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Part One: Understanding Our Challenge

The Oddity of Leadership

Life teaches us that the authority to lead and the opportunity to lead are a package deal. When we’re given the authority to lead—a title, a uniform, a corner office—then, and only then, will we have the opportunity to lead. But that’s just not true.

We come to see positional authority as a prerequisite for effective leadership.

Leaders don’t sit back and point fingers. Leaders lead with the authority of leadership…or without it. The authority is largely irrelevant—if you are a leader, you will lead when you are needed.

Influence has always been, and will always be, the currency of leadership. This book is about how to cultivate the influence needed to lead when you’re not in charge.

People lead all the time with little to no authority. Some of the most effective leaders—the people who have changed our world—led without formal authority.

Think about Martin Luther King, Jr.  He wasn’t bound by his position. (Check out my summary Martin Luther King, Jr. on Leadership by clicking here). He knew change would come about as the truth was brought to light and hearts and minds were exposed to a new .aradigm, one that saw the worth and equal value of all people and did not judge them by the color of their skin. King led because that’s what leaders do. They cultivate influence with a title or without a title.

Who put Nelson Mandela in charge of abolishing apartheid in South Africa? No one.

October 2 is now recognized as the International Day of Non-Violence. Why this day? Because that is the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi led a national revolt against one of the largest and most powerful governments in the world. But he had no formal position within the government. He has a title now, though, since India received its independence from Great Britain in 1947. Today, he’s referred to as “the Father of the Nation.”

In his TED Talk “Why Good Leaders Make You Feel Safe,” Simon Sinek explains, “Many people at the top of organizations are not leaders. They have authority, but they are not leaders. And many at the bottom with no authority are absolutely leaders.”  (See my summary of Sinek’s Leaders Eat Last here.)

Leadership expert Jim Collins writes, “For many people, the first question that occurs is, ‘But how do I persuade my CEO to get it?’ My answer: Don’t worry about that…each of us can create a pocket of greatness. Each of us can take our own area of work and influence and can concentrate on moving it from good to great. It doesn’t really matter whether all the CEOs get it. It only matters that you and I do. Now, it’s time to get to work.”  

But what you can do is focus on your own area of responsibility and make it great. Collins continues, “Take responsibility to make great what you can make great. And let others do it in the areas that they can make great. And if the whole company doesn’t do it, you can’t change that. But you can take responsibility for your area.”

When someone has to pull out the gun of authority, something is broken. You only pull out the gun of authority when nothing else is working. No one wants to follow someone who is holding a gun to their back. That’s not leading. That’s pushing people around and forcing them to go where they don’t want to go.

Jesus argues that the best leaders, the ones who align with his vision for leadership, will lead as servants who are aware of their responsibility and who answer to a higher calling.

In a Harvard Business Review article titled “The Key to Change is Middle Management,” Behnam Tabrizi writes that mid-level managers are the lynchpin of change within an organization. He finds that these managers do not necessarily have the authority to effect change, but they can still make change happen. “A hallmark of the successful 32% was the involvement of mid-level managers two or more levels below the CEO. In those cases, mid-level managers weren’t merely managing incremental change; they were leading it by working levers of power up, across, and down in their organizations.”

Influence always outpaces authority. And leaders who consistently leverage their authority to lead are far less effective in the long term than leaders who leverage their influence. Practice leading through influence when you’re not in charge. It’s the key to leading well when you are.

Identity Crisis

Near the core of what makes a person a leader is their sense of identity. Your personal identity is even more crucial when you’re determining how best to lead when you’re not in charge.

Kurt Vonnegut famously said, “I am a human being, not a human doing.” Vonnegut was an avowed atheist and president of the American Humanist Association, but his observation parallels the orthodox Christian view of how God created us. We were crafted in God’s image to be something before we were given any mandates to do something.

Another way to say this is that our identities precede our actions; our behaviors flow from our identities. So before we spend any energy on what we do as leaders, we really need to spend some time on who we are as leaders, especially when we are not the ones in charge.

No one wants to be known as a pretender. For teenagers, college students, and young leaders, being called “fake” is an egregious insult. Because of that, many young leaders admit weaknesses in the name of keeping it real. While the authenticity of that is great, we have to find the balance between authentically admitting our weaknesses and excusing weaknesses. Too many young leaders use phrases like “That’s just who I am” or “They just need to know that’s how I’ve always been” to excuse areas of potential growth.

