Insights from Ken Blanchard!

I've been spending the past couple of days surrounded by church leaders and church "planters" at the Exponential Conference here in Orlando. I have such an incredible compassion and respect for those who sacrifice their comforts, security and lives for the purpose of bringing light to the ends of the world or right next door.


One of the keynote speakers is Ken Blanchard. After a lunch story-telling session, I had the wonderful opportunity to speak with Mr Blanchard. After thanking him for a very inspiring presentation and his life's work...I asked the author of The One Minute Manager, Situational Leadership, etc. what he believed were the top 3 opportunities for church leaders today. His response was insightful, clear and applicable to ALL leaders.

1. Know your Mission...be able to clearly articulate it, share it with others, inspire others by it and most importantly live it.

2. Be a Servant Leader...once you set the Mission, "turn the hierachical pyramid upside down...lead by serving your people...egomaniacs make horrible leaders.

3. Keep to you Mission...stay focused on who you are and don't allow mission drift.

This advice also applies to us personally as we search for our own life's work or maybe just our next job:


1. What is your Mission? Why are you here? What is the purpose of your life? What are your unique gifts, talents and motivations? Many describe it as your Calling. What type of vocation fits with your personality, skills, motivations and values?

2. Do you lead to be served or do you lead to serve? Often we can fall into the trappings of position power, status, title, influence and the like and forget about those we are leading.

3. If you know your life's mission...how often are you derailed or distracted from it? Another speaker today said that the greater the work, the more critics and naysayers you'll have. We all have our own agendas and we can try to "hijack" the mission of others or criticize them if we don't understand or agree with their life mission.
I look forward to reading Mr Blanchard's latest work Lead Like Jesus...what better model of a servant leader, great motivator, and life changer?