Here's Craig Groeschel's talk from the Willow Greek GLS18 about anticipatory leadership (which pretty much drained my brain.)
Where do we go from here? We’ve absorbed so much. I want to talk about anticipatory leadership. How do we look
forward and anticipate what could be coming in the future?
I lead a church and we’re passionate about eradicating Bible
poverty. About 12 years ago we had
an idea to create a website called YouVersion.com like a Christian
Facebook. We were about two weeks
from taking down the site when Bobby Grunewald said Apple is coming out with an
app. What if we took our content
and built and app and released an app with the Bible on it. We decided to ask around to see if
anyone knew how to create an app. We found a 19-year-old part-time staffer who
built the app and we launched it 10 years ago. We found the first weekend 81,000 people had downloaded the
app. On Monday the 19-year-old had
a full-time job and now 10 years later 1/3 of a billion people have downloaded
the app.
Everyone say “What if”—how do we anticipate where things are
going?
The difference between a good leader and a great leader is
one who learns to anticipate rather than react.
“Most players skate to where the puck is. I skate to where
it’s going to be.”—Wayne Gretzky
The lifespan of your structure is diminishing as we speak. If we are not changing we’re falling
farther behind. As we’re
anticipating the future you have to realize what you know may be wrong.
For centuries around the world pastors ministered in one
local church but now because of technology we can do ministry in multiple
sites. We formed very strong opinions about how this should work. Some called us experts. If we start to
wrongly own the title of experts we’re susceptible to the “curse of
confidence.”
When Twitter came out I didn’t believe people would care
what I thought about in 140 characters or less…or pictures on Instagram. I thought it was a fad. I was
sure. Therefore, I am behind in
social media influence.
When we’re completely sure, we’re vulnerable:
The Curse of Confidence
--Difficult to receive feedback
--Answer more questions than they’re asking
--Assume too much and stop innovating
How we learn to anticipate: The three D’s of Anticipator y Leadership
Develop
Discern
Disrupt
1)
Develop
situational awareness—honestly and accurately assess the true current state
of our organization. Many times we don’t know what we don’t know.
Self-awareness is incredibly difficult. The Dunning-Kruger Effect—people have
difficulty recognizing their own incompetence. Those who rank themselves as the
most skilled are generally the least skilled. Those who are the most capable often don’t know it. We have to work hard to fight for
humility so we can assess ourselves. Most leaders could learn more from their
mistakes if they weren’t so busy denying them. Look honestly and have the
integrity to tell the truth. No one lies better than leaders. Look at the
culture and the health of the team.
If something is not working, ask why. Andy Stanley says, “If you don’t
know why something is working when it is, you won’t know how to fix it when
it’s not.” A doctor who was
diagnosing me said, “I always force myself to ask 21 questions.” I asked him
why and he replied, “Because 21 is one more than 20.” You are asking questions to get to the root reason of why
something is working or not—honestly diagnosing your organization
2)
Discern
future threats and opportunities—I encourage you to start to learn to
anticipate in areas outside of your area of expertise. Begin to practice in areas outside your
field developing theories. For
instance, I have a theory that younger people may reject social media. I have a theory about higher
education—that it might be overrated.
The cost/benefit may be starting to tilt. How do we approach this? --Embody healthy skepticism and lead with bold optimism.
What we’re doing now will not work forever. In 66 years Lego never had a down year, then suddenly
everything changed in 1998 and profits plummeted from 146 million to 48 million
in one year. Lego underestimated the digital revolution. All kinds of things could go wrong. The
price of oil could drop, the housing market could plummet… At the same time we remember fear is a
choice and so is faith. You’ll always
face obstacles but we remember new challenges always equal new opportunities.
Lego showed this when they partnered with Star Wars which led to them creating
their own movies. When you see a
problem you train yourself to think opportunity. Innovation is born out of limitation. “ Innovation is seeing
what everybody else sees and thinking what nobody else thought.”
3)
Disrupt
what is and create what could be—Think about Air BnB or Uber. See
possibilities before others see them.
Sometimes people ask me what I see as the future of the church. These are my opinions for my
culture. My theory is that for a
while churches have been trying to make the gospel cool. I think people are
getting tired of cool and want more Jesus and less cool. The contemporary
service is the new traditional. There needs to be more focus on substance than
style. Now I believe the focus
should go from trying so hard to get them in the one hour and go to them for
the rest of the hours. What matters in engaging people? They need to be needed
and to be known. One of the greatest forms of discipleship is getting people
into community. Less Jesus in me and more in we. Christianity is experiencing God together. When the world gets darker the light
shines brighter. Through Jesus Christ the local church can make a difference.
What do we do from here? Three Questions:
1)
What is the true, current state of your
organization? Your leadership: Where are you successful? Flat? Struggling?
2)
If you were starting now, what are you currently
doing now that you would not do? Why are you doing it?
3)
If you were starting today, what would you
attempt? When are you going to attempt it?
If you wait until you’re 100% to try something new you will
always be too late.
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