Your self-identity is complicated, so let’s put it in simple terms: your identity is the conception you have of yourself. It is those core beliefs about yourself that you tell yourself all day long.

There are five basic components of identity, and Scroggins helps us remember them by starting them all with the letter “P.” They are your past, your people, your personality, your purpose, and your priorities.

1. Your Past:  Your family plays a large role in sculpting your identity. And this includes factors like your race, your socioeconomic class, your citizenship, and your gender. How you see your family of origin and the lineage of people from which you’ve come determines the constancy and consistency of your identity. This is your self-in-time.
2. Your People: Your identity is not just a matter of how you perceive yourself based on your past, but it’s also based on how you sense others perceive you today. The people you’re surrounded by in your existing relationships and roles distinctly shape who you are in the here and now. This is your self-in-relationships.
3. Your Personality: We are all born with some hardwired realities that also shape our identity. Our physical bodies, our characteristics and traits, our emotional and impulsive lives, and our talents and skills all shape how we experience life. This is your self-interior.
4. Your Purpose: We were all created to have a purpose, but let’s go one step further. We were all created to thirst for a purpose. Every one of us has a desire to see and understand how our lives fit into a bigger picture. Every one of us has been hardwired to desire a reason for our existence. “Why am I here? What can I uniquely contribute to the world?” This is your self-agency. In the church world, we designate this a “calling.” But at times well-meaning people hijack the term “calling” and use it for selfish manipulation. Scroggins notes that he only knows a few men and women who have a specific and personal purpose or mission statement. For the rest of us, God has revealed enough of his general purposes in this world for us to chew on for the rest of our lives.
5. Your Priorities: Your priority of truths shape your identity. This is where your faith—or lack thereof—comes most clearly into play. God has something to say about our priorities—our most important ideals, beliefs, aspirations, values, and passions. And your priorities will shape how you see yourself. This is your self-determination.

Scroggins points out that these two truths have had more impact on his identity than anything else:

• Because I have been created in the image of God, I am a chosen child of the King.
• For God so loved me that Jesus died for me.

The clearer you are about who you are . . .

• the more consistent you will be with others.
• the more confident you will be about what you do.
• the less concerned you will be with the opinions of others.
• the less confused you will be by your emotions.

Remember God’s conversation with Moses.  Here’s a paraphrase: “I know your weaknesses. I know what you’re not good at. I know you stutter. I know you’re scared. I know you’re insecure. I know your past. I know about it all. But I don’t want that to define you. You have what it takes! Well, you don’t have what it takes, but because I’m going to be with you, you have what it takes! Now go! And quit worrying about who you are not and focus on who I AM!” There’s an identity check we all need to pay attention to.

Consider what Hebrews says about Moses’s identity early in his life. “By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin” (Hebrews 11:24–25). Moses refused to let others define him. He said no to what would’ve been an easy identification so he could say yes to the identity God wanted for him.

Your identity is healthiest when what God says about you is most true of you.

Here is a key truth about your identity as it relates to your leadership, “If you fail to believe what God says about your identity, you will fail to reach the potential he’s put in you as a leader. Your ability to be a fearless leader is squarely rooted in your identity.”

The best leaders may or may not have all the authority they need or want, but the security of their identity—especially as someone called and loved by God—gives them a freedom and fearlessness to do what is right. They are able to challenge well, to lead by making a way even when there isn’t a way. Jesus followers should understand this, but more often than not, we are as guilty as anyone of letting our fear paralyze us.

Reclaim Kibosh

The why of leadership is the engine that drives your leadership train. You are motivated by something inside of you, and you need to know what that is.

The distortion for many young leaders revolves around one word: ambition.

God has placed desires inside of us: a desire for more, a desire to see things change, a desire to make things better, and a desire to lead. But those desires can easily get twisted. And when the ambition inside us is distorted, it affects every aspect of our leadership.

In its purest form, there’s nothing wrong with ambition. It’s one of the hallmarks of leadership. Do you feel it? Drink it in, because it’s good. Ambition is what drives us to want more opportunities, to have more influence, and to contribute to the overall mission of life with greater impact. The problem for many leaders is that they do not know what to do with that drive. Letting it run wild can be disastrous, but putting it on mute doesn’t work either.

Ambition doesn’t magically begin when you are placed in charge.

