Leader Breakthru — Breakthru Blog

Many of you have heard me use Edwin Friedman’s defintion of a leader: “A leader is a self defined person with a non-anxious presence.” At the core of Friedman’s message for the home, church, businesses, organizations and government is the need for differentiated leaders.

In his final book, “A Failure of Nerve” (that was published after his death in 1996), he goes further both in unpacking how self-differentiation is not only essential, but also is at the heart of why the American fabric, as we know it, continues to unravel.

Fascinating book. Even more fascinating is his view that the unmotivated are not brought into the game with more insights, but rather because they experience and begin to see soemthing different. It is not the cognitive but the relational processes that will cause people to actually desire to participate in the change. To see the change through leaders who live different, and differentiated from the problem.

But for this to happen, we needs leaders who have nerve. Who have the capacity to stand separate from the organizations they lead that have become toxic (and most have).  They themselves must work hard on their our definition, align themselves to God’s shaping,  deal with their “stuff,” and at peace with they are, and who they are not. Most do not, and inflict their pain and stuff on those they lead.

To lead today, and return people back to a time of innovation and adventure requires the leader to be different. Someone who is clear about his or her own direction, goals and issues. Leaders who are at peace with themselves. Less likely to become lost in the anxious issues that change raises. The greatest way you can influence your world and those you seek to influence, is to have the courage to be yourself.

Listen to this…

“The colossal misunderstanding of our time is the assumption that insight will work with people who are unmotivated to change. If you want your child, spouse, client or boss to shape up, stay connected while changing yourself rather than trying to fix them.”

For years I have been saying that personal renewal was the key.

It is the key for leaders to lead, and it is the key for organizations to change and move forward. Most agree, but few have truly embraced this truth. We are still infatuated with our methods and skills.

Differeniated leaders are our best hope to becoming the people called to influence our world, and for organizations to once again be free to innovate, adventurous, and can lead us to something different. And non-differentiated leaders abound, continuing to wound and hurt good people all for the sake of building some “great” organization.

Needless to say I recommend the book. Nice to read the thoughts of someone who is saying the same thing I have tried to share through the years, only better.