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Bill Hybels on Taking Responsibility for Your Leadership Development

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A good video from the Global Leadership Summit, which is happening August 11-12:

Here’s an abbreviated transcript:

“I do leadership development as a discipline. I don’t do it as a recreation. I read one or two leadership books a month by sheer discipline. I don’t ask myself if I feel like it. I need to read–I have to take responsibility, God has given me, whatever size platform it is- big or small. I have some people I’ve been given charge to lead well. I have to read to get better as a leader. I’m asking you leaders, take responsibility for your leadership development and read more and read as a discipline.

I’m asking you to get around other leaders that are better than you –as a discipline, I’m not asking you to do it recreationally. Every 30 days, ask yourself who could I ask to lunch or dinner? Who can I get around who’s been where I haven’t’ been – built something I have not yet built? How can I ask them the right questions so I can stretch my mind and heart and get better?”

Enjoying the Growing: Addressing a Problem with Setting Goals

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This is a guest post by Loren Pinilis. Loren blogs on time stewardship at Life of a Steward.

One of the foundations of effectiveness is goals: setting them, reviewing them, and acting on them. This is Productivity 101.

But there’s a common problem with goals. They keep us so focused on our desired outcomes that the present passes us by. We move from milestone to milestone, waking up one day to realize that our lives have been joyless pursuits of what’s always over the horizon.

To be sure, Christians should live with an eternal perspective. Yet we glorify God by our attitudes in the present. “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him,” goes the famous John Piper quote. That joy and satisfaction don’t happen when our days are consumed with chasing the carrot on the end of a stick.

How can we combine present satisfaction in God with ambitiously setting goals for our future?

There are a multitude of answers, such as the motivating drive we feel when we truly grasp his grace. But I want to mention one powerful and often overlooked way: finding joy in the act of growing.

God uses the journey for his purposes, not just the destination. This means that we’re not to be satisfied only when our outcomes have been reached. We are to take pleasure in the process of striving for our vision.

To use the popular example of a fitness goal: We don’t just visualize our desired weight loss. We go beyond simply congratulating ourselves when we step on the scale and see how far we’ve come. Instead, we take it a level further and actually enjoy the process of dieting and exercising.

The first-time author can appreciate the frustration felt as they pound out that manuscript. A novice teacher can find joy in the awkward experience of losing a class’s interest. Leaders can rejoice in being challenged as their team struggles to deal with unplanned difficulties.

We may have lofty ambitions to reach radical heights, yet his providence has placed us where we are for a reason. We don’t want our focus on the future to turn into a subtle rebellion or a questioning of God’s wisdom.

The process of working towards our goals can be a tool that God uses to mold us into the image of Christ. We may want to lose weight; he wants to teach us patience. We may want to expand our ministry; he wants to show us our selfish pride.

His loving hands are guiding us – even testing and trying us — this whole time. Even though we’d like to “arrive,” what a joy it is to have the father leading us.

With our sovereign God in control, we can give thanks for — and find joy in — the growing as much as the growth.

Fast Forwarding the End of Poverty: 58 The Film

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Here’s the trailer for 58: THE FILM from Live 58, a Christ-centered global initiative to end extreme poverty in our generation:

The film releases in October. Here’s the synopsis:

WE HAVE EVERYTHING WE NEED. WILL WE DO EVERYTHING IT TAKES?
Premiering this October, 58: is the inspiring true story of the global Church in action. Witness bravery and determined faith in a journey from the slums of Kenya to the streets of New York. Confront the brutality of extreme poverty and meet those who live out the True Fast of Isaiah 58 and create stunning new possibilities for the future.

Travel from the sun-scorched plains of rural Ethiopia to British shopping centers, from Brazilian ganglands and the enslaving quarries of India to western churches, businesses and conferences.

58: invites audiences to discover the incredible work of God through His people in our hurting world. Meet ordinary people, hear their stories, and see their struggles and their victories as 58: shows the relentlessly loving God at work through His Church bringing hope to the darkest challenges of our day. Experience eye-opening reasons to lift our expectations of the future.

