Tag: leaders

Leadership in 2021

~ jordan ~ Leave a comment

Dear Leaders, let us be honest enough to accept that the pandemic will not go away as fast as it came. Eradicating the virus will take time even if an antivirus is made available today. The manufacturing and deployment of the anti-virus is a massive undertaking. We need to take into account the population of the world.

After the virus has been eradicated, it will take time also for businesses to recover their former glory. Business processes would have changed or will have to change given the new way of work. Consumer consumption will not automatically switch back to pre-pandemic values.

Given the business climate for the following years, our Leadership competencies have become even more important than before.

Great organizations do not run under singular leadership. Under the new normal stress and challenges, the quality of the second and third line of leaders becomes more important. Their competencies play a role. Their ability to set aside their differences and work as a cohesive leadership team is even more important.

Empathy for employees is another critical value. We have to remember that rank and file employees are already barely making enough in pre-pandemic times. Reduced pay and getting safely to work has added an extra layer of burden in their minds.

We need to accept the fact that we cannot know everything no matter how smart we are. We cannot anticipate everything no matter how much we plan. We need to learn to get input from others who are smarter than us in particular areas of our business.

We also need to understand that given the volatility of the economy, we cannot always get the result we planned for. We need to be agile enough to accept the result and adjust accordingly. We need to be more innovative than before.

Extreme stress can also push us to blame others. It’s normal to delegate work. However, we need to remember that accountability is still ours and ours alone. The people around us may be trying their very best to deliver for their love of the company. However, they may not get the results they planned for. There is so much indecisiveness out there because of uncertainty.

We have a great responsibility to our customers and employees.

That is why we are here. That is why we are leaders.

From 12 unlikely leaders come 2.3 billion believers and growing

~ jordan ~ Leave a comment

Since I was a young supervisor, I hear about this common misconception that leaders are born or went to the best schools. So goes the theory that you are either born a leader or not. From my experience, I beg to differ.

Yes, there are people who are born leaders. However, that far and few in between. The rest of the great leaders of our time had to learn it. Of course, you have to want to learn and practice the right leadership principles. Allow me share a story that supports why I think that leadership can be learned.

August 15, 2020 7pm started as a normal fellowship for our Victory Group. That Saturday was a little different than our previous Zoom fellowship. That night, our Bible Study group discussed a brief lesson from a very interesting topic – Lead Like Jesus.

The members of our Victory group comes from all walks of life. For everyone in the group, we are all equal. We are all leaders in our own way. Some of us are leaders by designation in our jobs. All of us are leaders by the roles we play in our family structure. Some of us are leader Dads, leader elder brothers, leader uncles, leader cousins and so on. Our role leadership is something we are born into. We cannot easily turn our backs on our role leadership.

In the course of our 90 minute fellowship we touched upon two kinds of leaders that began over 2,000 years ago. On one corner, you have the powerful Roman empire led by Emperor Augustus all the way to Emperor Marcus Aurelius. On the other corner you have a carpenters son leading twelve disciples. If I  could time travel back to those days, I would have imagined that the Roman Empire’s leadership would have carried the empires dominion all the way to present day.

Ironically today, the Roman Empire no longer controls the 50 countries it did before.

On the other side; Christianity, under the leadership of Jesus and the twelve disciples has ballooned into 2.3 billion believers or 31.2% of the worlds population. Talk about successful and sustainable leadership.

Let’s see what the disciples were doing before they were called and trained by Jesus. Thomas and Bartholomew were possibly fishermen. Philip, James (the son of Alphaeus), and Judas (Thaddaeus) were tradesmen. Andrew and Peter were fishermen. James and John were possibly businessmen. Matthew was a tax collector. Simon was a zealot or someone that was passionately against the Jews.

These twelve disciples learned important leadership principles from Jesus in the years prior to the great commission. This Great Commission, lead by the Jesus disciples, has transformed the lives of billions of people for over 2,000 year and is still continuous to grow.

If these unlikely twelve was able to lead, so can you. Anyone can lead provided you understand the leadership principles the disciples learned (and practiced) from Jesus.

So here my friend is proof that anyone can lead.