Holy Ambition is a useful term, especially for a church crowd where any ambition is often too closely associated with the sinful tendency to seek prominence, grab power, and grow in pride at the expense of others. In the church, it’s automatically assumed that these three P’s are dangerous roommates with ambition, living together in a four-room college suite with an efficiency kitchen. And that association creates confusion for many young leaders.

When our good, God-given ambition is distorted, it can manifest itself in a selfish need to be in charge, to seek recognition, or to exert control over others. Clearly, these distortions of ambition are problematic and flat-out destructive.

Leading when you’re not in charge does not mean you learn skills to get ahead by circumventing the authority above you. Just as the response of killing ambition mutes something God has placed within you, the response of letting your ambition run wild fails by allowing your ambition—instead of God—to take the driver’s seat.

Leading without constraints and giving into unbridled ambition will be the death of any leader because God didn’t intend for our ambition to run wild.

This command to “subdue it” is a mandate for leadership, and in this mandate, we find a clue to the third option—that middle way that helps us understand what we should do with the ambition God has put inside us.

Kabash /’kä bäSH/ means to subdue, cultivate, and organize something in such a way that it thrives, grows, and flourishes “fill the earth and subdue it.” Kibosh /’k¯ı bäSH/ to put an end to something or to dispose of it decisively “put the kibosh on my deal” Kabash, as we first see it in Genesis, speaks to the ambition God has given us to lead—our drive to subdue, cultivate, and organize so this world flourishes. It’s a good thing, a gift we need to steward creatively and responsibly. But here’s the problem: far too often, that good kabash becomes kibosh—an attitude of opposition and negativity that kills creativity and shirks responsibility. When we give in to kibosh, we are embracing a distortion of kabash.

Scroggins argues that we’ve taken God’s good command in Genesis 1 and twisted it. It may not be intentional, but somehow we’ve taken God’s command to kabash and have filled it with a new meaning—the exact opposite of what God intended

As we learn to trust that God is the one to establish authority, we find ourselves becoming the kabash leaders God intended us to be.

Scroggins notes, “The older I get, the more I realize that between the extremes there is usually a third option.”

Jesus did this all the time. The teachers of the law were constantly trying to catch him in black or white, yes or no, good or bad scenarios, but he transcended their elementary thinking with a third option that shattered their categories. For instance, in Mark 12, the Pharisees are found trying to trap Jesus with binary options, but he offers them a third way. “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s” (Mark 12:17).

A kabash leader is marked with humility because they know that pride sets us against God (see James 4:6). A kabash leader is courageous, not because they possess inner strength, but because they know God is the one who controls the destiny of every man and woman. A kabash leader longs to organize and create for the betterment of all—for the good of others and not just the good of the leader. A kabash leader uses his or her influence to help others get ahead and not to get ahead of others. A kabash leader pours out, trusting that God’s new mercies each day will be enough to fill them up.

When the kabash in you is harnessed under God’s authority and for his glory, you’ll find yourself leading in the way you were meant to lead.

Part Two: The Four Behaviors

Lead Yourself

Just as there are inalienable rights, there is such a thing as inalienable responsibility. What this means is that everyone leads something. Everyone is in charge of something—even if it’s just you.

WHERE THE BUCK STOPS

Here’s the truth you need to know: Your boss is not in charge of you. You are in charge of you. You are in charge of your emotions, your thoughts, your reactions, and your decisions. It’s the law of personal responsibility, because everyone is responsible for leading something, even if that something is just you.

If you find yourself abdicating responsibility because you’re not in charge, step one is to recognize it. Step two is to fix it. And that leads to the second truth you need to know as a leader: When you’re not in charge, you can still take charge. To put this in the form of an Old English question, “Of what should you take charge?” Great question. For starters, the answer is you. You should take charge of you.

As the adage says, “I would much rather steer racehorses than carry racehorses.” Steering a racehorse is exhilarating. Carrying a racehorse is exhausting. It’s easy to blame someone for not leading you well. Resist that urge, own your ambition, and begin to lead yourself.

Jesus was making a statement about stewardship when he said, “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much” (Luke 16:10), but implicit in what he’s saying is that there’s so much more at stake in how you’re leading yourself than just you leading yourself.

THE GAME PLAN

Self-Leadership Principle #1: Model Followership.

Do you know how to follow well? Does the team around you know that you’re following well?

Self-Leadership Principle #2: Monitor Your Heart and Behavior.

