Leadership can often seem like a club that is difficult to break into. As a church leader, you see others doing amazing things and making huge impact for the Kingdom. This can leave you feeling like you don’t measure up. The risk of this thinking is that you may be missing the everyday moments of leadership. Opportunities for you to make a lasting difference can be found in everyday situations.
Recently, I watched an interesting TED Talk that exposed this truth that we often forget: Leadership is not about influence and world changing, it is about people changing.
Leading with Lollipops
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What is one of your lollipop moments? If you are a leader today, then someone has spoken into your life and given you the willingness and confidence to take the risk to lead.
Here are a few thoughts on leadership after watching this video:
Leadership is not about titles, power, money, or influence. If you don’t hold a leadership position in your church, don’t let that stop you from impacting people’s lives. Leadership is more about impacting lives than it is about a title. Become a connector and encourager of people. Look for opportunities to tell others how they have impacted you.
Build margin in your life so you have time to really see those around you. In our fast-paced life, it’s very easy to be so activity driven that we miss the opportunities to be fully present with people around us. Some of the best leaders I know are those who have built a margin into their life to allow them to have an impromptu conversation with the person ringing up their groceries. It is those unexpected moments that can be the words of encouragement someone needs to make it through the day. Don’t let our business keep us from that.
Become a ‘thank you’ person. There are few things more encouraging than hearing from someone that you made a difference in their life. If we begin to see the people in our lives as a blessing, then we are better able to communicate to them how they have blessed us. There are two significant outcomes from this: it helps us to live out of a posture of gratitude, and it encourages the person who blessed us to continue blessing others.
Model everyday leadership moments. As a leader, you influence the culture of leadership in your church. Those that look to your leadership should see you creating lollipop moments. If the people that you lead feel like you know them and you communicate how valuable they are to the team, they will begin to do the same for others. The better you are at creating lollipop moments, the more likely your team will become lollipop people.
Leadership is about impacting people in the moment.
How do we create lollipop moments, experience them, and pay them forward?
[Image via Franck Chicot via Compfight cc]
Eric Dye says
I loved this TED Talk. Great stuff, Steve. Thank you!
Steve Caton says
Grateful for the opportunity to share it Eric!