What I Learned at the Global Leadership Summit, Day 2

My last post shared what I learned at Day 1 of Willow Creek’s Global Leadership Summit. Here’s what I learned the second day:

MASTERING THE SKILL OF INFLUENCE | JOSEPH GRENNY

Joseph Grenny is a business leader and author. His presentation was practical and engaging.

• Leadership is intentional influence.
  
• We’re naive about how profound our social influences are.
• There are personal, social, and structural influences.
• Your job as an influencer is to help the good stuff feel pleasurable and the bad stuff feel painful.
• Help people frame specific daily decisions in godly ways.
• There are 6 sources of influence that can work for or against us:

DARING GREATLY | DR. BRENE BROWN

Brene Brown is a professor at the University of Houston who gave a wildly popular TED talk on vulnerability.

• People need to be be seen and loved, to belong, and to be brave.
  
• If you struggle to ask for help, then you are judging other people when you offer them help.
• Professing love has very little meaning in comparison to practicing love.
• You can choose courage or comfort, but not both.
• If you are not in the arena also getting your butt kicked on a regular basis, I am not interested in or open to your feedback.
• As the world has grown, so have the number of cheap seats.

VIRAL LEADERSHIP: MULTIPLYING YOUR IMPACT EXPONENTIALLY | OSCAR MIRIU

Oscar Miriu is the Senior Pastor of Nairobi Chapel in Kenya and is, apparently, a leadership development machine. As somebody who oversees a pastoral residency program, I had great interest in his talk.

Five Convictions About Leadership Development

1. The size of your harvest depends on how many leaders you have (Matt 9:37-38).
   
2. Don’t live just for your generation, but for the next one (Psalm 71:18).
3. Identify the budding leaders around you and take them to the Lord in prayer (Num 11:10-17).
4. Instill the 5 loves into your budding leaders (Mark 12:32-33).
5. Never do ministry alone (Acts 4:13).

REVERSING THE DEATH SPIRAL OF A LEADER | DR. HENRY CLOUD

Dr. Henry Cloud has written about a million books and consults with many top companies and leaders. This talk resonated with me personally as I’ve had some moments where I’ve fallen into the trap he discusses.

• The hardest thing that a leader has to be “ridiculously in charge” of…himself.
  
• Leaders who lead themselves well think, feel, and behave differently than others.
• When leaders get stuck along the way, they’re tempted to fall mentally into the 3P trap:
  • Personal — taking the challenge or failure personally. “I’m not good enough.”
  • Pervasive — thinking the problem is bigger than it is. “This happens all the time. Everyone knows I’m not good enough. Everything sucks.”
  • Permanent — thinking it won’t change. “It’s always going to be this way.”
• Fortunately, there’s a way out:
  • Log & Dispute — write down the negative thoughts. Dispute it when it comes into your head with the word of God.
  • Get Back in Control — write out what you can and can’t control. Control what you can. Don’t worry about what you can’t.
  • Connect — your brain runs on oxygen, glucose, and relationship. Reconnect with people.

CLOSING SESSION | ANDY STANLEY

Andy Stanley is the Senior Pastor of North Point Community Church. I’ve learned so much from Stanley over the years and I love his leadership podcast. This talk combined some of the material in his latest book, Deep & Wide. It was my favorite session by far. Great way to end the conference.

I liked this message so much that I plan to show it on a Sunday at Redemption Gateway at some point when the DVD is released. Because it was so good and I was so caught up in it, I didn’t take too many notes.

• Jesus said he would build his “congregation”—how Tyndale translated Matt 16:18.
  
• We are here because Jesus made a promise that he would build his church. Jesus has been and will continue to build his church and nobody will stop it.
• The central teaching of the church was not, “We believe something was true” but “We believe something happened.”
• Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain.