Leadership Humility

There are many great definitions of leadership, but one of my favourites is this simple one by the little known Arnold H. Glasow. “A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.” Leadership must certainly be measured by degrees of humility. The woman or man who does not recognize the contributions of followers or does not recognize that their own success was built upon the foundations of others before them, is no leader. Leadership is experimentation, taking chances, using best guesses, following hunches, and trusting in higher powers. How can one revel in oneself when a particular hunch pays off? Great leaders practise great gratitude.

We have all known those who profess to be leaders while seeking to find a place to lay the blame. They are all too willing to point at their staff or their superiors, “throwing them under the bus.” Leaders will seek to make others successful and will redirect fault: they will either recognize fault with a “buck stops with me” mentality or seek to learn from the problem and move on without pointing at anyone.

Certainly, it is okay to take a share of the credit, but it is a whole team that moves an organization forward. When there is significant recognition, the pseudo-leader is like a “black hole” of credit, allowing nothing to escape absorption, whereas the accolades will quickly reflect off a true leader’s convex surface to shine back on others.

A Prayer for Today

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
My one desire is to live a thankful life.
You have rescued me, blessed me, healed me, redeemed me.

Selah

I desire to live this life in gratitude to you.
I desire to find my place in Your will.
I desire to fulfill the role to which you are calling me.
There is a place into which I uniquely and perfectly fit.

I aspire to get as close as possible to that spot.
Forgive me when I fall.
Forgive me when I fail.
Forgive me when I stray from that perfect place.

Selah

I will trust You and allow you to guide my path into that way.
I will trust You.
Lead me into Your perfect will.

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, amen.

(a contemporary prayer by Keith Shields modeled after ancient Celtic prayers)

Gratitude

“To be grateful is to recognize the Love of God in everything He has given us - and He has given us everything. Every breath we draw is a gift of His love, every moment of existence is a grace, for it brings with it immense graces from Him.
Gratitude therefore takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder and to praise of the goodness of God. For the grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference.”
― Thomas Merton

Narcissism, Entitlement, and Gratitude

I just finished reading The Narcissism Epidemic by Jean M. Twenge and W. Keith Campbell. It is a good description of our present culture backed up with plenty of sociological studies. The following quotes are examples of how Twenge and Campbell convince the reader that we need to be concerned about narcissism in North America.

Enron – the company made up of "the smartest guys in the room" that cooked its books and subsequently imploded – is a microcosm of the downfalls of narcissism. As Malcolm Gladwell argues in his essay "The Talent Myth," "Enron was the Narcissistic Corporation – a company that took more credit for success than was legitimate, that did not acknowledge responsibility for its failures, that shrewdly sold the rest of us on its genius." Gladwell argues that creating a great organization involves cultivating great teams of individuals who can work well together – not just individual superstars. This is yet another reason narcissists are often not very successful in the long run: they would rather take all the glory for themselves than share it with a team.1

The idea that girls should start looking sexy at five – or even earlier – has entered the mainstream. It needs to exit. You can now buy high heels for newborn babies.2

In business, entitlement often boils down to an equation: less work for more pay. Plenty of workers today want that, but they also want more flexibility, balance, meaning, and praise for their work. . . . That would be fine if they were willing to work for it. However, the number of Americans who embrace the idea of working hard has steadily declined. One study found that fewer employees in 1999 (vs. 1974) agreed that "A worker should feel a sense of pride in his work" or that working hard made them "feel more worthwhile and [like] a better person." The 1999 employees were also less likely to agree that "A worker should do a decent job whether or not his supervisor is around."3

They present much more evidence to suggest that we are living in a world of excessive narcissism and entitlement. Fortunately, the last section of the book is devoted to prognosis and treatment. They suggest that

One of the best ways to combat entitlement is to be grateful for what you already have. In one fascinating study, people were asked to list all the things they were grateful for once a week for ten weeks. Compared to a group of people who did not do this task, those who thought about everything they were thankful for reported a greater sense of well-being, enjoyed better health, and exercised more. They were also more emotionally supportive to others. Gratitude is the opposite of entitlement: you think about what you already have, instead of what you deserve to have but don't.4

The book makes a great pitch for something that the Bible (Colossians 3:15, 4:2, and Hebrews 12:28), our parents, and common sense have told us before, live a thankful life and you will be happier and better liked. Why wait for Thanksgiving? Perhaps we could all start right now to list the things for which we are grateful. How different might your life be if you set out to list all the things for which you were grateful once a week for ten weeks or more?

The authors of the book point out that part of the remedy for narcissism is humility. I might also add that a remedy for narcissism is to humbly recognize that we are all broken and in need of being fixed. None of us can claim to have it all together. We know too well the dark corners of our lives which need improvement.