Woven with Biblical truth, this film draws audiences into life-changing examples of the True Fast of Isaiah 58 — a young British woman prevailing over the pressures of consumer society, Ethiopian Christians working to restore their environment, an American business owner promoting Fair Trade coffee and connecting his local community with the work of ending poverty, a local pastor in India working to be a Good Samaritan to those enslaved by bonded labor, and the sacrificial generosity of New York youth giving up their own food for the sake of those with even less. These impatient revolutionaries and ordinary prophets present viewers with an empowering vision of the Church rising up to its remarkable potential to end extreme poverty, by bringing God’s words through Isaiah to life in our time, in our day.

Experience 58: this October on television, online, on DVD, and at screening events throughout the U.S.

When Multitasking is Not a Good Idea

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This is a guest post by my friend Andy Naselli. Andy is research manager for DA Carson and editor of the online theological journal Themelios. He has two (!) PhDs and blogs at andynaselli.com, which I highly recommend.

From Tim Challies, The Next Story: Life and Faith after the Digital Explosion (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), 113, 117–18:

During a time of singing at a recent conference, I spotted a woman raising one hand in worship while sending a text message with the other one. We mix worship with our work and pleasure. Why are we surprised when we can only give partial attention to any one of them? . . .

One way we pursue the virtue of efficiency is by becoming multitaskers. If we are driven by efficiency, it is not enough that we work quickly; we must also work on many things simultaneously. Imitating our computers, we seek to switch seamlessly from one task to the next, from one priority to another. At our desks we work on our projects while chatting on instant messengers, sending off text messages, and glancing at our favorite blogs. Even in our entertainment we want to be able to do many things at once—to be able to watch television while sending a text message and checking in on our friends’ Facebook pages.

A rash of recent studies shows that multitasking is not a solution. In fact, studies show that multitasking is actually a misnomer. While we think we are multitasking, we are actually task switching, doing a little bit of one thing and then doing a little bit of another. Our brains just won’t allow us to perform two complex operations at the same time with the same skill. Quality necessarily suffers, as does depth. Not only that, but multitasking is not even very efficient. David E. Meyer, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan, found that “people who switch back and forth between two tasks, like exchanging e-mail and writing a report, may spend 50 percent more time on those tasks than if they work on them separately, completing one before starting the other.”

Meanwhile, if we surround ourselves by too many stimuli, we force our brains into a state of continuous partial attention, a state in which we keep tabs on everything without giving focused attention to anything. . . .

Whether through multitasking or through monitoring so many sources of input that we remain in continuous partial attention, we lose the ability to think in a sustained way. . . .

This is as true in worship as it is in the workplace. Efficiency is a dangerous mind-set to bring to our faith. We do not want to be efficient worshipers, driven by a desire to get more of God in a shorter amount of time. We do not want to be hurried worshipers who value speed over quality.

Related from Andy’s Blog and Themelios:

The Difference Between Buzz and Word of Mouth

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It’s common to hope for new products, books, and marketing initiatives to “generate buzz.” And if something creates a season of buzz early on, that is often looked at as a mark of success.

At first this sounds good. It sounds like it’s in line with one of the core principles of (good) marketing: create things worth talking about. Unleash word of mouth, which is then amplified by the internet as never before.

But it’s actually not. The concept of “buzz” is actually a hold-over from the old methods of interruption marketing where the organization (or marketer) sees themselves as in control. The reason is that there is a difference between buzz and word of mouth.

Buzz is surface level. It is usually based on superficial realities about the product or message. It doesn’t last.

Word of mouth, on the other hand, is substantive. It facilitates meaningful interactions and is based on deeper realities than just surface factors. It stems from a real emotional connection with the product. It is meaningful.

It’s not that buzz is bad. It’s just not enough. Seek for your product, book, message, website, or organization to generate true and valuable word of mouth, not just buzz.