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Andy Stanley - The Foundation of Exceptional Leadership · Andy Stanley Sermons

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Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast, a conversation designed
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to help leaders go further faster. I'm Andy Stanley, and before we jump
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Y too five five one two three. That's Andy A and d Y too
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five five one two three. You'll be glad you did. And now let's
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jump into today's content. Joining me today as my co host is our Reverb
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host Susie Gray. So welcome back, Susie. Thanks Andy, good to
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be here, yep. And today we're discussing what really should be leadership one
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oh one. And I say should be because it's possible to lead without what
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we're going to be talking about today. But eventually, I think every leader
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wishes they had taken seriously what we're talking about today because the ad we're talking
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about self leadership, which honestly is the foundation of exceptional leadership. Any that
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is so true. I have heard you teach on the importance of self leadership,
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and while it's important for leaders to pursue, it really begins with a
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rather discouraging realization. So why don't you start us off on a high note
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and share that with our audience. Yeah, the discouraging realization, and I'll
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just personalize it is I have participated in every bad decision I have ever made.
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I was there for all of them. Whether it was a bad financial
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decision, professional decision, hiring decision, organizational decision, parenting decision, marriage
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decision. The list goes on and on. I was there for all my
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bad decisions. The common denominator of all my bad decisions is me. And
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of course the reason I don't mind sharing this, Susie, is you know
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is that this is true of you, This is true of everybody listening.
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We have all participated in every bad decision we've ever made. We were I
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guess you could say the masterminds behind our greatest regrets. I'm difficult to lead
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and I know it. And you're difficult to lead, and you know it.
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And we know we're difficult to lead because we all attempt it every single
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day. And the most difficult person we will ever lead is always the person
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in the mirror. And that's why we say this really is the foundation of
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exceptional leadership, because it begins with leading the person in the mirror. Well,
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you and I both know I'm difficult to lead. And while that is
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discouraging. It's also important because, like in anything, awareness is the first
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step to change. Yep, So this is a really, really big deal,
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and I've heard you mentioned three specific reasons why it's such a big deal.
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So the first reason is you won't be a leader worth following if you
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don't lead yourself well. And honestly, that's a gut check. Why don't
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jump back that one for us? Yeah, Well, as all of our
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podcast listeners know, we are drawn to leaders who demonstrate consistency and authenticity,
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which always stems from intentional self leadership. As I alluded to at the top,
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self leadership is not essential to leadership, but it is essential in order
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to be, as you said, a leader worth following. Because we all
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know organizational leaders who are a mess personally, right, I mean, in
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the context of their marketplace leadership, they're phenomenal, they get things done,
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but we look at their personal lives, their friendships or lack of friendships,
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and we think wow. So again, while we might admire what they have
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accomplished, we don't necessarily admire them as a person. We don't want to
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be like them, and we don't really consider them leaders worth following. We
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may want to travel like them. We may want a vacation like them,
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but we don't want to be like them. Yeah, and unfortunately, I
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actually think too many people can relate to having at least one leader like that
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in their career. Yep. I actually can think about two back in my
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days of telecommunications, and it was in the same company, but one in
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particular I remember so well. He was larger than life. He was so
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driven, so demanding, and honestly just kind of callous and mean, and
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in fact, several people on our team literally went out on stress leave working
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for him. Oh wow, But he got results. And so while achievers
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like me who loved to win, loved that side of him because we always
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made progress and we always were winning, I would never want to meet people
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that work for me feel like he made all of us feel working for him
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that was not a win. So while we're on this, let me admit
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something. When I was a young leader, I don't know, Susie,
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maybe you felt the same way. When I was a younger leader, I
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wondered if one resulted in the other. And by that I mean I wondered
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if in order to be successful in the marketplace or successful professionally, it required
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being a yeah that person, right, I just wondered. I thought,
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well, maybe it's a choice. I can either be successful personally, successful
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at home, balanced a good father or a good husband, or I can
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do something extraordinary and sort of impact the world. Because it seemed like all
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the famous get it done charging leaders again, as you said, they were
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great within their field of expertise, but in terms of their personal life,
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their friendships, their family life, oftentimes you know, they were disasters,
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so shrapnel everywhere. Yeah. Yeah, So when we started our organization,
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what twenty eight years ago, I found myself at this crossroads that every leader
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comes to at some point. There really was not enough time to get everything
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done. I mean, when I looked at what the organization needed for me
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and I looked at what my family needed for me. We had two in
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diapers and one that had just gotten out of diapers. They're just there wasn't
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enough time. And so I decided, very intentionally, we'll talk more about
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how in just a few minutes, to opt for the character piece and the
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dad piece and the good husband piece over the organizational piece. But at that
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time, I really was not sure that I could be as successful as I
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wanted to be at both. I felt like I had to make a choice,
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and that is a false narrative, but honestly, I believed it,
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and I'm grateful that really because of how I was raised and my values and
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again how much I love Sandra and what was going on home, I really
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felt like, Okay, I'm willing to sacrifice some public success in order to
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be a success in terms of just my character. And you know, my
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calling is a father and a husband. And then you know, twenty eight
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years later, you know things have been great. It worked out, Yeah,
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it really And my point is that that so much is it really is
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a false dichotomy. And so for the young leaders out there, who if
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your only models are like the gentleman, if we can call him a gentleman
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that you worked for, and maybe that's a stretch. And again, some
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of the most famous leaders politically marketplace leaders, and honestly even in ministry.