Charlie Peacock's song "In The Light" (most famously recorded by DC Talk) is a reminder of my own brokenness, my need for others, and in particular, my need for a saviour.

"In The Light"
(Music and Lyrics by Charlie Peacock)

I keep trying to find a life
On my own, apart from You
I am the king of excuses
I've got one for every selfish thing I do

What's going on inside of me?
I despise my own behavior
This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That I'm still a man in need of a Savior

I wanna be in the Light
As You are in the Light
I wanna shine like the stars in the heavens
Oh, Lord be my Light and be my salvation
Cause all I want is to be in the Light
All I want is to be in the Light

The disease of self runs through my blood
It's a cancer fatal to my soul
Every attempt on my behalf has failed
To bring this sickness under control

Tell me, what's going on inside of me?
I despise my own behavior
This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That I'm still a man in need of a Savior

I wanna be in the Light
As You are in the Light
I wanna shine like the stars in the heavens
Oh, Lord be my Light and be my salvation
Cause all I want is to be in the Light
All I want is to be in the Light

Honesty becomes me
(There's nothing left to lose)
The secrets that did run me
(In Your presence are defused)
Pride has no position
(And riches have no worth)
The fame that once did cover me
(Has been sentenced to this Earth)
Has been sentenced to this Earth

Tell me, what's going on inside of me?
I despise my own behavior
This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That I'm still a man in need of a Savior

I wanna be in the Light
As You are in the Light
I wanna shine like the stars in the heavens
Oh, Lord be my Light and be my salvation
Cause all I want is to be in the Light
All I want is to be in the Light.

1 (Twenge and Campbell 2010, 45)
2 (Twenge and Campbell 2010, 158)
3 (Twenge and Campbell 2010, 235, 236)
4 (Twenge and Campbell 2010, 241)

Works Cited:
Twenge, Jean M, and W. Keith Campbell. The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement. New York: Free Press, A Division of Simon and Schuster, Inc, 2010.

Think on These Things

I have been pondering these verses from the book of Jeremiah.

This is what the LORD says:
"Cursed is the one who trusts in man,
who depends on flesh for his strength
and whose heart turns away from the LORD.

He will be like a bush in the wastelands;
he will not see prosperity when it comes.
He will dwell in the parched places of the desert,
in a salt land where no one lives.

"But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
whose confidence is in him.

He will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit." Jeremiah 17:5-8 (New International Version - NIV)

Heal me, O LORD, and I will be healed;
save me and I will be saved,
for you are the one I praise. Jeremiah 17:14 (NIV)

We can be like a tree planted by the water. We will bear fruit for our Lord.

Thankful

I want to live a thankful life. Mary Jo Leddy says that "we are held captive by dissatisfaction." I see this around me. People living in one of the greatest places on the planet are dissatisfied and want more. I must confess that often I want more. Ingratitude oppresses and binds us. But I will reject this ingratitude as it rises up in me. Gratitude releases and makes us free. Gratitude brings peace. I will be grateful. I will be grateful for my wife and my daughter with whom I live. I will be grateful for my other daughters living in Calgary and Port Dover. I will be grateful for parents and friends, for nature, for food in my belly, for a roof over my head, and for so many other rich gifts in my life. And to whom will I be thankful? I will be thankful to God.

"Always be thankful." Colossians 3:15b, The Bible.

Vineyards

Isaiah 5:1-6 (New Living Translation)
A Song about the Lord’s Vineyard

Now I will sing for the one I love
a song about his vineyard:
My beloved had a vineyard
on a rich and fertile hill.
He plowed the land, cleared its stones,
and planted it with the best vines.
In the middle he built a watchtower
and carved a winepress in the nearby rocks.
Then he waited for a harvest of sweet grapes,
but the grapes that grew were bitter.

Now, you people of Jerusalem and Judah,
you judge between me and my vineyard.
What more could I have done for my vineyard
that I have not already done?
When I expected sweet grapes,
why did my vineyard give me bitter grapes?

Now let me tell you
what I will do to my vineyard:
I will tear down its hedges
and let it be destroyed.
I will break down its walls
and let the animals trample it.
I will make it a wild place
where the vines are not pruned and the ground is not hoed,
a place overgrown with briers and thorns.
I will command the clouds
to drop no rain on it.

This passage of the Old Testament of the Bible makes me think of fruitfulness. Out of gratitude for what the owner of the vineyard has done, I want to be a vineyard that produces fruit; and in particular I want to produce sweet grapes. This is true of my own life but it is equally true for the church of which I am a part, the community in which I live, the country of which I am a citizen, and the world as a whole.

God has given us much: He has prepared the land and cleared it of obstructions to growth, He has planted it with the best of vines, He has guarded it and kept the vineyard safe, He has built the structures that will take care of the fruit of the land. Now He waits for the harvest. What will I produce? What will we produce?