Why Great Leaders Celebrate Other People's Strengths

Summary

Living Influence with Bill Thrall and Scott Boyd
Episode: Why Great Leaders Celebrate Other People's Strengths
Release Date: July 2, 2026

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Overview

In this episode, Bill Thrall and Scott Boyd explore a rare and vital quality in leadership: the ability to genuinely celebrate and submit to the strengths of others. Drawing on biblical principles, personal business experience, and practical leadership lessons, they unpack why mature leaders do not fear the giftedness of others but instead see it as essential to their own growth and the flourishing of those around them. The conversation orbits around how God designed us for each other’s benefit and what shifts occur when leaders embrace this truth.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Fear of Other People's Strengths in Leadership

[00:04 - 02:05]

• Opening Reflection: Scott frames the problem: many leaders, even successful ones, carry a secret fear of being outmatched (00:04). This fear impacts decisions around hiring, meetings, and whose voices are prioritized.
  • "Mature leaders do not fear other people's strengths. They understand them, appreciate them, submit to them, and know that they'll benefit from them." – Scott [00:04]
• Bill’s Perspective: Bill connects this fear to trust and immaturity, especially from a Christian perspective.
  • "We are created for each other's benefits, but innately in our persons, we fear other strains because we're immature in lacking trust. Fear dominates our choices." – Bill [01:14]

Outgrowing Roles and the Myth of Hiring “Better” People

[02:05 - 05:39]

• Scott’s Business Experience: As companies grow, some leaders struggle to scale their influence. They may inadvertently prevent stronger people from thriving.
• Debunking a Business Maxim: The adage “hire people better than you” is, in Scott’s view, a fallacy.
  • "If I'm looking for a job and I'm good at what I do, I'm not going to be looking for somebody more mediocre than me to go work for." – Scott [03:34]
• The Real Work of Leadership: Instead of just hiring talent, great leaders believe in and invest in their people, developing them to surpass their own abilities. Scott shares how his own son may now be a better construction company leader than he was—and how celebrating that is key.

Celebrating (Instead of Competing with) Strengths

[05:39 - 08:37]

• Biblical Example: Bill contrasts King Saul and David:
  • Saul’s immaturity became evident only when David excelled. Rather than celebrating David, Saul felt threatened (06:00).
  • "Grace does something. It takes you and me out of competition with each other... There’s no glory to God when I rob others of his design in me." – Bill [06:11]
• Church Leadership Illustration: Bill recounts coaching a mega-church pastor to switch from making solo decisions to leveraging the collective strengths of his leadership team (07:28). This shift was transformative, though not everyone welcomed it.

Role vs. Capacity—and the Power of Submission

[08:39 - 11:18]

• Leadership Humility: The story of the pastor whose capacity was assumed to match his role. Bill and Scott highlight that a leader’s title doesn’t mean they possess every required strength.
  • "His role gave him the responsibility, that his capacity would somehow measure equally to his role... I've never been freer in my whole life." – Bill [10:32], quoting the pastor
• The Best Use of Strengths: Rather than spending years marginally improving in weaker areas, leaders can empower those who are already strong and submit to their abilities (09:46).

Delegation, Trust, and Cultural Change

[11:18 - 14:36]

• Decision-Making and Proximity: Scott advocates for pushing decisions as close as possible to the work itself. Trust allows people to outperform even the more experienced leader (11:35).
  • "If I try to make all the decisions because I think I'm the best one to make it, I will just destroy my company and its people." – Scott [12:20]
• Pruning for Health: When some team members prefer avoidance over responsibility, it’s healthy for both the individual and organization when they exit.

Honor, Trust, and the Growth That Results

[14:36 - 15:42]

• Human Value in Organizations: Bill and Scott stress starting with the affirmation that people are amazing. When leaders honor people, the entire organization grows.
  • "When you begin to believe that the whole organization is filled with amazing people, they step up, they grow, they take risk, they learn from their mistakes... it's a whole different company than it was beforehand." – Scott [14:58]

Grace is Messy—But Essential

[15:42 - 16:14]

• Accepting Imperfections: Growth through grace is inherently “messy,” but it’s the only true hope for transformation.
  • "Grace is kind of messy, but it is, Scott... it's the only hope I have of dealing with the message." – Bill [15:42]