There is good reason David is called “a man after God’s own heart.” Look at all the times in Psalms when he bared his soul before God, begging God to help him keep his heart pure.

Self-Leadership Principle #3: Make a Plan.

You will not lead yourself well by accident. It must be intentional—use a “Lead Me Plan.” Everyone needs to be able to answer this question: what are you doing to lead yourself well? What is your “Lead Me Plan”? To lead you well, you need to focus on three simple aspects:

1. Know where you currently are.
2. Have a vision for where you want to go.
3. Develop the discipline and accountability to do what it takes to stay on track.

In How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In, Jim Collins described “the hubris of success.” The first misstep success brings is to credit the success to your own doing, but this only sets leaders up for future failure: “Truly great [leaders], no matter how successful they become, maintain a learning curve as steep as when they first began their careers.”

We each need to have a personal vision for our own lives, a plan for our futures. Without a personal vision for your life, how do you know what to do with the opportunities that present themselves? Especially the good ones, like a promotion?

It’s dangerous to hold too tightly to the plans we’ve determined for ourselves, but it’s just as dangerous to have no vision or direction for stewarding the gifts, talents, and opportunities God has given us.

You may not be in charge, but you are in charge of you!

Use the mindset that “My boss owes me nothing.” That may not necessarily feel good, but it’s worth a shot. Choosing to believe your boss owes you nothing, or at least very little, is a powerful step forward for the relationship.

What if God wants to accomplish something in you more than he wants to accomplish something through you? What if the only way for him to grow it in you is to put you under a bad leader?

Don’t we all learn more from times of struggle than we do from times of ease?

Choose Positivity

In Seven Habits of Highly Successful People, Steven Covey says, “We see the world, not as it is, but as we are—or as we’re conditioned to see it.”

Covey’s next comment is also worth noting. “We must look at the lens through which we see the world, as well as the world we see and that the lens itself shapes how we interpret the world.” There is someone, somewhere facing a similar situation and is seeing life with a lens that allows them to have more influence, excitement, and contentment.

How you see your world shapes your world. And you have a say in how you see.

Dale Carnegie Training developed a white paper a few years ago titled “What Drives Employee Engagement and Why It Matters.” Their research describes the evolution required for employees to move from feeling “esteemed” to “involved” to “enthusiastic” to eventually becoming a “Builder Employee.”

What does it take for employees to move from mildly engaged to deeply engaged? Those leaders who feel a strong sense of ownership and have made the crucial connection between what their job is and how it drives results for the organization are more deeply engaged.

It’s your responsibility to look for ways to connect what you do each day to those overall goals and objectives. You’ve probably heard the phrase, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” Your manager can make the connection clear or he or she can make it muddy, but it’s your duty to hold that objective in front of you.

What you believe about God and how you see the future are foundational voices for how you will lead right now.

Hope is a confident expectation of something good to come. The basis of our Christian faith is that our God is a God who is always able, always moving, and always working on our behalf.

Trust-fueled, hope-filled, forward-thinking people can push through anything that gets in the way because their eyes are fixed on more than what’s directly in front of them.

Positivity is not just a personality trait. Positivity is a character trait. Personality refers to our inherent bent, much of which is predetermined. But character is developed over time. And more often than not, character is developed when things are difficult.

In Patrick Lencioni’s book The Advantage, he argues that people are more likely to buy in when they’ve had the opportunity to weigh in. But that doesn’t always happen, does it?

A deep trust in God and a persistent hope for the future will push you to keep growing and learning because you believe God is getting you ready for something he will lift you into. Until he does, you’re not quite ready. Scroggins points out, “This kind of humility allows me to keep working on my craft, knowing that when I’m ready, my time will come.”

Think Critically

Leaders need to cultivate a positive vision in those they lead. And they need to see that vision for themselves. Consider the article entitled “Millennials: Are they a group of misguided optimists or a group of rainbow-puking unicorns?” Doesn’t that do such a fantastic job of describing some of those positive people you know?

When this skill is coupled with a genuinely positive, hope-filled perspective, you can become an effective and balanced leader with the ability to add lift to any room and add value to whatever team God places you.

Rather than becoming uber positive and blindly supporting everything that’s handed to us, or becoming cynical, bitter, and negative, we need to respond critically and thoughtfully. Choose positivity, but also think critically.

Critical thinkers are also able to connect things. Similar to the ability to observe, critical thinkers are able to observe and then make connections between seemingly disconnected behaviors and feelings.

