A (11:27)
Hey, welcome back everybody. Today I'm in the studio alone and I'm really excited because I just want to have a conversation with you. I really want to have a fireside chat with you about your motives. It was Jack Welch that said, before you are a leader, success is about growing yourself. But after you become a leader, success is about growing others. Now, I hope today, as we kind of check ourselves to be honest with you, I hope that by the end of this podcast you're going to realize that your leadership is not about you. Your leadership is not about gaining status or gaining popularity. Your leadership really is about others. It's about serving others and making a difference in the lives of other people. I want to take three points that John taught today and I want to break them down for you and I as we kind of apply John's standout statements, kind of his points. The first point he kind of wrapped with his teaching and it was really this. The pathway to doing the right things for the right reasons is good motives. It's really what is on the inside of you. What is your driver. See, good motives is it is putting others first. We believe that. I hope that you do as well. But it's. It's about serving others. It's about helping others accomplish great things. In fact, we call this the foundation of leadership is about serving others. Leaders, typically they find a way to get things done. They find a way to make life better. It's those leaders that you and I have come across that really do that for their own benefit, that has that turn off factor. They kind of turn you off the more you're around them. And typically that is because they have decided that leadership influence, the ability to get things done, the ability to problem solve, all the things that we associate with this concept of leadership has one benefactor themselves. It's those leaders that you and I have no doubt worked for that we, we feel like that we have been manipulated like John talked about. I loved what John did today when he shared with us the idea of motivation compared to manipulation. Motivation is for mutual advantage. John said, while really manipulation is about personal advantage or self advantage. So as we're talking about this pathway of doing things for the right reason reasons, we've got to do a motive check, we've got to do a heart check. John taught in this lesson, motivation is for mutual advantage, manipulation is for personal advantage. That whole statement that I just repeated is because you want to understand that your heart is the most important thing in your leadership. How you lead, why you lead, to what extent you lead others needs to be reflected on within yourself before it can be felt beyond yourself. I remember a leader. In fact, just recently I met a leader in Indonesia. I was traveling to Indonesia. By the way, hello to all of my friends, podcast listeners in Indonesia. Many of you came up and said, hey, we listen to the podcast, we love the podcast. I was talking to a business leader, very, very successful business leader, does a lot in the finance industry. And he said, mark, for years we put in a productivity metric that told us how well our organization was doing, how well our company was doing. He said, four years ago I got really impacted by a John Maxwell lesson, by the way, that our greatest indicator of success was the people on our team and their enjoyment of, of working for our organization. He said, we scratched everything in our year end reviews, in our 360 assessments, we scratched everything but one question. And that question was, how fulfilled are you from working in this environment? This year he said, we do a scale of 1 to 75. I didn't have time to ask him why 1 through 75 and not 1 to 100 or for more simple people like me, 1 through 5. But this leader said to me, he said, when we begin to assess how fulfilled are you in working in this environment on a scale of 1 to 75, and they put these different metrics in it, that the first 25 means your personal fulfillment, your second 25 means your corporate fulfillment, and your third 25 means your financial Fulfillment. It was a little more sophisticated than just this one through 75, but they look at a 75 metric. He said, when we first looked at it, the average score was 32, 32 out of 75. We felt pretty good about it. Most organizations that asked similar questions was in 25% or less, and we were able to get a 30, a greater than 30 report. He said, but something happened when we started asking the questions. We started implementing on the answers and we started to have conversations about the answers. He said, we're now at a 6, 63 out of 75 people that feel a sense of fulfillment at working there. He said, but let me tell you what else has happened. Our productivity metric that we used to count has now over tripled in productivity while on corporate time and sense of anticipation at coming in the office. And he looked at me and he said something incredibly interesting. He said, we thought our motive was our people until we started assessing our people's sense of fulfillment. And then we realized our motivation was not our people's fulfillment. Our motivation was our corporate productivity. And in that one moment of revelation, we turned it back to our people. And now we are the best place to work in Indonesia. Why? Because they began to work on their motives. They built a pathway to do the right things for the right reasons. And the right thing for them was a sense of fulfillment for the people that's working in their organization. Here's what I want us to do today. I want you to take an application here. John has challenged us. Hey, are you doing the right things for the right reasons? And I want to give you a couple of things to apply as we apply this point. Number one, I want you to do an inventory. I want you to conduct a personal inventory of your motives. Do a motive check before you make a decision, ask who will this benefit most? In fact, I would ask you that in this application point, who's going to benefit? If you slow down and ask your motive, your heart, your purpose for doing something, I dare say that if you'll ask that question sincerely of yourself, the people around you will benefit more than you will. The second thing I want you to do is I want you to seek