Lead, Don't Pull

I love serving with great Pastors and Leaders at Christ Fellowship!

If you have a big goal that you begin working toward, if you have some set objectives and numbers you want to hit in your job, your ministry, or with your team, you soon realize that you need to enlist the help of others to get there.

Rebecca Vardian (right) is one of the best leaders I have ever worked with.  People love serving along with her! #ServantLeader

I work in church ministry for my career.  I love it and feel called to it.  Working and serving in a high impact church like www.gochristfellowship.com requires that I build a team of great people around me who can help me accomplish all of the needs of people and the ministries that we offer.  In fact, it takes me getting high impact leaders who can lead teams of people to manage all of the demands of building our church!

Philip works at Christ Fellowship, but serves along with our teams  #ServantLeader

In your job, in your ministry or in your team, I imagine you must also depend on other people to help you manage.  If you don’t, you will never hit your goals, and you will never survive the pressure of responsibility!

The challenge comes in getting your team to follow your direction, to get them all moving together in harmony and working effectively toward reaching the goal.  Easier said than done, right?

Tim Leads a team at our Stuart Campus, yet is always serving  #ServantLeader

THIS is why I write so much on leadership.  THIS is why I am so intrigued with leadership, learning it myself.  I talk with so many great high impact people who struggle with getting team to come along with them.  They feel like they are herding cats! Or….horses.

I love the movie THE HORSE WHISPERER with Robert Redford.  I own it, and watch it every once in a while when I am in the mood for a heart-warming story.  The story is about a girl and her horse who are in an accident with a car hitting the horse, throwing the girl out of the way to protect her.  The horse is badly injured and the doctor advises that the horse is beyond repair and should be put down.  The girl can’t stand the thought of “punishing” her horse after saving her life, and demands that they find some way or some one to restore the horse.  The family find this man living in Montana who is affectionately called The Horse Whisperer.  He has an unconventional, untested practice working with horses, having almost magical powers of getting unruly horses to follow his lead.

Robert Redford, the Horse Whisperer agrees to work with this girl’s horse, inviting the family to his Montana ranch.  In the first encounters with the horse, Robert Redford does no training, no talking, no rehabilitating.  He simply watches the horse, sitting a far distance away from the damaged horse.  The family grows anxious and frustrated with him after a while of “nothing happening.” The are expecting some type of conventional training to happen.  However, the Horse Whisperer is taking plenty of time to establish some deeper things to happen between him and this horse.  He does not use a whip or tools.  He does not pull or tug at the horse.  He almost “whispers” to the horse, slowly wooing the animal to his voice and his presence.  Redford continues building repoire with this damaged animal, eventually begins testing the horse, and ultimately invites the girl to ride the horse - something that is highly risky and dangerous.  Miraculously, the girl rides the horse with ease and the once damaged horse is now healed and restored, along with the girl! Beautiful story.

I see great leadership principles in this:

Don’t Pull the Horse,

Lead the Horse

Our Church got to serve Paul and Dunbar Childrens Center!

When you are working with High Impact People, you cannot pull them along.  As a leader, you want to get your team to get in line and follow you, follow the plan.  But High Impact people many times are slow to follow your direction, hesitant to adhere to your system.  Sometimes out of impatience to get our team to perform, we treat them like horses trying to pull them along.  Or, like a Horse trainer, we may even pull out the whip and start beating them with intimidation.  This may work with weaker people or followers, who will comply out of a sense of fear; but High Impact people are like high-performing horses that will not budge, no matter how hard you pull, no matter how much you whip.  

You Must Lead Them

Leading is different then pulling.  Leading, by definition means that others are following you, not because they HAVE TO but because THEY WANT TO.  Leading takes a lot longer, but it is so much easier on your back 😃 You do less pulling, less cracking the whip, and more interacting with your High Impact People.  

I once heard John Maxwell, a great teacher of Leadership say:

Before people follow a leader, they first ask themselves three questions about the leader:

1. Do They Love Me?

Is this leader using me? Or do they truly care about me? 

2. Can I Trust Them?

Is this leader trustworthy? Do they have credibility? Have they demonstrated wisdom in their life? Have they achieved prior success?