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There is a way to be successful in both fields. And it really does
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come back to what we're talking about today. Self leadership. Yes, absolutely,
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Well, the second reason that you say self leadership is important is that
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exceptional self leadership is the key to sustained influence why is sustained influence even important
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in the life of a leader. Well, influence has the potential to go
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beyond a professional relationship with somebody. Again, and we've talked about this before,
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there's a difference between influence and authority. We can have authority because of
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a title or a position, but in terms of lasting impact, it really
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goes back to influence. Let's go back to your example for a minute.
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And I have not asked you this until just now, so I don't know
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if we'll have to edit this out or not. But when you no longer
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worked for that particular company, did it ever occur to you to reach out
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to the ambitious boss for advice? In other words, did he continue to
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have influence once he no longer had authority? Absolutely? Zero? Oh really?
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Oh good, So that was the right answer. Just really he had
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none, right, So, and that's my point. He had authority,
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you admired what he accomplished, but then when the professional relationship went away,
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you didn't consider him a mentor. This was freed decigh of relief. Yeah,
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right, And he continued to go on and do great things and was
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successful. But the moment you are no longer under his authority he lost influence.
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Well, great leadership is able to and great leaders are able to extend
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their influence beyond the context of a particular job or company or even industry.
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And so for that to happen. For those leaders who are listening, if
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you want your influence to go beyond an ORG chart, you have to do
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a good job with self leadership, because that's what gives you sustained influence.
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We rarely open ourselves up willingly to the influence of people we don't respect.
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We may have to do what they ask us to do because we work for
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them, but we rarely open ourselves up voluntarily to people we don't respect.
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We may do what they ask us to do again because they're our boss or
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a manager, but in terms of being open to the influence beyond their position
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and title, we only open ourselves up to the influence of people we have
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respect for and who do we respect well. We respect people who lead themselves
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well. In fact, everybody's listening, just think for a minute about the
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people you have the most respectful, not even necessarily professional, but just the
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people you respect the most. Here's what I know about those people they lead
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and have led themselves well, because self leadership, or I should say good
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self leadership, leads to influence every single time. So for the leaders out
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there who want to have more than authority, but who want to have influence,
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self leadership is extraordinarily important. In fact, it's absolutely essential. Yeah,
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I feel like that has definitely held true in my world as well.
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So the third and final reason that you gave that self leadership is important is
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because it leads to exceptional leadership, which is the key to sustain performance.
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Unpacked that a little bit. Yeah, So here, here's something all of
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our podcast listeners know to begin with. When a senior leader in an organization
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gets taken out or burns out, generally it's because of poor self leadership.