feedback from trusted sources, from colleagues from inner circle, from people that are around you that want what's best for you. Just on my walk down here from my office on a second floor here, I came down the first floor in our building here in Atlanta and I got on the phone because I had a very long meeting this morning. I had a very intense meeting. In fact, if Chris Goede was here with me today assessing my leadership. Like he does often. He would say, hey, Mark, what was behind your motive in the meeting that we had today? Because it was a, it was a tough meeting. It was a upfront, difficult conversation meeting. Hey, hey, guys, we're getting ready to turn the calendar. What is going to be a difference in our story next year? And so without Chris Goede coming into the studio and doing what he does to me often and putting me on the spot, I called my colleague, I called Kimberly Wetzel, and I said, kimberly, let me ask you a question. What do you think my motive was from today's meeting? And she says, well, at first, I'll tell you. I thought your motive was a frustration from something that you wanted to happen this year and that you didn't get the results that you wanted. I said, really? You said that at first? What is it now? She says, well, after the end of the meeting, when you began to build on what we had discovered this year and put it into practice for what we will do next year, I realized the self reflection of this year from a little bit of a frustration standpoint really was a setup for us to be better in the future. Now I said bingo to Kim because that's really what I felt. I really felt seen in that moment. But I also realized something very important. How many times do we act out of frustration? And while what we want is what's best for people, what comes across is frustration from ourself. That's why I want you to seek feedback from a colleague. I did from Kim, and she gave me feedback that was very helpful to me. But if the meeting would have stopped midstream, I had not done a good enough job to say, guys, we're assessing today so we'll be better tomorrow. They just thought I was assessing today out of frustration leaders. It's very important. Take the feedback that I'm challenging you to get and put it into practice. So again, application number one, conduct a personal motive check, see how well you're doing. Question number two or application number two, find a colleague and ask them to describe back to you when what they think your motive was. Maybe a particular hard meeting, maybe an exciting announcement. Do a motive check and get people to check your motive, but also give critical feedback. Now, John made a great point in the lesson. It's very important before I go to number two and it's this. Do unto others what you would have them do unto you. Before your next decision, ask the question, am I doing this for personal gain or because it adds value to others. The second point that I pulled out of John's lesson today, that I really want to, I want to co apply it with you is help begin making better decisions or right choices by rejecting actions that undermine your leadership. In other words, you can improve your choices. You can improve the effectiveness of your decisions when you reject actions that undermine your leadership. Now, I made myself sound good with my assessment just a moment ago with Kimberly. I also had another conversation with one other key leader on my team. And I asked him, I said, hey, how'd the meeting go? Is your opinion. He said, I gotta tell you something. The intensity that you used today, I think undermined the hope and help you wanted for tomorrow. I've got to tell you, just like I asked the motive question of Kimberly and she gave me a great answer. I asked the effectiveness question of another leader and they didn't give me such a great report. They said your motive, your intent, your desired outcome was masked by bad implementation or bad performance. See, what I did there is, I realized that bad actions, difficult actions, undermined the leadership that I was trying to exhibit. So how do we do this? How do we reject actions? And what actions do we need to reject? Number one, I think the way we reject actions that undermine is having conversations like I did today. See, here's what I was doing. And this is one of the actions that I want you to reject. I was taking a shortcut. I really didn't have time to make today's meeting a question, go back and do research and come back with conclusions. I needed to have all the question, the conclusion and application in one meeting. I've been traveling a lot. Oh, the excuses. They come very easily, don't they? But I really didn't have the luxury of a second meeting that I would like to have in moments like today. And so what did I do? I took a shortcut. And when I realized right before coming into this environment that by embracing the tendency to create a shortcut because I had a short amount of time, I reduced the effectiveness of my meeting. In other words, I chased what was easy. I took the shortcut. There's another action that we take often that really creates a challenge and undermines our leadership. And that is when we're seeking applause. In other words, we're looking for everybody to be excited about what we're doing. And it's the popularity contest. It's when we work hard to feel better about what people say about us than be better because of the critique people put toward us. And today, if I Could challenge you in this. Motive matters. Is your motive to get something done or is your motive to win the popularity contest? John asked me this question some time ago. I'll never forget it. In fact, I often talk about the greatest mentorship moment. That was literally 18 months of moments. The greatest mentorship moment I've had with John Maxwell is when he asked me the question mark, do you want to be loved or do you want to lead Now? I said, what I believe, probably many of you with both. I want my cake and eat it too. I want to be loved and I want to be effective. And I did. I answered John the exact same way. I said, I want both. And he said, that's fine, that's a good thing. He said, sometimes you can't have both, and when you can't have both, do you want to make people happy or do you want to make people productive? Do you want to help people or