more than they like to hear you talk about yourself. As a leader manager, you shouldn’t act like a know it all (even if you do know it all.) Take on a posture of likeability and vulnerability—it will get you more access and information that arrogance will.
Perhaps you have heard it said that culture trumps vision. I love the way John Maxwell articulates this truth: “Don’t tell them what you’re going to do—that’s vision. Do what you’re going to do—that’s culture.” You lead by doing, not talking.
There is a caveat to likeability. I would rather be respected than loved when it comes to make important decisions that move the organization forward. As a leader, there will be situations where you have to make unpopular decisions. However, if you’ve made the right decision, wise people will come to respect it (and you) in the long run. You don’t get respect automatically; you have to earn it. You earn respect by making difficult decisions.
3. Cultivate Quality Communication
Communication is not just what you say. It’s how the other person perceives what you said. This is especially important to understand when you are dealing with a difficult team member or employee. Sometimes you have to take people along with you slowly.
Even after you’ve been patient, there will still be people in your organization who struggle to understand the directives you are communicating. If those people are willing to learn and grow, the best thing you can do is reposition them—not let them go. You can carry people with you if you give them time and attention.
Learn to touch your downline. (Your downline are the employees who work on the ground level of your business.) One of the greatest business principles I ever learned was that nothing takes the place of personal observation. Does that mean you don’t trust your downline? Of course not! You still need to delegate—observation doesn’t mean micromanagement.
In addition, be mindful that you don’t uncover their upline (the people they report to.) Meaning, if you’re spending time with the downline, you don’t want to promise them something that their upline isn’t willing to deliver.
4. Focus on Personal Development
Work harder on yourself than you do on your job. What comes to your life is attracted, not pursued. The more that you work on your personal growth, the more that things that God has planned for your purpose will be attracted to you.
Psalm 5:12 says, “For You, O Lord, will bless the righteous; With favor You will surround him as with a shield.”
You are covered with favor. There is a magnet inside of the shield that attracts God’s plans and purposes to your life. Some people push too hard to obtain something. Oftentimes, that results in getting stuck with something you don’t want! Recognize that God has divine connections and Kairos moments. If you focus on your personal growth and preparation, God will do His part, too.
As a leader manager, it’s important to focus on personal development for your team, too. Create rhythms of personal growth into your organizational culture, and lead by example.
[Related: 3 Examples of Practical Wisdom in the Bible]
5. Serve Your Way to Promotion
In the corporate world, the concept of serving your way to promotion is completely counter cultural. Business is cut throat, and you grind your way to the top. Service is the opposite of what’s modeled, yet it’s the exact posture that the Bible charges us to implement.
“Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Him, saying, “Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask.”
And He said to them, “What do you want Me to do for you?”
They said to Him, “Grant us that we may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on Your left, in Your glory.”
But Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”
They said to Him, “We are able.”
So Jesus said to them, “You will indeed drink the cup that I drink, and with the baptism I am baptized with you will be baptized; but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared.”
And when the ten heard it, they began to be greatly displeased with James and John. But Jesus called them to Himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered rulers over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them.
Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant. And whoever of you desires to be first shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Mark 10:35-45 (NKJV)
This passage is pregnant with meaning. A place where I see it lived out is Andrew Wommack Ministries and Charis Bible College. Andrew and Jamie Wommack exemplify Mark 10:35-45. I’ve never met more humble and authentic people in my life. As the CEO, I’ve seen how their leadership style trickles down to every member of the organization.
As a leader manager, it is so important to lead from a position of service. The people you lead will follow suit. And when they don’t, it will be blaringly obvious because their attitude of self-promotion will be so contrary to the rest of the culture.
Serving God’s Will for Your Organization
Your leadership is not about you. It’s about serving the will of God. If you can’t serve the people in your organization, you probably need a heart adjustment. If you don’t work on your heart, you will be stopped from going where God wants to take you. I’ve seen it happen again and again. The worst people to work with are the ones who are always trying to self-promote themselves into a higher position. God has people for your life that you’ve never met and positions you’ve never dreamed of. When you serve your way to your destiny, God will bring you people to help you get where you need to go. You don’t need to kick doors down.
Several years ago, I was watching Tiger Woods putt on television. The commentators were talking real quiet, and one said, “He putted the ball completely away from the hole!” The other commentator responded, “Look, there’s a halt on the green right there.” The ball hit the disruption, curved, and landed right into the hole. When you serve your way to promotion, it often feels like you’re putting away from the hole. However, if you stay the course and trust God, you will end up in the places He wants you to go. Serve the will of God in your organization, and God will take care of you personally, too.
Do you want to learn more about how to apply practical, biblical wisdom as a leader manager? If so, we created The WealthBuilders Business Development and Nonprofit Workshop just for you! You’re invited to join us August 19-21 in Denver, Colorado. Click here to learn more.
Good read. Very true and effective advise.