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It's rarely ever a talent issue, or they wouldn't have gotten to the point
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they are in the organization. It's generally not a skill issue. It's generally
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a personal issue. You there's performance, and then there's sustained performance, so
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to go the distance. Self leadership is not an add on. It really
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isn't essential. Or in other words, you can put it this way,
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great leaders last because they lead themselves first. And that's good. Let's repeat
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that one. Yeah, great leaders last because they lead themselves first. Self
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leadership really for leaders, it really is your primary or our primary responsibility as
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a leader, and it begins, as we said earlier, every morning in
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the mirror. And if I can keep that person, the person in the
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mirror between the rails, if I can get that person straightened out and keep
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them straightened out, everything else pretty much follows again based on talent, based
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on opportunity, but it ensures that our talent and our opportunities are maximized because
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we're healthy enough to maximize them. So we just talked about great leaders lead
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themselves first, and that's a really, really big deal. So let's talk
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about what it actually looks like to lead yourself first. Can you provide our
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audience with a deeper understanding of that idea? Yeah, Well, the short
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answer is it really comes down to aligning our actions with our values, our
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behaviors, with what we really believe is most important. And when there's a
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lack of congruity, it's a bit like your car when the front end is
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out of alignment, everything rattles, everything shakes, everybody in the car is
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uncomfortable. So it really comes down to whatever disciplines are necessary, and I
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think for different ones of us, the disciplines may be different, but at
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the end of the day, there has to be alignment with what I do
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and what I value, what I do and what I say, and what
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I believe is most important. Well, I think that's true in all of
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us that we look for congruence and the people that we allow to influence.
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Yeah, nobody is open to the influence of an overt hypocrite, right,
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I mean, if people aren't walking their talk, we're suspicious, we close
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up and shut down. Yeah, for sure. So now that we've established
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the importance of self leadership, let's turn to practical decisions that leaders can make
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to improve their self leadership. Yeah. Well, here's what I've discovered about
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this. And obviously there's so much more that could be said, but I
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think there are at least three decisions leaders can make to improve their self leadership
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that they can begin with now. The first one is this, and this
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may be the most important one, it's perhaps the most difficult one. And
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that decision is this. It's deciding I will not lie to myself, even
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when the truth makes me feel bad about myself, that I will not lie
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to myself even when the truth makes me feel bad about myself. And this
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is for me, this is difficult in organizational life because I want things to
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go great because of my position in our organization. I take it very personally.
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When things aren't going well, I don't feel well right, And when
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things are going great, I feel great. So of course the tendency for
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me will be to overlook what's not going well and to focus on what is
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going well, and to exaggerate what's going well, and to think it's going
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weller than it's actually going because my emotions and to some extent my self esteem
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is not just wrapped up in my personal performance but in the health in the
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direction of the entire organization. So I'm constantly tempted, and don't share this
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with anyone, Susie, I'm constantly tempted to lie to myself about how well
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things are going because I feel better about myself. So this first decision really
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is it's in some ways it's a keystone decision. I will not lie to
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myself even when the truth makes me feel bad about myself. I'm not gonna
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lie to myself about myself, and I'm not gonna lie to myself about the
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health, the culture, or the direction of the organization. To lead ourselves,
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well, it's sort of like leading anybody else. If I'm going to
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lead you, well, I have to be honest with you about the areas
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where you need improvement, and there aren't many Susie should be urged. But
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to lead myself, well, it's the same thing, right, So if
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I lie to myself to make myself feel better about myself, I'm failing as
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a leader. Honest evaluation is essentially to improvement. Anybody who's ever sat through
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a one on one or does a one on one or three sixty, you
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understand that we don't learn anything from a three sixty if the people involved weren't
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honest. We don't learn anything from self evaluation if we're not honest with ourselves.
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And you're an Enneagram one, so you're always honest, well not always,
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but maybe it's the advantage in crime is the one who told me that
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I was a one on the Enneagram? Remember that? And I said,
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how do you know that? He said, well, do you have an
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inner critic? And I'm like, well everybody does. He says, no,
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they don't don't, right, And I'm like well, how do I
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get mine to shut up? You know? Because it's kind. So at
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the end of the day, it's it's more difficult to be honest with ourselves
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sometimes than it is to be honest with the people around us. Bottom line,
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exceptional self leadership requires brutal honesty with ourselves. And if we can't be
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honest with ourselves, we're never going to move past the things that hold us
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back. So number one, we have to be brutally honest with ourselves.