FOUR SUBTLE SHIFTS

Shift #1: Stop thinking as an employee. Start thinking as an owner.

In Romans 8:17, Paul makes this point clear: “Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” If we are sons and daughters of God, then we are responsible for thinking like owners.

Shift #2: Stop stacking your meetings. Start scheduling thinking meetings.

It’s the natural gravitational pull of any organization. Scroggins’ favorite description of this comes from The 4 Disciplines of Execution by Chris McChesney, Sean Covey, and Jim Huling. The authors describe this gravitational pull toward busyness as “the whirlwind.” The whirlwind is described as the massive amount of energy needed to simply keep your operation going on a day-to-day basis. When thinking of the whirlwind, the first thing that comes to mind are the countless meetings that show up on the calendar. Sometimes numerous meetings just start to appear. After a while, you start wondering, “Do I run my calendar or does my calendar run me?”

Cognitive psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman says that seventy-two percent of people get creative ideas in the shower. That’s because thinking critically requires uninterrupted mental space. It’s not just showering that creates these times of clarity. Mowing the grass, taking a walk, driving to work, or pausing long enough to look, observe, and connect the dots brings the space necessary to think clearly. If you’re going from meeting to meeting, you will not have that space. You need to carve it out or your leadership will suffer.

The greatest enemy of thinking critically is an overcrowded schedule. Again, own your calendar or your calendar will own you.

Shift #3: Stop being critical. Start thinking critically.

What is the key difference between someone who is critical and someone who is a critical thinker? Scroggins’ favorite answer is motive. People who are critical want you to lose. People who are great critical thinkers want you to win. They’re motivated to make something better.

Shift #4: Stop giving others a grade. Start lending them a hand.

As you pursue the skill of thinking critically, keep that image in mind—the picture of Jesus on his knee, towel in hand, washing the filthy feet of his closest followers.

He could’ve graded us, pointing out where we had failed and missed the mark, but he didn’t. Instead, he introduced us to the radical concept of servant leadership by grabbing a towel and dropping the clipboard.

Reject Passivity

One of the benefits of being in charge, of having authority over others, is the semblance of control that authority brings. Owners feel a sense of control over the plan, the strategy, and the way forward for the organization.

One of the most dangerous temptations we face when we’re working for someone else is passivity.

Scroggins points out that there’s a value in his organization called remaining openhanded. This is massively important for his team because a team filled with closefisted people will become toxic. The best teammates are those who are willing to share ideas, who are able to withstand their idea not being used, and who understand when they’re asked to carry something outside of their job description for a season. That’s remaining openhanded. The danger of this value is that we begin to create leaders who lack the intentionality to fight passiveness. We’ve all worked with people who were too hesitant to take on more responsibility. Instead, they wait for direction.

Choosing

To get out of the passivity cycle, it’s going to take some initiative. You simply need to choose something—anything—that you will pick up and own.

Another antidote for passivity is developing the margin to plan. The whirlwind of your calendar likely has a way of whipping you into submission, but great leaders, whether they’re in charge or not, make room for planning. Instead of reacting to your calendar, create margin to get out in front of it.

This is a key idea to remember for your own work: never present your boss with just a problem. Always bring a plan for the solution. But remember, it takes planning to come up with a plan. Where in your calendar can you begin to make room to plan?

As you train yourself to choose what’s not getting done, plan time for future planning in the margins of your calendar, and then respond to what is most pressing for your boss, you’ll have a game plan that can work. That’s the CPR for resuscitating the proactivity that defeats passivity.

Tim Cooper, a good friend of Scroggins, has this line: “You will never passively find what you do not actively pursue.” You’re not going to bump into leadership or wait your way into it. Don’t let the feeling of having little control beat you.

Part Three: Challenging Authority

Challenging Up

The instinct to do what needs to be done is an essential aspect of leadership.

Leaders make a way when others can’t find a way. Leaders look at what is, see what could be, and organize others to move toward the preferred future.

As the authors of The Leadership Challenge put it, “Leaders must be agents of change.”

Challenge brings change, and change is inherently challenging. In The Leadership Challenge, Kouzes and Posner write, “Leaders must challenge the process precisely because any system will unconsciously conspire to maintain the status quo and prevent change.”

A bumper sticker said, “There are two things I hate: Change and the way things are.”