3. Can They Help Me?

Can they help me accomplish what I feel I am called to do? Before I am willing to help you achieve your goals, I need to see that you are helping me achieve my goals.  

If High Impact People can answer YES to all three of those questions, they will follow you to the ends of the earth.  On the front end, you must proof your love, your trust, and your desire to help them.  This takes time.  This takes investment.  This takes sacrifice.  

I want to give you one action step in how to accomplish your goals:  STOP

Stop trying to achieve your goals and your tasks.

Start Investing much time and energy in being with your people, in serving them, in listening to them.

Stop trying to pull them along with your plan, cracking the whip when they question or hesitate.

Start learning what their passions are, what their questions are, and help them get where they are going.

Stop demanding they they follow you, stop asking them to trust you.

Start loving them, start modeling servant leadership.

Proud of my daughter, Madison Pilot!

If you shift your focus to people, you will discover you will achieve your goals.  If you slow your pace in the front end, you will accelerate your progress on the back end.

Leading people is easier than pulling people; but it takes more time

Pass the Ball

Diana is a great leader who has a growing team at our church!

If you are a leader in some way, in your church, at work, in your neighborhood, good for you! I’m proud of you.  Leadership is hard! Easy to read a blog or book about it.  But when you try to accomplish a project THROUGH PEOPLE, it feels almost impossible!

So when the pressure is on to make something happen, as leaders, we tend to bear down and work hard.  Great people are willing to exert energy and invest their time to make the dream become a reality.  We know that as the leader, we are supposed to get out in front and lead.  That’s what leaders do.  They take charge.

So when we are feeling the pressure to perform, to create momentum and make something happen, our tendency is to get on stage and grab the microphone.  We start “preaching.” We sell.  We make our appeal.  After all, this is the image we know of great leaders.  The leader is the person up on a platform giving a rousing speech.  The locker room talk, the stump speech.  Inspire the troops!

Now...I love a great speech.  I love to hear great leaders and communicators inspire their team.  After a good speech, I am ready to charge the hill!

But here is what I am learning in my season of leading as a Pastor.  Sometimes the right move is to give the speech.  But sometimes the right move is to:

Pass the Ball

OK - basketball analogy coming.  I love the game of basketball.  I love watching great players do amazing things.  A slam dunk, an impossible shot.  But the most exciting thing to watch is a team win.  And how do teams win? By passing the ball.  The team that wins championships know they have to win consistently.  In order to win consistently, they cannot rely on one or two great players to make great plays.  That is not sustainable.  Great teams understand they must involve ALL of their players in the game.  They pass the ball.  

Pastor DJ showing our church family his beautiful new baby, Callie Ray!

I play basketball with some guys once a week, some of them leaders in my church.  One of those leaders is my friend and a Pastor, DJ Cabrera.  DJ is a great basketball player, having played at Martin County High School as a Point Guard years ago.  DJ has a great strategic mind, and it shows not just in his work at the church, but also on the court.  When I am playing on his team, and we are passing the ball, he sometimes shouts “one more pass!” What he is coaching us to do is to not settle for an average shot, but to keep passing the ball until one of us on the team gets an optimal shot.  He is trying to get us to play as a team, not just as a few individuals.  When we pass the ball to the open man and he makes the shot, we cheer! It’s awesome.  (DJ makes fun of me because I shout really loud with excitement - I can’t help it, I get excited!)

I have been attempting to apply this philosophy to my style of leadership.  As a Pastor at Christ Fellowship in South Florida, I have a lot I am responsible for -  a lot of people I care for.  How I endeavor to lead all that I am responsible for is through other leaders, other voices.  I realize that I need older voices, younger voices, female voices, different voices other than mine who are speaking the vision, giving the direction.  This doesn’t mean I abdicate my leadership, or that I cease from speaking vision.  Rather, I share the platform with others.  

I build a platform that others can stand on

Luiz and Jen are new to our church and have immediately started serving, helping others find their place - awesome people!