The Biblical Picture of Unity and Mutual Benefit

[16:14 - End]

• Final Thoughts: The concept of celebrating strengths echoes the biblical metaphor of the body—each part uniquely equipped and vital for the whole.
  • "It's a beautiful, beautiful concept. It's this concept of the body. When connected and all fitted together, it builds itself up in love and it grows." – Scott [16:13]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "Mature leaders do not fear other people's strengths." – Scott [00:04]
• "Innately in our persons, we fear other strengths because we're immature in lacking trust." – Bill [01:14]
• "You begin to believe that your people can grow and your people can become better than you." – Scott [04:26]
• "His immaturity wasn't known until David flourished... He became afraid of David's strengths. That was the evidence of his immaturity." – Bill [06:00]
• "Grace does something. It takes you and me out of competition with each other." – Bill [06:11]
• "There’s no glory to God when I rob others of his design in me." – Bill [06:36]
• "If I try to make all the decisions because I think I'm the best one to make it, I will just destroy my company and its people." – Scott [12:20]
• "When you begin to believe that the whole organization is filled with amazing people, they step up, they grow, they take risk, they learn from their mistakes." – Scott [14:58]
• "Grace is kind of messy... it's the only hope I have." – Bill [15:42]
• "It's a beautiful, beautiful concept. It's this concept of the body... builds itself up in love and it grows." – Scott [16:13]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:04: Opening — The rare quality of not fearing others' strengths
• 01:14: Bill on trust, immaturity, and God’s design
• 02:05: Scott on organizational growth and the myth of hiring “better people”
• 03:34: Debunking the idea that you can hire leaders better than yourself
• 04:26: The importance of developing and celebrating others
• 05:39: Bill draws the Saul-David contrast
• 06:00: Grace, competition, and biblical lessons
• 07:28: Case study: shifting to strengths-based leadership in a church
• 08:46: Role versus capacity and lessons learned from loss and freedom
• 11:35: Scott on pushing decisions closer to the work; trust and delegation
• 13:42: The benefit of people leaving who can't or won't step up
• 14:36: Organizational culture: affirming human capacity and value
• 15:42: The messiness and necessity of grace
• 16:13: Final theological reflection—unity, growth, and the biblical “body” metaphor

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Conclusion

This episode is a rich, authentic dialogue that brings together scriptural wisdom and hard-earned business acumen. Bill and Scott urge leaders to move beyond the insecurity of competition and to courageously celebrate and yield to the strengths of others. The journey may be “messy,” but it is the only way to true personal and organizational flourishing, echoing God’s intention for a unified, growing community.

Transcript

[A]

Mature leaders do not fear other people's strengths. They understand them, appreciate them, submit to them, and know that they'll benefit from them. Welcome to this week's episode of Living Influence. So mature leaders, they don't fear other people's strengths. That sentence is short, but it describes one of the rarest qualities in leadership. Most leaders, even successful ones, carry a quiet fear of being outmatched, of having someone in the room who knows more, sees further, or executes better than they do. The fear rarely announces itself. It hides inside hiring decisions, inside who gets invited to which meetings, inside whose ideas get championed, and whose get politely shelved. Mature leaders have done the work that makes that fear unnecessary. Wow, that's really a great paragraph. Bill, let me just hear your comments in your head right now. I got some stuff I want to talk about too, but talk to me about this fear.

[B]

How do I, as a Christian, maybe a leader, but how do I, as a Christian, come to the conviction that God created you for my benefit? I just want you to think about that for a minute, because that's what he did in Christ. We are created for each other's benefits, but innately in our persons, we fear other strains because we're immature in lacking trust. Fear dominates our choices. Scott, I love what you have to share about this, and I'd love you just to add that right now. That would be so significant.

[A]

So first off, it's such a true statement because I've seen so when you're in a company that grows, that's been in a growing environment for a long period of time, which I've been in, sometimes one of the hardest things that happens is you have a person that is really good at leading seven people, but now there's 21, and they're not so good at leading the 21 as they were at the seven. And part of what happens is you can actually sometimes outgrow a person and that person, without even knowing it, will disqualify and run off and not allow people that actually might be stronger than them to actually flourish and help them. And so it becomes their limitation. So there's a saying in business that, you know, one of the keys to business is hiring people that are better than you. And I like to pick on that. I think that's actually impossible to do. And the reason I think it's impossible to do is, let's say I'm a person looking for a job and I'm pretty good at what I do, and I want to find a really good opportunity for me. I Am not going to go find somebody that's more mediocre than me to go work for.