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Well, and you actually have a question that goes with this principle. That's
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really an awful question, but is so helpful when we're trying to get out
16:04
this, don't you yes? And it is a terrible question. And the
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question is this. It's looking in the mirror and asking the question, why
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am I doing this? Why am I doing this? Andy? Why are
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you going there? Why are you sending this email? Why are you texting
16:19
rather than calling? Why are you emailing rather than walking down the hall?
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Why are you putting this off? Why are you avoiding her? Why are
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you avoiding him? Why are you attempted to exaggerate? I could go on
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and on and on and on, but then I ask it a second way,
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I pause and then I say, Andy, why am I doing this?
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Really? And the reason I have to ask it twice, and I
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encourage everybody to ask it twice, is because the first thing that comes to
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mind when I ask the question why am I doing this? Oftentimes isn't true
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just excuse us. It's just an excuse, right, It is totally an
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excuse. Why am I doing this? Why am I saying this? Why
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am I p this? Really it's acknowledging the reality of what's going on,
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versus telling myself a story or creating a narrative that really doesn't reflect reality.
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And when leaders aren't leading through the filter of reality, they aren't going to
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lead. Well, we just can't lead Well, if we're kidding ourselves,
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we're going to attempt to kit everybody else. If we're fooling ourselves, we're
17:22
going to attempt to fool everybody else. And the super smart, dialed in
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people around us, they know that, they know, they see through it
17:30
immediately, and depending on the culture of the organization, they may or they
17:33
may not say anything. So in order to lead ourselves, well, we
17:37
have to be brutally honest with ourselves. And I think that means you have
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to hit the pause button every once in a while, and for me,
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asking that question and asking it both ways covers probably covers a multitude of future
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issues, and it certainly reduces the number of apologies that I have to make
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later on. So the first decision for those who want to be exceptional self
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leaders is simply to decide I will not lie to myself even when the truth
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makes me feel bad about myself. Just the question alone we just talked about
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would be a great start, And as good as that is, there are
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actually two more decisions every leader should make for great self leadership. The second
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one is I will prioritize what I value most over what I want. Now
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talk through that. Yeah, The best way to understand this is to think
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in terms of organizational leadership. If you're leading a team toward a goal,
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there is some sort of end game, there's some sort of win, right,
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Well, the same is true with self leadership and self leadership. There's
18:30
an endgame, there's a goal, there's a win. So the question is
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what is the endgame? What is the goal? And the people who lead
18:37
themselves well, lead themselves toward what they value the most, not what they
18:41
want in the moment, and I don't know if every time, but on
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many occasions there is a short term win that actually can become an obstacle to
18:52
the ultimate win. There's generally something I want now in the moment versus what
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I ultimately want, So self leadership. Part of self leadership is recognizing that
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and realizing, uh, oh, I'm about to opt for a short term
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gain a short term when sometimes I'm about to opt for something that benefits me
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that may be a detriment to the organization, and ultimately I value the health
19:15
of the organization. So it's deciding I will prioritize what I value most over
19:21
what I want now. But here's the catch. If I'm leading myself towards
19:25
what I value most, it means I cannot lead myself well until I identify
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what I value most. And this is something I think, especially for young
19:36
leaders, that's easy to miss because again, there are other people holding to
19:41
carrot out in front of us, and if we're not careful, we confuse
19:45
those carrots, whether it's a raise or a promotion or the next opportunity,
19:48
we confuse that with what we value the most. And so it takes a
19:53
little bit of maturity to stop and say, Okay, all of that's attractive,
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and I'm honored and I'm thrilled that I'm being offered these opportunities and people
20:02
recognize my talent, my skill, But wait a minute, you know what
20:06
do I value the most? And again, creating that differentiation and identifying that
20:11
differentiation really sets us up to lead ourselves. Well, we always know what
20:18
we want now, We always know what we want now. But until we
20:21
do the work of identifying what we value most, we will not be able
20:26
to lead ourselves. Well. Yeah, and like you said, that can
20:29
be more difficult than it really appears. Right, So there's an exercise that
20:33
helps with this that you've mentioned before. It's from Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of
20:37
Highly Effective People. Tell us about that. Yeah, and I think we've
20:41
talked about this a couple of times on the podcast, but I don't know
20:44
a better way to get to the heart of what we value most. And
20:47
some of you've read the Seven Habits, some of you have not. Some
20:51
of your your father's or mothers read it and you're you know, it's a
20:53
big, thick paperback book that sits on somebody's shelf. But it's a fabulous
20:56
book. It's in so many ways it's timeless. But in the book,
21:02
Stephen Covey recommended that readers stop reading the book and actually work through the following
21:07
exercise. And susey, I don't know about you, but when I'm reading
21:10
a book and the author tells me to stop and do something, I just
21:12
ignore that. I really don't want to. I want to because I want
21:15
to finish the book. Yep. And I again, And this is an
21:18
example of what we're talking about. The value of reading a book is not
21:22
finishing the book. But when you're reading a book, the short term win
21:26
is I finished the book. I can tell people I read that book.