I have learned that leadership is not best played like golf, where you are a solo act.  Leadership is best played like a basketball game, as a team endeavor.  In basketball, you don’t win unless the team wins.  The leader doesn’t achieve success unless he or she can empower his or her teammates to be effective in their roles.

Here are some practical ways I attempt to pass the ball to our team at our church:

Lead without the microphone

I am challenging myself to find other avenues to earn influence with people so they will follow my lead.  While the platform is a powerful and visible place to speak directly to people, I am learning the power of serving with my teams off platform.  Recently, I have been serving with our Traffic Team by parking cars and welcoming people in to our church services.  

That's me!

This has been one of the BEST things I have EVER DONE as a leader.  People love seeing their Pastor out serving with the team.  I have enjoyed actually DOING ministry, not just LEADING ministry.  It has been good for my heart to serve in this way.  And, I get to spend lots of time interacting with our people - something that fills me up.  I caught this idea from my friend and fellow Campus Pastor, Travis O’Neal who often serves with his teams at the Port Saint Lucie Campus.  I highly recommend you get down from the platform and serve WITH your team!

Share the microphone

Many times, we are afraid that if we share our platform with someone, they will mess it up.  Or, even more scary, they might outshine us because they are more gifted at communication! It takes a very secure and big-minded leader to be willing to allow trusted leaders to share the platform with them.  

Jake is a great Worship Leader and a "Go-To" Team Player in our church

When you take a chance and share part of the platform with gifted and committed people, it actually elevates your influence.  Here’s why: when others share your vision, it is an indication that you have effectively instilled your vision in them! Remember, the greatest communication does not come from your mouth; it is revealed by how well it is repeated by those around you.  

Hold the microphone for others

Secure Leaders are willing to share their microphone with other gifted Leaders.  Seasoned Leaders will go a step further by identifying potential leaders and helping them develop.  Many leaders can spot a gifted person quickly.  Most people struggle with seeing the potential in a person who is undeveloped or untested.  But because there is always such a great demand for gifted, committed, courageous people, we must look beyond the obvious choice to the risky choice.  As leaders of people, it is our job to help others develop their gifts and realize their dreams.  This means we have to adopt a process mentality with our people, realizing that they are going to need YEARS of development, not just WEEKS.

Many people comment about my beautiful daughter, Madison Pilot, how gifted she is in music and in ministry.  Now that she is seventeen years old, many leaders are seeking after her to sing or to lead.  My wife, Kellie and I love it.  We love seeing her getting many opportunities to use her gifts.  People will ask me “how did she get so good?” I tell them that it took 12 years of teaching her piano and singing.  12 Years of instilling in her healthy habits, learning life values, skills in learning to interact with people well.  What you see Madison doing now is a product of daily, weekly and monthly training, nurturing and challenging.  She did not develop just magically.  There is no secret formula or 30 day training that helped her.  She worked hard, she stayed committed to training and growing.  She paid the price and still pays the price today to develop.

(I am SO PROUD of her.  Can you tell?)

Pastor Ismael has more people serving on his team because he cares for people well!

There are people on your team that, if you evaluate them now, may not show signs of greatness or giftedness.  Let me challenge you: IT’S THERE - YOU JUST HAVE TO DRAW IT OUT OF THEM.  Like a hidden treasure deep within the earth, you must take the time to dig it out and help develop it.  This is like holding the microphone for them as they learn to develop their skill.  Whether it’s organizational, gift of hospitality, strategic gifts, public speaking, motivating people and recruiting, writing, the gift to start or build a business, etc.  Look for the hidden treasure in your people.  Begin to dig - keep digging - encourage, affirm.  Help them see a bigger vision for their life.  Show them what COULD BE and begin to give them small opportunities to develop their gift.  And when they step up to your challenge, hold the microphone for them until they can hold it for themselves.

Here's Asher walking next to his father, John.  Asher makes everyone around him feel valued and included

Pass the ball to others on your team.  Lead through others.  It’s harder, it’s riskier.  But, slowly, your people will begin to win championships.

When your team wins, you win!