[B]

Say that. Scott, you got to say that whole thing again because it's so wise, right?

[A]

If I. You know, they say in business, you know, you're supposed to try to hire people better than you. But if I'm looking for a job and I'm good at what I do, I'm not going to be looking for somebody more mediocre than me to go work for.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

And so it's an impossibility to hire someone. I mean, you can hire somebody that's a better accountant because I don't have an accounting degree. Okay, that's fine. But to find somebody that is a better leader than me, to come work for me, it's almost impossible. Because people that are already good leaders are going to want to find a leader that's, I don't know, better than them to help them in their journey. They're going to want to find a mentor. They're going to want to find somebody like that. So what do you do then? Well, what you do is you begin to believe that your people can grow and your people can become better than you. You begin to believe in people, and you have to develop people in business, because as you develop people, they will grow, and then sometimes they'll grow better than you. I think I've experienced that in my company in succession. I think my son, my oldest son running my construction company, he might actually be better at doing it than I did. And I get to celebrate that. I don't have to shrink down from that. I don't have to worry about that. And actually, it's not even an item that we could actually really define or determine what the truth of the matter is, because, you know, I climbed the hill and he got on when we were at this level and he took it to that level. And so they're two different journeys. We don't really have to compare or compete. But not being afraid of the strengths of another and celebrating the strengths of another and believing in other people that they can be amazing and great is, I think, probably one of the keys to becoming a great leader.

[B]

I couldn't agree more, Scott. I just think of the great biblical model of Saul and David, where Saul's immaturity wasn't known, his immaturity wasn't known until David flourished.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And once David flourished, his immaturity became known because in his fear of being, having David 10,000 and him thousands, he became afraid of David's strengths. That was the evidence of his immaturity. He became afraid of David's strengths. He did not learn a principle that we love to teach and share with leaders and pastors. And that is, how do I learn as a parent? How do I learn as a leader? How do I learn as a Christian to submit to the strengths of others? You see, grace does something. It takes you and me out of competition with each other. Grace does something. It brings you and me into a relationship where we can appreciate the design of God in each of us. By learning to submit to the design of God in each of us, and learning to submit to the design of God in each of us gives us an opportunity to benefit. Lots and lots of Christians grow up in environments where they literally are taught they've got nothing to contribute. They got nothing to contribute. That's it. Nothing to contribute. And somehow they even spiritualize that. Like, if you can say you have nothing to contribute, you are really a godly person. No, you're not. There. There's no glory to God when I rob others of his design in me, there's no glory to God for that. I rob you of the strengths God has given you by competing with you rob rather than submitting with you. Yeah, I have a great illustration of this. I was working with a large, mega church, huge church, and spending a lot of time kind of coaching the senior pastor. And finally we got to this point where I was teaching this process of submitting to each other's strengths. We began the process of introducing the idea of the leadership of this church at the cabinet level would be based on the strengths of the people around the table. TABLE. Not singularly the role of the pastor. It was. It was an amazing process. But to be fair to our audience, one of the men in the room said, I ain't gonna play. I didn't come here to make decisions. I came here to support the pastor. It's his job to make all the decisions. That. That. That was a true, true statement. Yeah, the guy quit.

[A]

Yeah, it's okay.

[B]

But the pastor said, I learned something from this process.

[A]

So what did he learn when that guy quit?

[B]

He learned that there was an assumption that his capacity was equal to his role. And it's never the role. The role of a leader is never equal to their capacity. And so what we really want to be careful of is this. What if I, as a leader do not have the strength of this area or that area or that area? Well, what do I do? I teasingly say to people, well, you could spend the next five years Moving those from a seven to an eight. Or you could find people who already are tens in those areas and submit to their straits. And it's amazing how much more effective you all will be. Which really was the model of this church. They became a church where their decisions were made in a collective sense around the strength that was around the table

[A]

in the different individuals.

[B]

And it had an amazing effect.