It’s natural that the more personally we take something, the more personal we’ll be with anyone who challenges it. Great leaders don’t get defensive. Any change to the present system will be perceived as a criticism of past leadership.

Great leaders challenge up with the best motives. Great leaders are keenly aware of what the boss is most interested in. When possible, position your challenge as a step toward a greater solution for the macro-problem your boss is looking to solve.

Great leaders know what’s core and what’s peripheral.

Great leaders challenge up quietly, but they are not silent. They know how, when, and with whom to communicate when trying something new. The words you use when you share your idea are bricks that will either build a bridge of relationship for your idea or a wall of distrust. Since words matter, here are a few common statements and phrases you should probably avoid:

• Constantly comparing your team, organization, or church to another team, organization, or church
• Emphatically declaring that what you’re doing now isn’t working
• Blaming the current situation on anyone, especially your boss
• Obstinately offering an ultimatum for your future

Breaking Down Challenging Up

When you decide to challenge up, nothing is more important than the relationship you have with the person you’re challenging. Before you decide to approach your boss or even someone in another department with something potentially challenging, you need to think through the relationship you have with them. Do you get the sense they like you? Do you feel they respect you? Do they trust you?

You need to choose to love your boss. Loving your boss means you genuinely want what’s best for them and you’re trying to do what’s in their best interests. Even though 1 Corinthians 13 is widely known as the Love Chapter, Philippians 2 is extremely helpful in understanding what it looks like to love someone well. Philippians 2:3–4 reads like this: “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” In other words, put yourself to the side. Choose what’s important to the other person as more important than what’s important to you.

Leadership is not simply a matter of authority. Leadership is about influence. And challenging up is a form of leadership. You are leading your boss to make a decision that they might not make on their own.

Be convinced that God put your boss in their position. Whether you like your boss or not, God establishes authority. The more convinced you are that God has appointed the authorities over you, the more responsible you will be with how you challenge them.

To build trust, practice faithfulness. Nothing will win your boss over like selfless faithfulness over an extended period of time.

Do the little things to build trust. Show that you are faithful with a little so you can be trusted with a little more.

Bring up disagreements when emotions are low. When emotions are low and we’re speaking in hypotheticals, it can be helpful to ask your boss this simple question, “Hey, this rarely happens, but I’m sure it will. When I disagree with something I see, what’s the best way to bring that up with you?” It’s amazing how disarming that question can be.

Champion publicly. Challenge privately.

Choose to trust your boss. If you constantly dwell on how frustrated you are, you will go into your meetings feeling closed and negative. Those negative emotions, feelings, and thoughts will naturally leak out in what you say.

Markus Buckingham’s The One Thing You Need To Know About Great Managing, Great Leading, and Sustained Individual Success is a must-read. Buckingham argues that the most common behavior in every great marriage is the decision to believe the best about the other person. He summarizes his advice with this directive: “Find the most generous explanation for each other’s behavior and believe it.” This insight is congruent with what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13:7 about love: “It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

Admit to yourself and to your boss that you may be missing information.

Ashley Montagu, a British-American anthropologist, said, “Humans are the only creatures who are able to behave irrationally in the name of reason.”

It does you no good to walk into a situation thinking you have it all figured out. There is always information you’re lacking that can help you understand the situation more clearly. Stay in the balcony to remain emotionally neutral. Prepare yourself to be okay with a no.

Local bar theologian, Garth Brooks, had something profound to say in his song “Unanswered Prayers”: “Sometimes God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.” Sometimes God is giving you an unexpected gift when you get a no to your great, world-changing idea.

Scott Adams, the voice and author behind the comic strip Dilbert, has written a fantastic book called How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big. In talking about careers, Adams writes, “Avoid career traps such as pursuing jobs that require you to sell your limited supply of time while preparing you for nothing better.” He says that everything we do should provide preparation for something else we can do in the future.

The Leadership Challenge says this well: “Leadership is not about challenge for challenge’s sake. It’s not about shaking things up just to keep people on their toes. It’s about challenge with meaning and passion. It’s about living life on purpose.”

Legendary professor Dr. Howard Hendricks said, “If there is a mist in the pulpit, there’s fog in the pews.” This isn’t just true for preaching, though. If you are fuzzy on how a change you propose will make things better, your boss will be confused as well.

Start by finding the why. Begin by answering some simple questions:

• Why?
• Why are you suggesting this change?
• Why will this change make it better?