Hands Off

Have you ever tried teaching a skill to someone? Ever been in charge of a project with a team and tried explaining how to do what needs done? Most people would rather just DO IT THEMSELVES.  They don’t want the aggravation of having to try to teach someone else how to do what they do.  

But teaching others what you have mastered is so valuable.  Here are just a few reasons why:

1. to accomplish big tasks, you need a big team - you can’t do it alone
2. you can go farther faster when you empower a team
3. teaching others leaves your legacy in the world

OK, so if you are still reading this article, you likely are bought in to the value of teaching others what you do, what you know.  Now, I want to teach you HOW I TEACH others.  This is my philosophy of how I equip others, how I have learned is the best way to effectively get my “students” to comprehend what I am attempting to teach them.

Hands off

I have a Hands off approach to how I teach.  I learned this years ago when I first started teaching piano.  I had taken piano lessons myself since I was 5 years old all the way through college where I earned a degree in Piano Performance.  I thought to myself “teaching piano will be a breeze - I have had piano lessons all my life!” 

I remember my first student was an 8 year old boy.  His mom would sit with us as I taught him music.  This boy was excited, respectful, and motivated to learn music.  The first few lessons, I did a lot of talking and explaining about the piano.  The next few lessons, I did a lot of playing the piano, trying to show him how to play.  Then, in the last few minutes of each lesson, I would have him sit at the piano and repeat what I had been showing him.  He struggled to play, but I just chalked it up to him being young and new to the piano.  

After 2 months of lessons, the mom met with me and told me that her son was discouraged as he was not really getting what I was teaching.  She said “Matt, I wonder if you maybe had him do more playing, he may start to embrace the piano more.”   I have to admit, my first emotion inside said “hey, lady - I have my Bachelor’s Degree in Piano Performance.  I am a professional musician.  Don’t tell me how to teach!”  But, I remained teachable to this comment.   To please the mom and keep the boy as a student, I began taking the mother’s advice and started the lesson with the boy on the piano bench.  When I taught the song, I taught it with him in the seat in front of the keys.  I would lean over him to play the song, then immediately would have him repeat.  I would let him make mistakes.  And when he would make mistakes (wrong fingers, wrong position, wrong rhythm), I would resist the urge to correct.  I found that when the boy would sit and figure it out, he would eventually self-correct.  I would only correct when he got stuck.  The more that I would be quiet and let him get his hands on the keys, the better he would learn the song.  And…when the boy would play it right for the first time, he would look over at me with the biggest smile, looking for my approval.  I would cheer and celebrate him!

A hands off approach to teaching takes longer.  It takes incredible amounts of patience, restraint on your part as the teacher. The key to making this approach work is:

The teacher must take their hands off so the student can have their hands on

As the teacher, think of yourself as a Football Coach.  The Coach is in charge of the team.  The Coach is responsible for the team to win.  However, the Coach does not actually play in the game.  The Coach stands over on the sidelines.  In Football, the Coach does not even call all of the plays.  He lets the Quarterback take that role.  Think how stressful it is to be the Coach in charge of the team and responsible to produce a win, but he can’t go out and make the winning play! But the Coach embraces this concept: for the Coach to win, the Team has to win.  The Coach must trust his players.  He must allow the players to implement the strategy.  He must trust the Quarterback to earn the respect of the team, because it is the Quarterback who must work with the team on the field.

Let’s apply this Hands Off Teaching Approach to how you work with your team, whether it be at school, at work, or at church:

Less Teaching, More Empowering

I think I have been guilty of thinking my leadership training and my Powerpoint presentation was so great that everyone in the room should now be a great team player.  There is a place for teaching, for sure.  But what I have come to realize is that my team members get it best when they have the opportunity to lead something themselves.  Empowering does not mean just throwing them in the pool like a child who has never swam before.  But it does mean letting them swim with you close by.  People develop their “swimming muscles” when they have to swim on their own.  A teacher won’t let them drown, but an empowering teacher won’t “hold them in the water” either.  They take their hands off the child so they can truly experience the feeling of having to swim on their own.  This is empowering teaching.