[A]

Yeah, it was really fruitful for him.

[B]

Very fruitful.

[A]

So tell me again, you made a statement, and I didn't understand your words. So he had a.

[B]

That happens a lot. So just keep.

[A]

So he had a guy, he was like, no, I want to follow this man and his decisions. I don't want to be here making decisions at all. And so he left. Did I get that piece right?

[B]

Yeah, that's right.

[A]

And so when he left because he didn't want to make decisions, the senior leader learned. Say it again, because I need to understand what you said.

[B]

Yeah. Because what he learned was that it was assumed around even that table, that his role gave him the responsibility, that his capacity would somehow measure equally to his role. And if he was in charge, then every decision, he was equal to the task of every decision, because that's what his role demanded. And he said to me, bill, thank you so much. I've never been freer my whole life. He said, I can lead out of the way. God designed me, but I've got these other leaders around me who can help because I can submit to their strengths. And collectively, we're stronger than I ever was. That's what he said.

[A]

So because I have the role of senior leader, that doesn't mean I have the capacity to make all. All the decisions in the organization.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

Can I say that in a more simple way?

[B]

Exactly. It's the same, Scott, with. It's the same with you and your business.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. Delegation and affirming people and their strengths and the right. Getting people on the right seat of the bus and then letting them make decisions. So for me, I need to know as a leader that I gotta push the decisions of this organization as close to the actual work and as far away from me as I can. Because if I do that with people that I trust, who trust me, they'll make better decisions than I will, even though I have more experience than all of them, because I'm so far away from the work, I get to be responsible for all the decisions. But if I try to make all the decisions because I think I'm the best one to make it, I will just destroy my company. And its people. It's amazing how that works.

[B]

I think you're absolutely right. I think you've laid a foundation. Scott, our words really aren't different. You laid a foundation in your company. I've been with some of your people, and I know that you did something. You made a decision to submit to the strength of the guy in the field to make the decision. And I've talked to some of the guys in the field in your company, and they can't speak highly enough of how much they respect you because of what that did for them to be trusted with choice. Yeah, that is the same thing.

[A]

And by the way, there were people that ran away. That's above my pay grade. I don't want to do that. It's like, all right, man, it was so good to have those people leave because you didn't know how. How much they were hurting you because they weren't making decisions and they were. They were. They wanted to sit back and blame. Have somebody else make the decision. And now I can. Now I can criticize it and blame it. Blame. Blame that decision for why my job's not going well and things like that. So crazy.

[B]

But. But that is the essence of it. You learn to understand, appreciate, and submit. And that benefited them. But, Scott, you're a businessman. It not only benefited them, as you just said, it benefited the company. There was a weeding process which strengthened the. Your company and the strengthening of your company because of these people's strains that you submitted to enhance the total. I think you said something there that a lot of businessmen still have to understand. What if we could help businessmen make decisions not only to fill a role, but make decisions to honor a person when they fill that role?

[A]

I mean, it's my statement, people are amazing. And that starts with a leader. You meet with a leader, you go, do you know that you are an amazing man or woman? You have an amazing capacity to do things? And so it starts there, but it doesn't end there. It flows down to the whole organization. And when you begin to believe that the whole organization is filled with amazing people, they step up, they grow, they take risk, they learn from their mistakes. And oh, my gosh, five years down the road, after you have a whole organization doing that, it's a whole different company than it was beforehand. It's interesting. It's not something a perfectionist could do because you end up letting people make mistakes and you gotta go fix them. So there's a part of the journey that's hard and messy. I think I have a saying, Grace is kind of messy,

[B]

but it is, Scott.

[A]

Yeah, it is.

[B]

And it's not only messy, but it's the only hope I have of dealing with the message.

[A]

Yeah, it is the only hope we have, isn't it? So our topic this week is learning to submit to the strengths of others. It's a beautiful, beautiful concept. It's this concept of the body. When connected and all fitted together, it builds itself up in love and it grows.

[B]

Amen.

[A]

It's a concept of God's. It's an amazing concept. So thanks for listening once again. We love you, too. Yeah, we'll see you next week. Thanks again for listening to Living Influence. We appreciate you. We'd love it if you'd go to livinginfluence.com, contact us and send us an email. We'd love to know what you're thinking. See you next week.