Interesting Links about Faith and Work

• Finding a Job that Fits. Listen to this message from R.C. Sproul.
• 7 False Assumptions Made about Introverts. Ron Edmondson writes “There are a lot of false assumptions made when someone is introverted.”
• 10 Things We All Want from Our Leaders. Dan Rockwell is one of my favorite leadership bloggers. He has the gift of being able to deliver helpful advice in posts of 300 words or less. Here he shares 12 things we wish our leaders would stop and 10 things we all want from our leaders.
• Great Leaders Walk the Talk. Mark Miller writes “When we do what we say we’re going to do, when we walk the talk, this builds trust and confidence in our leadership. When we fail to Embody the Values, we erode or destroy our opportunity to lead. As leaders, we must be adept at building trust.” He shares 3 steps to embody the values.
• Authenticity. In this “Minute with Maxwell”, John Maxwell discusses what it means to be authentic.
• 13 Key Points on Being an Authentic Leader. Brad Lomenick writes “Here are 13 points on the importance and practice of being Authentic as a Leader. You might consider these “Authenticity Rules.” And in today’s leadership culture, it’s true that “Authenticity does actually rule.””
• Cut it Out: The Secret to Winning. In this “Tuesday Tip”, Dr. Alan Zimmerman writes “If you’re a leader or a manger that means you’ve got to keep on training your employees. And if you’re an individual contributor, you’ve got to recognize that school is not out and it never will be.”
• 13 Points on Being an Authentic Leader. Brad Lomenick writes “Here are 13 points on the importance and practice of being Authentic as a Leader. You might consider these “Authenticity Rules.” And in today’s leadership culture, it’s true that “Authenticity does actually rule.”
• Preacher with a Skate Shoe Named After Him. Bethany Jenkins interviews Brian Sumner, a professional skateboarder and evangelist pastor originally from Liverpool, England. In 2013, he produced a short film, Foolishness, which John Piper called “the fullest 60-minute gospel word I’ve heard.” Sumner currently serves as city pastor of Rock Harbor Church in Huntington Beach, California, where he lives with his wife and their three children.
• Evangelism in the Workplace: Is Sharing Your Faith Ever Appropriate? Bill Peel writes about whether evangelism in the workplace is appropriate.
• Three Reasons Leaders Must Constantly Ask “Why”. Eric Geiger writes “Wise leaders constantly ask “why.” Not because they find joy in questioning everything but because they want to ensure the thinking beneath the decisions is sound and the motivations beneath the actions are pure. Instead of mindlessly executing, they think deeply about what is beneath the execution. Instead of simply implementing, they care about the theology and philosophy underneath the implementation.”
• Mentorship. In this “Minute with Maxwell”, John Maxwell encourages us to reach out to multiple mentors.
• A Heart Transplant. Mark Miller writes “To become a leader people want to follow is primarily an issue of the heart. The truth is, if your heart is not right, no one cares about your skills.”
• Seeing Seamlessly. Steven Garber, who gave the commencement address at my graduation from Covenant Seminary, writes “Every vocation at its truest is a call to see things as they really are, to understand the reality of the world that is really there. In science, in art, in economics, in education, in politics, in law, at home and at play, in our work and in our worship, from the most public of our responsibilities to the most personal of our relationships, we are called to the vocation of seeing seamlessly.”
• Business as a Moral Community. Drew Cleveland writes “Integrating faith with the demands of work is a challenge many Christians face.  Two men with a lot of insight on faith, business ethics, integrity, and leadership recently sat down to discuss this challenge: Al Erisman of Seattle Pacific University and Bill Pollard, retired CEO of ServiceMaster and professor emeritus at Wheaton College. They recorded a video conversation about the God-honoring business model, thoughts on Peter Drucker, and the struggles of godly leaders in corporate management.” 
• 5 Leadership Questions about using Profiles and Assessments to Build a Team. This episode of the 5 Leadership Questions podcast looks at the best ways to use profiles and assessments (think Strengthsfinders, Myers-Briggs, etc.) to craft the best team.
• Seven Signs Success Has Outgrown Your Character. Eric Geiger writes “When a leader’s competence outpaces a leader’s character, implosion is imminent. When skills surpass the process of sanctification, the trajectory is downward though everything looks great on the outside. It is often easier to see the speck in someone else’s eye than the plank in our own, so here are seven signs your success is outpacing your character.”
• Top 30 Must-Read Posts On Leadership/July 2015. Paul Sohn shares this helpful list of articles.
• The Top 10 Ways Leaders Erode Trust. Randy Conley shares this helpful list.

No one wants to follow people who are constantly impressed with themselves. Andy Andrews

The world is full of leaders with impressive credentials who people choose not to follow. Mark Miller

Success is not counted by how high you have climbed but by how many people you brought with you. Coach K

• Don’t tell me what you start. Tell me what you finish. Dan Rockwell

The Conviction to Lead Book Club ~ Won’t you read along with us?

The Conviction to Lead: 25 Principles for Leadership That Matters by Albert Mohler

We’re reading this excellent book on leadership principles from a renowned agent of change, Albert Mohler. It is one of the best that I’ve read on leadership and is broken down into 25 relatively short chapters. Won’t you read along with us? This week we complete our overview of the book by looking at

CHAPTER 25 – The Leader’s Legacy

• The leader unconcerned about leaving a legacy is a leader who will leave the job undone.
• Every leader must understand that whatever we contribute, build, and dream can be lost more quickly than we can imagine.
• The leader’s central concern with regard to legacy is the perpetuation of conviction.
• The convictional leader strives to the end to see fundamental beliefs taken up by others, who will then join in the mission that grows out of those convictions.
• The evidence indicates that most leaders are not very good at managing succession and most organizations do little more than hope for the best.

1. The leader’s first task is to make certain that the organization’s core commitments and convictions are shared by those who will hire the new leader.
2. Second, the leader bears the responsibility of building a leadership team of outstanding individuals who fully share the leader’s convictions and vision.
3. Third, the leader must communicate these convictions to the organization’s various constituencies, laying a solid foundation for a healthy succession.
4. Fourth, the leader should strive to drive the convictions and beliefs so deeply into the culture and ethos of the organization that alteration or abandonment is seen as betrayal.
5. Fifth, this means that every hiring decision is a legacy decision.

• The ideal of retirement seems to be a life of leisure and ease, occasionally interrupted by travel and entertainment. That is a fundamentally dangerous concept.
• For Christians the issue should be redeployment rather than retirement.
• John Piper puts this new vision of our lives into clear focus when he writes, Finishing life to the glory of Christ means resolutely resisting the typical American dream of retirement. It means being so satisfied with all that God promises to be for us in Christ that we are set free from the cravings that create so much emptiness and uselessness in retirement. Instead, knowing that we have an infinitely satisfying and everlasting inheritance in God just over the horizon of life makes us zealous in our few remaining years here to spend ourselves in the sacrifices of love, not the accumulation of comforts.
• The legacy I aspire to is the perpetuation of conviction and the furtherance of a worthy mission—nothing less.
• Your legacy is all that remains when you are gone. Do you have any idea what that legacy will be? Answering that question honestly is part of what it means to have the conviction to lead.