Less Correcting, More Coaching

Correcting is good and necessary.  But Coaching is better.  What’s the difference? To me, it’s the timing of when you give it.  My friend, Dave Simiele is great at this.  He teaches his team at Christ Fellowship church to minimize correcting conversations on Sunday service times.  When one of his team members comes to him with a problem, he says “that’s a Monday conversation.”

What he is saying is that he would prefer to evaluate processes or correct problems during the week in private where he and team can focus on solutions with margin.  Sunday services for a Pastor is like the NFL Football game.  We need to be focused on people and focused on doing our best to make the service run smoothly.  That’s good coaching!

Less Watching, More Doing

Take your hands off the project or task, and have them put their hands on it.  Back to the piano lesson story, understand that people retain much more of what they learn when they DO, not just listen or watch.  Also, when people do something, there is a dynamic of muscle memory that comes in to play.  Once my piano students would play a musical passage correctly, I would cheer for them and then immediately have them repeat it over and over.  I wanted them to feel what playing it right felt like.  I knew they likely would forget all of the notes and rhythms, but what would help them is seeing it and feeling it several times.  When you teach something, get their hands on it.  

Whether it’s getting your team to recruit volunteers, or share a story publicly, or write out a progress report, have them do it over and over.  Point out specific things they do well, and you will find they will repeat those things.  Your team wants to be successful.  This is how you help them feel successful.  They will improve as they are hands-on in doing the work themselves.  When they get it right - cheer them on!

Teaching takes patience, insight and strategy.  But it is worth taking time to teach others what you do well.  Teaching others skills that you have mastered will turn out to be the most rewarding thing you do.  Empowering others to be successful becomes your legacy that will give greater meaning to your life.

Pour Out

If you have been serving in some role for a long stretch, you eventually realize the strain it puts on you personally.  Whether you serve in your church in some way, or in your neighborhood or community organization, serving is demanding and draining.  Why? What is it about serving that is demanding and draining? Is it the hours of work? Is it the manual labor? Is it the preparation? 

I have found what contributes most to the demand and drain of serving is having to work with people.  It’s a paradox, because people bring the most joy and the most meaning to why we serve.  People are the REASON WHY we serve.  Yet, interacting with people can be frustrating, hurtful, and draining.  It is not the long hours that discourage people to serve.  It is not the manual labor that frustrates people.  On the contrary, manual labor actually energizes many people and gives them a sense of immediate accomplishment.  It is the process of working with and interacting with people that drains our battery fast.

I have written many blogs on leadership because leadership is all about working with people.  And while there are many great insights in to how to understand people better so you can work better with them, this blog is focused on the sacrifice of serving.

Serving Takes Sacrifice

I have to remind myself that there is a personal sacrifice in me serving where God has called me to.  Serving is not about me.  Serving is not about fulfilling me, although the benefit of serving is that it does bless me and grow me.  Serving, by it’s very definition is about giving yourself to others.  Serving is about accommodating people.  It is about seeking to understand people and then attempting to meet their needs.  Serving is about denying your own needs and preferences for a moment so that you can take a lower position of a servant to attend to the needs and preferences of others.  

The Apostle Paul was one of the first Church Leaders in History who helped establish many churches.  Paul wrote letters to other Church Leaders to give instruction and counsel that were later included in the Bible.  Paul, with all of his proven experience and Church authority understood the serving mindset and the price of serving.  

One of the letters Paul writes is to a young, up and coming Pastor named Timothy.  Timothy was being faithful leading and caring for people in a church Paul established in the city of Ephesus.  The Apostle was in prison at this stage of his life because of sharing the message of Jesus Christ.  The Apostle by this time had traveled throughout the world preaching, starting churches with people who became new believers.  The Apostle had served people all of his life since his conversion to following Jesus.  Knowing that he would likely be executed by the Romans, Paul wanted to give Timothy and other Church Leaders one final letter on the essence of leading people.  The Apostle Paul gave this charge:

2 Timothy 4

But you should keep a clear mind in every situation. Don’t be afraid of suffering for the Lord. Work at telling others the Good News, and fully carry out the ministry God has given you.  As for me, my life has already been poured out as an offering to God. The time of my death is near.