21:29
I read that whole book. But the you know, the ultimate value is
21:33
gleaning from some learning principles. So anyway, on this particular occasion, many
21:37
years ago, I decided, Okay, I'm going to put the book down
21:41
and I'm actually going to work through this exercise. And he calls it the
21:44
funeral exercise. And here's what he recommends. He said, stop and write
21:48
down what you would want to hear from a list of people at your funeral.
21:52
They're participating in your eulogy, they're celebrating your life, and then he
21:56
goes through a list. What would you want a spouse to say about you?
22:00
What would you want a child to say about you? When I did
22:03
this exercise, we had just gotten married and I didn't have any kids.
22:07
So even I imagine, what would I want a son or a daughter to
22:11
say about me at my funeral? What would you want a best friend to
22:14
say? What would you want a coach to say? What would you want
22:17
your boss to say? What would you want someone you worked with? So
22:18
it takes you through this sort of concentric circles of relationships and write down what
22:23
you would want to hear them say at your funeral. Well, when I
22:29
did this and I looked at and I wrote and wrote and wrote, I
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spent you know, a couple of days I would spend time reading, but
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instead of reading, I just kept working through this exercise and wrote all of
22:37
this out. And one hundred percent of the things I wrote down related to
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my character, nothing related to my performance or my accomplishment's not a single one.
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Well, in that moment, what happened for me is what happens really,
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I think for almost anybody that works through this. I discovered what I
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valued the most and hook stopping and working through, you know, starting with
23:03
the end in mind. So when that happened, I looked at all this
23:06
information and I boiled it down to a list of seven words. Started with
23:10
nine, got it down to seven, and I wrote these seven words down
23:14
and I realized, Andy, this is your definition of success. Your success
23:19
for you really is about the person you are, not what you accomplished.
23:25
And these seven words that I'm not going to share, So don't ask these
23:29
seven words, get your own words. I'll tell you. I'll give you
23:33
an example maybe in a minute. But they kind of became like fence post
23:37
around my behavior. So, for example, one of my words was honest
23:42
that you know, if Andy tells you something, you can you take it
23:45
to the bank. You can. You can know he's telling the truth.
23:48
That I would want to be willing to tell the truth, even when it
23:52
made me look bad. So what happened is and this is just an example.
23:56
So when I recognize the importance of honesty, dishonesty wasn't simply, you
24:03
know, in my religious thinking, a sin, and dishonesty wasn't just bad
24:07
for me. Dishonesty was failure. It was failure because your values. Right,
24:15
I'd predetermined that being known as a person you can trust what they say.
24:19
That's what I considered success, not just always a good person, that's
24:22
success. So suddenly those kind of virtues and those values became success versus failure,
24:30
not just good person versus not so good person. And that's the power
24:33
of discovering what we value most. And until we understand what we value most,
24:40
we will always run the risk of opting for what I want now,
24:44
and run the risk of sacrificing what I ultimately value the most. I mean
24:48
that is literally opting for the ultimate versus the immediate yeah, which we would
24:52
never regret doing. No. No, And those are the people we admire,
24:56
right, the people that make those choices exactly so good. Well,
25:00
the final decision a leader can make to improve their self leadership, there's one
25:04
more. What is it? The third decision is I will not attempt to
25:08
lead myself by myself. This took longer to learn than I would like to
25:14
admit, because the profile of a great leader publicly you know, whether you're
25:19
reading articles, you hear the stories, you watch documentaries, they all look
25:23
kind of like the Lone Rangers. And I know that dates me. Nobody
25:26
knows what the Lone Ranger is anymore. But you know, even the Lone
25:30
Ranger had Tanto right and Batman had robbed you know. But there's this picture
25:36
of these iconic leaders and they just they just kind of they're a force of
25:41
nature. They kind of drag the organization forward. They have all the answers,
25:45
they're the smartest person in the room, and behind the scenes, that's
25:48
never the case, not especially leaders who not only do extraordinary things but lead
25:53
themselves well. The bottom line is, you can't lead yourself well by yourself.
