GLG - Starters and Initiators

Starters and Initiators
Global leaders work with teams. The most difficult part? Building them. Here's some food for thought about the kinds of people you are going to need to recruit to your teams.

Let's retire the term entrepreneur. It's outdated and loaded with baggage. It smells like a members-only club.
Instead of entrepreneurs, let's just call them starters. Anyone who creates a new business is a starter. You don't need an MBA, a certificate, a fancy suit, a briefcase, or an above-average- tolerance for risk. You just need an idea, a touch of confidence, and a push to get started. - Jason Fried, Rework

Building a team of enthusiastic and talented people is one of the greatest challenges for leaders. A resume gives little indication of a candidates true mettle. Rather than focusing exclusively on an individuals experience, truly effective managers instead measure a prospective employee's ability to take initiative.
When you stumble across an Initiator - someone who has passion, generates ideas and tends to take action - recognize your good fortune. Nothing will assist your ideas more than a team of people who possess real initiative. - Scott Belsky, Making Ideas Happen

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.

GLG - Movement Thinking

Movement Thinking
Most of us think in terms of addition. We are thrilled when one or two people chooses to follow our lead, someone gets excited about one of our initiatives, an individual donates to our cause. But global leaders banish this excitement about addition. Instead, they hold their breath waiting for multiplication.

For our leadership to really mark history, we must be about movement thinking. The rate of our leadership must be catalytic at an exponential rate - not just adding followers here and there. Consider the following statistics from the World Christian Database: in mid 2010, the percentage of Christians versus the total world population is 33.2%. The projected percentage in 2025 will be 33.8% - almost no negligible change as the world population increases by 1.5 million people. Addition doesn't help.

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.

GLG - Unpredictable Change

Paul summarized it like this: "The righteous will live by faith" Rom 1:17B. We could easily re-translate this to "the righteous thrive in the midst of unpredictable change." - Erwin McManus, An Unstoppable Force

[This quote is from the chapter called Change Theology, which I believe every ministry leader should read.]
If you aspire to be a global leader, be prepared to carve a future in the midst of a great amount of change. But you've probably already got a sense that the world around you is moving at a dizzying pace. If you don't know this already - it's going to move faster. And global leaders - as challenging as it is - embrace this chaos; get used to making plan B, C and D; and empower those they serve with to roll with it. In many senses, that's when we need leaders the most - when we're still committed to the core but we need help with interpreting everything else around us.

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.

GLG - The Economic Ladder

Poverty and The Economic Ladder
You probably already know about the issue of global poverty. You know about Product RED, The One Campaign and you've probably given some money to something related.

What you might not know is that in 2005, Jeffrey Sachs, a economist out of Harvard, wrote a book called The End of Poverty. The book outlined some of the basic ideas of economies, poverty and what the world looked like today. Sachs also went on to outline a plan for ending poverty in the next 50 years - in your lifetime. Bold, audacious and challenging - if you are reading this, you would probably like him. Others found merit in his plan. In fact, Bono wrote the forward to the book and The One Campaign is largely based on the concepts Sachs outlined.

What you need to know about is Sachs' concept of the economic ladder.

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.

GLG - Context and Culture

Context and Culture
In 1993, I spent some time in the Dominican Republic. I learned a little bit about the culture while I was there, facts like chicken feet is a delicacy, softball is kind of a big deal and the nightlife is something else. Unfortunately, I only went to a food market once, never saw a softball game and didn't step foot into a nightclub. Our lodging was in a missionary building, designated for visiting missionary teams, where we lived among ourselves with no exposure to Dominican culture. Sad. Even now, I regret not experiencing at least one of those things in person, knowing that any one of them would have given me valuable lessons about the people of that beautiful country.

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.

GLG - Indigenous

Missiological Filters - Indigenous
You know what a filter is. Think about a coffee filter or an oil filter in your car or a colander - something that keeps certain things from getting through. These filters we are going to discuss deal with the way you look at something - consider it a filter for your perception or thinking. They are important because changing your perspective gives you a different view on the same subject. Most of the time, new insight leads to new action. And heaven knows, the world needs you to act.

Indigenous - "originating in and characteristic of a particular region or country; native."

The concept of indigenous is huge when you talk about cross cultural service. Yes, the Gospel sometimes requires people outside a culture to move into one - that would be the incarnation - like Jesus coming to Earth. But there is gold when someone intimate with a culture rises up to lead within it. God came not in a UFO, but as a baby.

My friend Jeremy Del Rio is one of the leading gurus in the area of urban youth ministry. What he knows he learned by doing - he has first hand experience. When he was a high school student, he was part of a team that created a ministry for students - by students. Generation Xcel started when he and a group of his friends decided that they needed to do something to spur on some positive growth in their community while helping kids their age invest their lives in something significant. Years later, after college and law school, Jeremy ran GenXcel for a time as the executive director. You can imagine how effective he was after being one of the founders. That's an indigenous leader - one that has erupted out of the context.

I'm posting some writing from a global student leadership guidebook that I'm working on. Let me know if you are interested in the progress of this project.