do you want to kind of coddle people? And John took me on a 18 month journey to help me figure out how to be more effective and to realize, to be honest with you, sometimes I shortcut my leadership, looking for applause rather than looking for a moment that we will applaud later. Looking for a moment of radical impact, radical change. What John was teaching me in that moment, what I want to share with you in this moment, is you're going to have to reject actions that undermine your leadership if your motive is truly to help others. I'm reminded that John often talks about casting vision. And he says, you cast vision to separate people, not to unify people. And I always thought I wanted to cast a good enough vision that everybody would love it, everybody would want to do it. And I found the more mature my leadership has become, the more responsible and the greater the opportunities ahead of my leadership, the more I have to realize I'm not looking for applause, I'm looking for effectiveness. I was so moved recently by a team that I got to spend time with. This team was highly functioning. Their culture, their affirmation was truly unlike any that I'd ever met. And I asked the leader. I said, leader, let me ask you something, Lynn. When you started leading this team, did you have the sense of commonality and the sense of continuity that I feel today? And he said, no. In fact, it was the. It was the absolute opposite. Everyone hated one another, everybody was talking about one another. They cut one another down. And he said, I determined right at the very beginning of my leadership that we were going to have a team that wanted to complement one another. Rather than compete with one another. And I said, okay, I've heard that before, but how did you do that? And he said, I started connecting the motive behind their participation with the results that happened because of their participation. And I said, okay, now you've got me. How did you go after the motive of individuals on your team and unify those into a way that the team's motive was an expression of the individual motives on the team? He said, with a whole lot of work, I had them, and here's my application for you. Under this point, I had them identify one easy habit that they would rely on to reject bad leadership conduct. And I went, okay, you got to give me an example. He said, well, one thing that they had all the time is they would come in late, they would come to meetings late. They would leave meetings right in the middle of the meeting. And I said, is it good for leadership to be late? Is it good for leadership to leave right in the middle? And they would all agree with me that no. And he said, okay, here's what we're going to do. We're going to eliminate that as bad leadership actions that are saying something about your motives that's probably not true. He said, and we began this punctuality commitment, this purpose around punctuality that said, hey, we will be on time and we will leave on time as long as you stay present the entire time. I said, lynn, I got it. I understand. What is it that you and I are doing right now that are undermining our leadership? What are we allowing on our team that is undermining the effectiveness of our leadership? And what is it that we need to eliminate to improve the effectiveness of our leadership? I've got another application point for you. I want you to practice making decisions that may not be popular, but they are fair for everybody on the team. I want you to make a list of your decisions, and I want you to look at the ones that are not going to be the most widely accepted. And I want you to spend time on talking about why they are the most widely accepted valuing of the people on your team. In fact, my next podcast next week is going to be all about valuing everyone. I want to invite you back. You're going to love this podcast. You're going to love what John shares. But right here, right now, what I want you to do is practice making decisions that may not be approved by everyone, but it will value everyone impacted. The third point that John made today, that I just want to spend our last little bit of time Together Is this most important question the one that I actually started my comments with at the beginning of this podcast? Why do you lead? What is it about leadership that attracts you? I've told you this story. I've told my story often podcast. But I can remember at 5 years of age I wanted to tell people what to do. I love telling people what to do. I was the baby of five and I was five years old. And I can remember waking up in the early morning and I'd say okay, today how am I going to influence my entire family? And most of the time for us it was around where we were going to eat that night or what we were going to have for dinner that night. And I would wake up in the morning and I'd say okay, I think I want shout out to my mom's favorite, my mom's best dish which was chicken and rice, black eyed peas and mushroom gravy. Oh come on somebody. Thanksgiving was just a couple of weeks ago, but anybody going back home to their roots, right as I said that, chicken and rice, mushroom gravy, black eyed peas. Oh, game changer. Shut everything down. I'm ready to go eat. I can remember that was my favorite meal. I can remember asking myself how can I get my family to have this meal tonight? I can remember the nights that we were blessed to go out and get something to eat, thinking about where I wanted to influence people to go, my entire family to eat. See for me back then, leadership was about getting people to do what I wanted them to do. And my motive that day really wasn't about what we were eating. I could eat pretty much anything. My motive was seeing how much influence, how much power I have. Well, if my leadership at 55 would have continued like it was at 5, I would have a massive motive issue. Why is it that you and I want to lead? Is it a five year old answer or is it your 55 year old answer? You're 25, 35, 50, 45 year old answer. Is it about something greater, something bigger? I challenge leaders all the time. Continually check your why? Because it will ensure that your leadership remains grounded in good motives and not self centered activity. It's why you and I need to constantly check. We're living in a world, gang. We're living in a world, political world, a religious world, a business world to where every leader is thinking about their bottom line, what they get out of it. They'll tell you what you want to hear in hopes of getting your vote and then not do anything that they said they'll make you feel bad about your relationship with others, your relationship with God, so that you will need them in your life. We watch business leaders that constantly protect their bottom line at the expense of the engagement of their team. So what is it that you and I can do that will make a difference and keep our why of leading where it needs to be? Recently, I was privileged to be in a roundtable. In fact, in the roundtable was all pastors, leaders of the faith community. And in this talking and in this sharing that we were doing, we were talking about the concept of servant leadership. And one of these pastors profoundly impacted me. Said, I constantly do a servant assessment for all of my senior leaders. And this is the first question that I asked them. What are you doing to serve the people on your team? What are you doing that gives you a servant quotient? And I said, well, okay, so tell me some of the answers. Well, he said, one of the things that I require all the time is for a staff member to go into a small group just to participate, just to serve, just to bring meals. Rather than telling them how to do rounds at small tables, small groups, I challenge them to be a part of one. I think what this pastor was telling me and telling you something that would help us is we need to constantly be assessing where we are serving without a position or a title. In other words, put the position, the title in the closet and go out and put a towel over our hands so that we can serve. I believe as this pastor began to break this on down for all of us in that roundtable that day, he truly had created a culture that says, let me remind you why you have a position in this faith community. It's so that you can serve the people inside the community. I know that works in the faith community, but it'll work in your business as well. It'll work in your community. It'll work in your effectiveness. In every single chamber of commerce, every single community event that you go to, if you'll put a towel on your arm and go and serve, it'll keep you more connected with your motive to lead in the first place. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to set aside some time regularly to reflect on your leadership and your leadership motives. I want you to ask yourself a question. We're coming down toward the end of the year. In fact, in just three or four weeks, we'll be celebrating a new year. Ask yourself a question. This year, what did I do to serve, and how can I serve better next year? What are my motives? Why do I want to do this? Ask your peers to hold you accountable to your why, get your why you lead clear and then have your accountability group your peers to hold you accountable to why you lead. Revisit, rewrite your personal leadership. Why often I love John's success statement. Success is when those that know and love me the most believe and think of me the most. What is it about your leadership? I exist to make the lives of people better. I lead so that others can excel. What is your leadership statement? Get it down, get your motive down. And then ask yourself inside yourself as well as with accountability, why do I lead? Because your motives matter. I love our listeners. I love each and every one of you. By the way, send us your questions. Send us your comments. It is your comments, your questions that literally make us better. We take them, Jake, our entire team assesses them. Some of them, we bring up, others we just go apply and make ourselves better. In fact, one of the things that I want to tell you, we have this app that we have created that will help you ongoing, not just on Wednesdays when we release in the app today, we have a video by Tracy Morrow talking about practice. What you preach, it goes right along with your motives matter. And we're going to put that in the show notes. I want you to go and take advantage of that. Sam asked the question, how long does it take to change negative thoughts into positive thoughts in any situation once one is intentional? On changing? And Sam, I love this question, I really do. And I love it because it denotes two things. It first says you have to absolutely make the intention, make the intentional decision to change and then the clock begins. Often people say, hey, how long will it take me? And I go, well, first you gotta make the decision. And I love this question, Sam, because you said once I make an intentional decision to change, how long does it take? And I've heard people say it takes 30 days to get a have it enforced. It takes 60 days to reinforce it. It takes 90 days to make it a lifespan. I can tell you this right here. Once you make that intentional decision to change and once you make that decision that you're going to change negative thoughts and turn them into positive thoughts, here's the biggest thing I want to tell you. You're going to be tested immediately and then you're going to be tested again a week later. And by the way, you're going to be tested six months later, 12 months later. It is a daily decision. And much like my friends that have been through AA or all the different things that requires repetitive competition. It takes till tomorrow, and then tomorrow take till the next day. Make a Conscious Decision Sam, Great question. Make a conscious decision that starting today you're going to have positive thoughts today. And when a negative thought comes, change, it changes. And tomorrow wake up. Same thing. Because over time I'm not going to give you a timeline. It's different for each one of us. But I am going to say over time, if you'll make it a daily decision, it will become a lifestyle decision. Sam asked that question after listening to the podcast six Steps to Successful Personal Change. We'll put that into the show Notes. Go listen to that. You'll love that episode. By the way, thanks for today. Thanks for checking your motives and making your motives about others because your motives matter. And by the way, they'll bring powerful positive change to the world around you because everyone deserves to be led well.