The answer to why is not always easy to find, but if you can nail this, it will help you be clear about the meaning and purpose of this change. With over thirty million views, Simon Sinek’s video has brought insight, and the power of the question of why is no secret anymore. Not only has his TED Talk shaped many leaders, but the guiding principle of his book, Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action, has been profoundly helpful as well. He writes, “People don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it. And what you do simply proves what you believe.”

Hold tight to why, but be loose with what. Adjust your approach to fit the person. Declare your intentions before you challenge. Ask questions of curiosity and mean it.

Disciplining myself to lead with questions helps me avoid the trap of rash judgments. Curious questions cause humility.

Here’s the seventy-dollar question: how does your boss feel about you when your name pops up on his or her phone? How you challenge will determine how your boss feels about you.

Your Next Chapter Starts Today

Great leaders know how to lead when they’re in charge because they’ve been leading long before they were ever given that authority.

Leadership starts right now, wherever you are.

One of the best things you can do today is to begin asking yourself questions about how and why you want to lead when you’re in charge. Then start leading with those answers in mind.

The truth is, all we need is a perspective shift. When we stop thinking about how we want to lead in the future and start looking for opportunities to lead right now, we truly learn how to make ourselves, and those around us, better. Real leadership isn’t about having the authority to lead. Authority matters, but it’s a tool that makes good leadership effective, not the secret sauce that makes everything about leadership suddenly happen. Instead, we need to learn how to cultivate influence.

One of the most important questions you can ask yourself is this: what do you want people to say about you when you are finally in charge?

Having a title doesn’t give you a reputation as a great leader. As Dave Ramsey put this in EntreLeadership: “I confused having a position with real leadership. Having children doesn’t make you a good parent; it means you had sex. That’s all.”

Nothing magically changes about your reputation when you are placed in a position of authority. The same reputation you have without power stays with you when you do have power and authority.

Chances are, if you wait to start leading, you will never be put in a position to lead anyway.

A Gallup study showed that fifty percent of people who leave their jobs do so because of their bosses. As a leader, it is your responsibility to create an environment where people enjoy their work and find meaning in it. You also need to create a team environment where others enjoy working with you. If people enjoy working with you, it is much more likely they will potentially enjoy working for you.

Solomon says, “When the righteous thrive, the people rejoice; when the wicked rule, the people groan” (Proverbs 29:2).

The best way to be the type of leader people want to celebrate is to care deeply about the people you work with. Effective leaders are inclusive. When they succeed, the people around them succeed. A rising tide lifts all boats.

Inclusive leaders do not isolate themselves as authoritarian figures. Rather, they include themselves in the discussion as influential innovators.

In Matthew 10, Jesus sends the disciples into towns and villages to heal the sick and spread the gospel. But he didn’t just send them out and hope for the best. No, he equipped them. He told the disciples where to go, what to say, what to do, and even what to take (verses 6–10). He also spent time encouraging them and warning them about the job ahead of them. That’s leadership.

The best leaders are learners. They realize there is always something to learn from the people around them.

Do’s:

• Value every opinion, especially those that contradict your own.
• Tell people you value the work they are putting in.
• Lead by action first and word second.
• Express expectations and make sure those around you know what you want and need from them.
• Provide as much encouragement and affirmation as possible.
• Be efficient with tasks and effective with people.

Don’ts:

• Underestimate the intern.
• Ignore an idea/belief/criticism shared by more than one person.
• Take the people who are doing the dirty work for granted.
• Schedule meetings that have no clear goal or purpose.
• Act as if you’re better than everyone, even if you are.
• Undervalue the time others are putting in to make your job easier.

The question we should ask ourselves is this: are the people I’m leading here for me or am I here for them? Great leaders sacrifice themselves for the good of others. Jesus laid his life down. If the Son of God didn’t lead with self-service as his priority, then neither should we. Jesus teaches us that leadership isn’t about being served. It’s about serving.

There are four words that create accountability for how Scroggins lives each day: “As now, so then.” Or to put these four words into our context: as you’re leading now, so you will lead then.

Patrick Lencioni once said this at Willow Creek’s Leadership Summit: “Management is good ministry. We are called to love the people we lead.” Sound familiar?

Great leadership depends on influence. The more influence you cultivate today, the more you’ll have tomorrow.

Choose to start leading today, whether you’re in charge or not. It starts right now.