What a picture of pouring our life out as an offering to God! If you have served faithfully, this will likely resonate with you.  When you truly serve consistently and faithfully, you literally pour out your life - your time, your gifts, your all to people.  You pour your life out at all times, not just when it feels good to you, not just when you understand the plan.  You serve when it becomes difficult, when it feels lonely, when it becomes heavy.  But you stay committed because you know you are called.  Like Paul, you are called to “fully carry out the ministry God has given you.”

Jesus Himself also used this analogy of pouring out in describing His life mission to His inner circle friends.   When Jesus was having a meal together with His Disciples, He knew soon He would be taken and beaten and killed by His enemies.  Jesus had enemies, not because He did anything wrong or selfish.  On the contrary, Jesus lived to serve others.  Jesus came to love the unlovable, to touch the untouchable.  He healed hurting people.  He forgave sinners.  Jesus brought a message of life and love.  But people in powerful positions were intimidated by Him, because He was turning people from traditional thinking.  Jesus was bringing freedom to people, and that endangered their power.  Jesus understood that there would be a sacrifice for his serving.  He would experience suffering for his serving.

Jesus used the bread and the wine at the table to illustrate the meaning of His life, to show the essence of what serving truly should look like:

Luke 22:20

..after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.”

The pouring concept really describes what serving feels like to me.   It is a complete surrender of self.  It is giving your all until you have nothing left to give.  It is giving yourself liberally, not holding anything back.

To pour out, you must empty yourself

But, here is the great thing about serving God!

You can never out-give God

When you pour out to people that you are called to serve, God re-fills you.  Jesus said:

“I am the Living Water.  whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life”
John 4

Proverbs 11:25 makes this promise:

A generous person will prosper; whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.

What I have learned as I have given myself to serving God and serving people I am called serve is that there is a sacrifice in serving.  There is a pouring out of my life, my emotions.  Sometimes, the people I serve do not always appreciate what I do for them.  And they do not always give back to me.  However, as I approach God with my needs and my emptiness after serving, He ALWAYS fills me up, He ALWAYS satisfies my needs.

If you are serving faithfully, be encouraged.  Keep on serving.  Keep pouring out.  Give generously from your life - do not hold back thinking that you have to reserve some back for yourself.  Whatever you pour out will be poured back in to you.

You can NEVER out-give GOD!

What Do You Want?

Everybody wants something.  Every one of us have desires.  We want to get somewhere in our life, we want to progress and reach the level of success that we are hoping for.

However, most of us spend a lot of time talking and interacting with others, but after the exchange we find ourselves no further along toward reaching our goal.  

I want to share something I have learned that has really helped me in my pursuits and my objectives.  In every conversation I have, In every interaction I am faced with, in every meeting I am a part of, I always prepare ahead of time by first answering this question:

What do I want?

I first take time to stop and force myself to work through these issues:

What is it I really want out of the interaction with this person?

What is a reasonable expectation to hope for out of the conversation?

What do I hope to accomplish out of this meeting?

I’m talking about making every interaction INTENTIONAL.

Most of us go in to interactions with people with our most primal desire to be heard, to be understood.  We FEEL BETTER when we have shared our heart.  If we have conflict with the other person, or if the other person has hurt us, we start from a place of emotion and prejudice of how the person makes us feel.  We are too close to the situation that we cannot see objectively beyond the hurt to see the path to progress ahead.

I see this in team meetings as well.  A lot of people share what they see, what they experience.  Others share big ideas and talk about what they used to do in their previous organization. Most share their frustrations or challenges they are dealing with.  Others who are task-oriented tend to rush the conversation by just getting the specifics of the upcoming event or task that they feel responsible for.  They want to know how many shirts to order, which songs are picked, what time to show up.

All of these feelings and all of these tendencies are not bad - at all.  They are natural, they are healthy to share and to express.  To ignore these and just cut to the chase in every interaction would be denying people the opportunity to connect and to relate in a healthy way.  By all means, there is a time and place where people should be able to share their feelings, experiences, and acquire key information.  

My point is to make sure to not miss the MOST IMPORTANT reason for the meeting - that is, to not leave the interaction with the person or leave the meeting with the team without the desired outcome.

I have learned this when I have had to meet with a difficult person about something that wasn’t going right, or was stuck.  I found myself frustrated with them.  And because I am a more outspoken person, I could easily give them a piece of my mind.  I could easily make them feel my pain in the situation.  However, this wisdom-skill of restraint, discernment and intentionality forced me to ask myself before the meeting: 

What do I want from this?

What is the favorable Outcome?

Asking this forced me to be strategic in how I directed the conversation.  To get what I wanted, I had to help them get what THEY wanted.  We call this a WIN - WIN.  

For someone that has hurt me or offended me, my reaction is to maybe hurt them back, or to be defensive and close up myself emotionally.  But when I realize what I really want is healing in the relationship and health moving forward, I go in to the conversation with tenderness, with a desire to first listen to them, and to share my feelings of what is important to me.  I surround everything I say with honor, love, affirming, believing the best about them, while clarifying the hurt or the offense, so I ensure that it won’t continue happening.

When I lead a meeting with a team, I state at the beginning what the purpose and what the desired outcome is.  I clarify the time duration of the meeting and I always start with a brief coaching on the proper mindset we all need to have as we begin sharing and discussing.  And while I allow for plenty of sharing, brainstorming and even fun, I constantly bring re-focus to the conversation.  I rarely do this in a harsh, directive way.  Rather, my style is to ask a leading question, either to the group, or to call someone out to ask their opinion.

Expectations

In all of these scenarios mentioned, one thing to define and to declare is your expectation.  And when you say it, say it clearly, and slowly.  You may need to say it a few times in the conversation, both at the beginning and then repeated towards the conclusion.  Most of the time, I also give it in writing in the meeting.  To do this, I first have had to first take time to really think “What do I want? What is truly important?” If you are realistic, and if you understand that people are a work in progress, then you reduce some of your ideas and dreams down to what is achievable and reachable for this person or this team.  In dealing with a difficult or hurtful person, you realize you may not be best buddies, but how can you understand eachother so as not to push eachother’s hot buttons.  For a team, how can you challenge them to stretch to great things, but break down the big goal in to bite-size, incremental steps.

Action Steps

Sharing Expectations clarify the focus of the mission.  Assigning action steps give legs so that the mission can get moving.  Give assignments to both you and your people as you come out of the conversation.  And then commit to a written deadline that you will personally follow up on.  This brings accountability to all parties.  When you set action steps, you give more credibility to what you have shared or advocated for by acting on what you are saying - and…to what they were advocating for.  Too many of us are all talk, but not much walk.  And we wonder why our voice is not heard.  I have learned that if I want a voice at the table, I first must BRING SOMETHING to the table.  I hate to use this analogy….but it’s kind of like going to a Poker Table in Las Vegas and sitting down asking for cards to join in on the game.  The dealer is going to stare at you and say “place your bets.” If you want to play, you have first got to pay.

Intentionality

To get where you want to go, you have do what is necessary to get there.  Resist your need to always be heard, to be understood.  Restrain yourself from trying to “win” every argument or control the conversation or meeting.  Rather, always keep focused on your intended outcome.  Only say things that help people move toward that outcome.  Intentionality uses more of positive affirming and less of negative conflict.  Intentionality paints a picture of how great the future can be when we work together, not rehearsing the hurt or the failures over and over.  Intentionality asks more questions allowing space for other people to actually figure it out for themselves, rather than spelling it all out for them.  To be intentional in your meeting, you carefully select every word and choose the right time when to speak it.  Some of the most successful meetings I have been in is when I said very little.  I let people get all of their feelings and ideas out, and then concluded with:

1. Affirming their feelngs and ideas
2. Re-focusing the conversation on the shared goal
3. Stating Expectations
4. Making Assignments
5. Asking one or two leading questions to spark their creativity on how they can accomplish those assignments to meet the expectations

In every interaction you walk in to, take time to decide what your desired outcome is.  It must be a WIN - WIN for you and the other person.  Say things that help you both move forward toward the shared goal.  

Know What You Want