Do you ever feel like you are just spinning your wheels through life? Busy, but not going anywhere?
Do you have a list of dreams and goals you want to accomplish, but nothing has happened yet? If so, you need traction.
TRACK + ACTION = TRACTION
A track is a plan, and the Destiny Panning Arrow is a clear track for your team to follow. Some people are good at taking action, but they have no real plan so they end up actively spinning their wheels. Other people are good at making plans, but they never act, so they have no traction.
When your team has a clear TRACK and takes appropriate ACTION, you get TRACTION. When you have traction you can accelerate your progress and productivity enabling you, or your organization, to achieve your destiny.
The purpose of planning is to make you an accomplished person—not an active person. You can be busy all day long and not accomplish one thing.
Hyper-busyness is the cocaine of the 21st century. People today live busier lives than any other generation in the history of the world. Busyness, though, does not mean you are making progress or accomplishing anything. Having a strategic plan will focus your energy in one direction so you can actually be productive.
Three things you must do to get traction in your organization:
1. Get Clear!
Unhappiness is not knowing what we want and killing ourselves to get it.
–Don Herold
Fundamentally, true leadership requires the leader to take responsibility for taking followers into the exciting unknown and creating a new reality for them.
Where do you want your organization to be 10 years from now?
Do you have a written strategic plan for achieving your dreams and future goals?
Without a written strategic plan, you will be tossed around by circumstances, troubles, failures, economy, others’ personal agendas, and possibly your own fears.
Successful leaders set clear direction. Leadership is about going somewhere. Effective leadership begins with a clear and compelling vision. A clear and compelling vision communicates specifically what type of business you are in, where you want to go, why you want to go there, what needs and problems you want to solve, and the values you will believe in on the path to your destination.
You and the people in your organization need a crystal clear picture of where you want to take them and why. They also need to know who is responsible for what and who is responsible for whom.
The Leadership Process to Turning Dreams Into Reality
Here is my definition of the ingredients needed in the “leadership process” to turning dreams into reality:
Leadership Process Defined
The deposit of destiny in the heart of a person to solve a problem or meet a need, that gives birth to a crystal clear purpose, organized and focused by a strategic plan, measured by priorities and goals, ignited by a passion that is highly inspirational, producing the result of influencing PEOPLE to get involved in making a change that benefits all of humankind.
Leadership Is a Result
A careful study of this definition will reveal that leadership is not a title, pursuit, method, or theory, but is more of an end result. The end result is produced by people being influenced to help all humankind. Under this definition, the word leader is not a label that you give yourself. Leader is what the people whom you inspire, motivate, and ultimately influence call you because they are stirred to participate in the positive vision of the destiny that you are presenting them—whether it is the vision or destiny for a country, business, church, company, or cause. Whether it is Jesus Christ, Mother Theresa, Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, or even Barack Obama, they all went through this leadership process in order to influence others to make a difference in their generation.
Leaders Inspire Through Destiny
A further study of this definition will also reveal the importance of inspiration produced by destiny in the heart of a leader. True leadership is influence through inspiration. If you desire to become a leader of influence and transformation, you must be able to answer these two questions: “How do I inspire others?” and “What is the “fuel” of inspiration?”
Leaders Inspire Through Their Passion
The source of inspiration is passion—a passion that is ignited by a sense of destiny and purpose to change the world that is beyond the boarders of self and personal gain. Leadership passion is birthed from a destiny and purpose that is not just something to live for, but also to die for.
How do you inspire? A leader inspires by communicating a crystal clear destiny, purpose, and strategic plan for the future. Destiny and purpose should unlock a leader’s passion. Leaders are able to effectively express their inner passions, which find a common purpose in the hearts of others. It is passion in the heart of the leader that attracts the people they need to help them take action to achieve the desired results.
The Attraction Factor
Focusing on the organization’s leadership process, not its packaging, attracts new people. Growing organizations have people who really want to be involved. It’s not the product or service you are providing, stock options, the fringe benefits, or the salary that attract great people. Great people are attracted because they want to become part of an organization that is going somewhere, that is doing something, that is changing the world.
Apple’s co-founder, Steve Jobs, was trying to convince John Sculley to leave his job as senior vice president of PepsiCo to become the CEO of Apple. Sculley wasn’t particularly interested in leaving a secure position at Pepsi to run this brand-new company. Jobs changed that by asking him, “Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?” Being part of a company that was doing something important is what attracted John Sculley to Apple.
Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality. –Warren Bennis
Leaders are focused on the future. They work from the future back to the present to show others how to achieve their vision.
Managers conceptualize by working from the past to get to the present. They build on the past to work efficiently in the present.
Managers tend to simply do what they are told and do not challenge the status quo, former policies, or old and outdated methods.
Leaders know the price of progress is change and innovation.
The majority of people in the world think, work, and plan from a manager’s perspective instead of a leader’s perspective. This is the reason why most people try to start planning from where they are to where they want to go.
Begin With the End in Mind
I believe Stephan Covey was right when he said we should “Begin with the end in mind.”
The most fundamental application of “begin with the end in mind” is to begin today with the image or picture of the end of your life as your frame of reference by which everything else is examined. To begin with the end in mind means to start with a clear understanding of your future destination. It means knowing where you are going so you will have a better understanding of where you are now. This gives you the confidence that the steps you take are always in the right direction.
Begin with the end in mind is based on the principle that everything was created twice. The first creation of everything begins in the mind with a clear picture of what you want to create. The second creation is actually seen in the physical realm by working through the process to make the first creation a reality. This concept is lived out every day of our lives. Think about some of these first creation principles:
· Before God created the universe, He first created a picture of it in His mind.
· Before a carpenter builds a house, he first creates blueprints created in his mind of what the house will look like.
· Before you go on a cross country family vacation, you first lay out a map of where you want to go.
· Before an entrepreneur starts a new business, he/she first creates a detailed business plan.
· Before an artist starts a painting, he/she first sees the picture in his/her mind before the first stroke of the brush.
· Before a farmer plants a crop, he/she must plan and prepare the soil before the first seed is sown.
· Before an entire golf course is built, the tee boxes, fairways, greens, and landscape for each hole is designed in the mind of the golf pro.
It is a universal and spiritual principle that all things were created twice. However, all things are not created intentionally or by design. Why? Most people do not understand how to design their lives, so they live life by default.
Most people are so busy or simply do not understand this principle that they do not take the time to “first create” in their minds what they want for the future. They let life, circumstances, obstacles, busyness of life, tragedies, trials, roadblocks, and other peoples’ wants take them where they want to take them. Sadly, most people do not end up in life at their desired destination.
The outcome of your future achievements and successes lies in your decision to take responsibility in creating a clear first creation.
A true leader takes responsibility for producing the first creation. A true follower takes responsibility for helping the leader produce the second creation.
Find out the Next Two things you must do to get traction in your church or organization in my next blog.
Enjoy today’s blog? Check the previous episode: “The 10 Questions Leaders Must Ask Themselves” by clicking here.
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