26:00
To our podcast leaders, my guess is this. I bet your greatest
26:03
regrets were with friends, not enemies. Your greatest regrets were with people you
26:11
liked that in some cases now you wish you had never met. Because our
26:15
friends determined the direction in the quality of our lives. You know, if
26:18
you have kids, you may want to tattoo that on their wrist. Right,
26:22
your friends determine the direction and quality of your life. It's true.
26:26
So we need people in our life with common values, that are moving in
26:30
the same direction, and that have permission to point things out to us that
26:33
we may not be able to see ourselves it's not enough to have friends that
26:38
you like the same restaurants and the same music. I mean, that's great.
26:42
You need people around you who have the same values, who like you
26:47
want to be a person of integrity, who want to end well with relationships,
26:51
who want to end well with their kids and with their spouse. So
26:53
finding those people doing life with them, it's absolutely essential. Because we are
27:00
inspired by people who lead themselves. Well, that's what inspires us to want
27:03
to be that kind of leader. So surrounding ourselves with people who are leading
27:07
themselves, well, it's absolutely it's absolutely critical. I could not agree with
27:14
this one more. I have a few friends in my life that are great
27:17
leaders, but they're also great friends, yep. And they help me see
27:19
things that I'm missing, my blind spots, things that I may have not
27:22
considered. And I cannot imagine not having those people in my life. I
27:27
am definitely a better version of me because of them, and that's really the
27:32
power of this decision. Yeah, and Susie, I'll just say this about
27:34
you, since we're talking about this, you really do go out of your
27:40
way more than anyone that I know to find those people. I mean,
27:44
there are people that are already in your circle of influence that have influence on
27:48
you because of who you work with and because the relationships you have because you've
27:51
lived in Atlanta a long time. But I've seen you go out of your
27:55
way to pursue other leaders to get on their calendar, ask them to coffee.
28:00
And I'm constantly surprised when in a conversation you'll say, oh, yeah,
28:03
I was talking, you know, and you'll name these people, and
28:07
I'm like, how did when were you talking to them? But you have
28:11
you have again, you have sought out the people who are doing well,
28:14
who are ending well, who are leading themselves well, and you've been very
28:18
proactive about that, and consequently, you know you're inspired to lead yourself well
28:22
so well. I really feel like that has been a gift of people that
28:27
are willing to give me time and leverage their experience in the work that they've
28:33
done on themselves to help me be a better version of myself. So it
28:37
is it is a gift, for sure. We are drawn to those people,
28:41
not just those who accomplish a great deal, but those who have led
28:44
themselves well well. And speaking of well, that is about all the time
28:48
we have today. In fact, We've gone a little long today, but
28:51
the good news is next week we're going to be back together in the studio
28:53
and we're going to tease this out a little bit more on Reverb. Yeah.
28:57
It'll be interesting because you and I typically get to talk about your conversation
29:03
with the guests that you had interviewed, and then we dig deeper on the
29:06
topic, but this time we'll be talking about our own conversation. We'll kind
29:10
of like talking to ourselves about ourselves with so yeah, yeah, you know
29:14
all of the oh I wish we had talked about and I was reading a
29:18
Forbes article recently relating to this topic and I'd love to get your take on
29:22
it, so we can talk about more of that next week. That'll be
29:23
great. I look forward to that. So to all of our listeners,
29:26
we want to thank you for joining us and invite you to visit Andy Stanley
29:29
dot com the Andy Stanley dot com website, where you can download the Leadership
29:33
Podcast Application guide that includes a summary of this fascinating discussion plus questions for reflection
29:41
for your team or any group that you're currently leading. And as we just
29:44
mentioned, make sure you joined us next week for our Reverb episode on this
29:48
very same topic of leading yourself well right here on the Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast.