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Andy Stanley - Beyond You Leadership · Andy Stanley Sermons

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I'm thrilled to be here, and I'll tell you this year why I'm mostly
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why I'm thrilled is the way this works is the incredible staff for Leader casts
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sits down and ask the hard questions what a leaders need to hear, what
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a leaders need to know, what does a theme need to be? And
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then they send it to me and they say, Handy, do you have
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anything to say on this topic, because we'd love for you to kind of
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kick the day off. And every year it's kind of challenging, and every
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year it's a lot of fun for me as a communicator. But this year
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in particular, as I looked at our theme, which is Beyond You,
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and we're going to talk about beyond you leadership in just a minute, I
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thought, I can't wait to talk about this because, as we'll see in
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just a few minutes, this whole idea of beyond you leadership and I'm going
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to define it for you in just a few minutes. This whole idea,
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I think, for me as a young leader in my early twenties and then
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late twenties, even though I didn't have this terminology, this idea that we're
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going to talk about, I think made a bigger difference in my personal life
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as a leader than any other thing. And in our current organization, which
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is a multi site church all over Atlanta and then about twenty five sides all
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or about thirty sides all over the country, all over the world. This
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one idea I think fuels the leadership culture of our organization really more than anything
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else. So even though I didn't have this terminology, as we begin to
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kind of tease this out and ask the question what does it mean to be
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a beyond you leader? I got really really excited. So this is going
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to be a fantastic day as you get to hear from all kinds of people
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from all over the country doing all kinds of cool stuff actually all over the
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world. But this idea, I am absolutely convinced just from personal experience,
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this idea if you have the courage to embrace it, and as we're going
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to see, it takes a little bit of courage. This is a little
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bit outside the box. This is the kind of idea that makes you wonder,
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can I really do that and eat and live indoors? You know?
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Can I lead like this and really you know, develop an organization? Can
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I really do this kind of thing and make my way up through the company
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in which I'm currently employed and hope to stay employed for a long long time.
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And I believe the answer is yes, but it might take a little
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bit of convincing. So our goal, our idea is to help you become
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a beyond you leader, and ultimately, and even better than that, as
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your influence increases in your organization, to create a beyond you culture and beyond
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you culture. And imagine this a culture where everybody in your organization, or
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everybody that reports to you, or everybody that you lead, thinks not just
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in terms of their own how they can benefit from the company, how they
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can leverage their position for their own advancement, but how they can leverage their
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power, leverage their influence for the sake of those around them in the company.
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Then are those around them outside of their current organization. That's what it
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means to be a beyond you leader. So if you're taking notes, and
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I'm like the ultimate note taker, it's hard for me to listen to anybody
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without a pin in my hand. I can't read my own writing it two
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hours later, but I have this habit that I continue to write because I'm
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left handed I want to give you a definition, talk about it just a
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little bit, then talk about why you might think this is a terrible idea,
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and then give you three practical applications, and then read you one of
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my favorite historical quotes, and then I will be finished and we will continue
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with this incredible discussion. Here is a working definition for the day as we
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talk about a beyond you leader. Beyond you leaders are leaders who fearlessly and
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selflessly, will come back to those words, empower leaders around them as well
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as those coming along behind them. Beyond you leaders, for the for the
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sake of our discussion, are leaders who fearlessly and selflessly empower leaders around them
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as well as those coming along behind them. And coming along behind them,
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I'm talking about the next generation of leaders. And one of the reasons I
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love this idea and I was so fortunate. And some of you've had this,
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so you'll appreciate it. Some of you have not had this, and
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so this may be new and you may be wondering, who's got time for
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that? But I was so fortunate as a young leader. The two or
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three people i'll tell you about one at the end came along around me.
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People that really had nothing to benefit from pouring into me, sat down with
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me and poured into me as a young leader, and empowered me as a
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young leader, and they had nothing, absolutely no way to gain from spending
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that time with me. And I was just silly enough, crazy enough to
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think that's what you're supposed to do. So from day one, simply because
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this was modeled for me, like it's been modeled for some of you,
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but others of you, this wasn't model for you. I just assumed that
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as a leader, part of my responsibility was to look for next generation leaders
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and figure out how I could invest in them, whether they were part of
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my organization, part of my company or not. So let's talk about these
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two first two words. Then i'll talk about a little pushback you may have
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on this idea. Fearlessly leaders who fearlessly fearlessly means that you're not afraid of
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the twenty five year old kid in your organization who you know is smarter than
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you, the one that you hand their phone to your phone to and say
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would you fix this? You know, the one that has an app for
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everything and may have written an app for everything. This that guy, it's
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that lady, that young lady who's you know, they're smarter, they're cooler,
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they're hipper, you know, they just kind of got it going on,
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and you're a little bit threatened, a little bit. Beyond you.
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Leaders decide, you know what, I'm going to fearlessly pour into that younger
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leader, even though they may one day take my place in the room gets
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quiet. Exactly. Leaders who fearlessly and selflessly, and this is the whole
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IDEA beyond you leader decides, you know what, I'm going to be a
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beyond you leader. I'm going to pour into other people, even though there
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is no personal return on my investment, even though I'll never be able to
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look back and say, because I was selflessly involved with another leader or another
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generation of leaders, somehow I benefited. Now I'm convinced you do benefit.
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But selfless beyond you leadership is the leader who says, you know what,
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regardless of what comes back my way, regardless of if I get credit,
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regardless of how long I'm in a relationship with this person, I want to
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do all I can for the next generation so that the next generation of leadership
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corporately, nonprofit, you know, in the church, whatever you know,
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environment, you're working in that the next generation of leaders is stronger, more
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focused, and more ready to lead our nation, in our country, our
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world as a result of my leadership than simply doing what's only good for me
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corporately or whatever, you know, regardless of what environment, I'm working so
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fearlessly and selflessly. And then the other word I want to talk about is
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the word in power. Now, the word power and lots of environments has
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become sort of a four letter word, even though it's a five letter word.
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But here's the thing about your leadership. And you don't think about this,
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you know, you know, depending on where you are in your organization,
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but every every single leader has power. Every single leader has power.
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If you set somebody's schedule, you have power. If you determine somebody's raise,
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you have power. Your words as a leader, sometimes your words is
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a leader weigh one hundred pounds. Sometimes your words is a leader weigh one
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thousand pounds. That's a lot of that's a lot of power in our organization.
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I'm my assistant, Diane Grant, who's here with me today. Every
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once in a while I'll say I'm going to go down there and talk to
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them about something, and she'll say no, let me do it in our
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little code and our organization is because she says, Andy, your words weigh
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one thousand pounds. This is something that needs to be said, but when
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you say it, it weighs too much. This is something that needs to
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be communicated. Let's find another way to communicate it. You have power.
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You don't think in terms of your power because as a leader, you don't
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think about so much the people that report to you. As the people you
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report to, you don't think so much about your power because you think about
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how little power you have compared to the people who have the power. But
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if you are a leader in any capacity in your organization, you are empowered
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to do something and beyond you leaders leverage their power fearlessly and selflessly for the
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sake of other people around them. In other words, every time you use
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your power, you're using it for somebody. And what we're going to talk
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about today is how to leverage your power and your influence, if you like
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that word better, for the sake of the people around you. In other
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words, the empowered beyond you leader ask this question when they look around the
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room and they realize I'm the most powerful person in the room. And that's
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going to happen from time to time. There may just be three of you
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in the room, but there's three of you, and you're the one with
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the power. You're sitting at the end of a conference table. You're the
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one with the power. The discussion is over, a decision has to be
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made, and everybody turns in your direction and says, and you've got the
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power. The beyond you leader is the one that, in that moment decides
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and ask the question, how can I leverage my power for the sake of
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the other people in the room. When it dawns on you that you're the
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most powerful person in the room, the beyond you leader stops and ask the
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question, Okay, but how can I leverage my power for the sake of
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the other people in the room. So that's our definition beyond you leaders.
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Leaders who fearlessly and selflessly empower leaders around them as well as those coming along
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behind them. Now, let me tell you why you might think this is
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a bad idea. You hear ideas like this, and you're sitting here today,
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you're watching today and you're thinking, Okay, Andy, that probably works
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for preachers because you only work one day a week. That probably works for
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authors because they work from home and they don't really have any employees. Okay,
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that probably works for people who've already made it. That probably works for
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people who are living off a trust fund and their company is kind of a
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hobby. You know, this is a great idea for people who have nothing
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to lose. This is a great idea for people who don't answer to a
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board. This is a great idea for people who've kind of already made it.
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And so the pushback on this whole idea is, look, I you
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know, I've got payroll to meat, I've got things I've got to do,
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I've got people I report to. I mean, I am so stinking
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busy. The whole idea of somehow stopping and asking this very, you know,
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almost intangible question, You know, how do I leverage my power the
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leaders around me, around me, around me? Besides that, nobody,
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nobody did that for you. In other words, when you tell your story,
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your story, isn't this person gave me an opportunity. This person gave
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me an opportunity, This person came along beside me. Your story is I
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got up earlier than everybody else, and I worked harder than everybody else,
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and my story is even you know, if you're you know, a theist
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and you believe in God and somehow factory and you know, your story is
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by God's grace and my hard work, I've gotten to where I am.
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So this is this is a really nice idea, you know, doing things
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for other people through my leadership, But I don't have time for that.
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And Andy, honestly, in my industry, you would say my company,
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you would say it might have divisioned my department. You might say, it
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just doesn't work. There's no reward for that, there's no benefit for that,
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there's no margin for that. So if during this day you find yourself
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defending yourself against these ideas, with those kinds of thoughts, I want to
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begin the day by giving you a really big idea, bigger than your job,
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bigger than your company, even bigger than your career, that I think
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is the context for this entire day and the context for our entire discussion.
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It's something that you know intuitively. You haven't thought of it in the terms
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I'm about to give you, because I just made this up, and there's
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probably a better way to say it. But here's what we know intuitively,
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and here's the conclusion. We all arrive at at some point in our life,
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even if it's at the end of our life. And here's the big
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idea of the context for today's discussion, the value of a life. The
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value of a life is always measured in terms of how much of it was
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given away. The value of a life is always measured, ultimately in terms
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of how much of it was given away. Now here's where you are reminded
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of that. Every time you attend a funeral. You're reminded of this.
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Every time I attend a funeral, a good funeral, a celebratory funeral where
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there's something to celebrate, I'm reminded of this because at funerals, you know
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what, At funerals, we never celebrate accumulation, do we ever. There's
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never pictures of cars and houses and you know, bank account numbers, and
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there's never you know, at funerals, we never, ever, we never
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celebrate accumulation at the end of a life. When you celebrate a life,
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you celebrate how much of that life was given away. At a funeral,
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we always celebrate generosity and selflessness. Now think about this for the rest of
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the day, because you're going to be sitting here and taking notes, and
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you're gonna have some breaks. The value of a life, the value of
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your leaderhip, The value of your leadership will ultimately be measured in terms of
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how much of it you leverage for the sake of other people. The value
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of your leadership, that your value as a leader to this world, to
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your company, to your family, your children, to the next generation,
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will ultimately be measured not by accumulation, although I am all for accumulation just
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like you, or we'll talk about that. But ultimately, the value of
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your leadership, the value of my leadership, will be measured in terms of
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how much of it was given away. In other words, you don't want
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to come to that point in your life, at the end of your career,
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at the end of this current chapter of your life or chapter of your
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career, and look back and have accumulated but have no one to celebrate.
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And in that moment, if you wait too long, and if you don't
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get this, and if you don't carry this idea of beyond you leadership throughout
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your career, if I don't carry it throughout my career, what happens is
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we get to the end of a season of life we get to the end
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of a chapter of life, we get to the end of our working years,
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and we have kind of a brave heart moment. If the brave heart
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moment is that moment where you think, Oh, I wish I could go
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back. I wish I could go back, maybe for some of you,
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to this very day, to this very season in your career, I wish
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I could go back, and I wish I could have. If I could
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go back, I would spend more time on leveraging my power and my influence
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for other people, and less of my influence and my power on accumulation.
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I would be willing, you may say, in a few years or fifteen
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years or twenty years fromund I would be willing to give up some of what
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I accumulated for the sake of influence. To think that at the end of
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this season of my life, the end of my career, I can look
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back and I can point to leaders who are doing extraordinary things in my industry,
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outside my industry, in that company, outside that company, or with
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my company, not because of what I did, but because of how much
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I influenced, empowered, invested in their life. Here's all I'm saying.
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And then you're going to be the rest of today is so there's going to
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be so much inspiration and you're going to listen to stories and think, I
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want to be him, I want to be here, I want to do
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that. I want people to say that about me. Here's the big picture.
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Ultimately, the value of our leadership, as in the as it is
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with the value of our lives, will ultimately be measured in terms of how
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much of it we gave away. We want you to leave here today with
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crystal clear ideas of how to leverage your current power and your current influence for
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the sake of the people around you and the sake of the people who are
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coming along behind you. And if you've ever if you've benefited from that because
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you've had people invest in you, then we're just reiterating what you've experienced.
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But for some of you, because you've never had that opportunity, we maybe
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today want to create a brand new category. As you think about your future
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and as you think about your leadership. Now here's the trick. Here's the
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problem in life in general. It's true that we celebrate generosity, but we
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envy accumulation. Isn't that true? I mean, you go to a few
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and you go, they really were a great person, and you go back
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to work, you know, or you see something on ESPN and it's an
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inspiring story. You watch the Olympics, it's an inspiring story. You're gonna
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hear some stories today, inspiring stories, and you go, you know,
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they were so generous. But then you go back to work. Because at
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the end of the day, it's true, we celebrate generosity, all of
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us do. We all celebrate generosity, we all celebrate selflessness. But at
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the same time we envy accumulation. And if we're not careful, all of
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us me included, if we're not careful, If we are not and this
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is what today's about, intentional, If we don't carve out time, if
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we don't create a new category, if we don't set for ourselves, you
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may not like our definition, come up with your own. If you don't
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decide somewhere out there in your time and your investment in your life, it's
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got to be beyond you and not just about you. If you don't decide,
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life is such raising kids and grandkids and all that's going on. Life
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is such that at the end of our career, at the end of our
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productive years, we'll look back and it will have been all about us instead
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of all about what we could have done for other people and with other people,
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and not simply in some generous altruistic you know, I'm talking about people
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that you work with, people that are getting up every day and working hard,
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just like you are. So if we're not careful, that's where we
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end up. Now real quick, I want to give you three very specific
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things, and there's twenty things. There's fifty things. In fact, some
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of you have better ideas than you're going to hear today because you've been doing
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this longer than a lot of us. But I want to give you three
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specific things, things that you can begin to do almost immediately as it relates
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to becoming a beyond you leader. And then today we're just going to stack
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on and add on is going to be a little bit like drinking out of
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a fire hydrant. So becoming a beyond you leader, one of the things
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I would immediately recommend is this, get in the habit of making as few
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decisions as possible, one of the most empowering things you can do. And
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if you think of it in terms of the people that you used to work
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for, that you work for as opposed to the people who report to you.
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One of the most empowering things that can happen to you. One of
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the most empowering things you can do for another person, the next generation leader,
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the people around you, is to refuse to make decisions that other people
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can make. This is probably the low rung on the ladder. This is
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probably the simplest first thing all of us can do when it comes to being
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a beyond you leader, because refusing to decide and encouraging other people to decide
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is empowering. Here's the thing. If you have the power to make the
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decision and you hand off the opportunity to make the decision, you have just
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empowered someone around you. That's part of what it means to be a beyond
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you leader. So we're going to practice this. Okay. For some of
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you, you've never said these words in your life. Okay, so this
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is going to be a first. For others of you, you've never heard
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these words in your life. In fact, you're here today with your supervisor
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or your boss, and you're going to be a tempted to turn and just
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see if they're even able to say these words. Okay, So I'm going
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to practice okay, because you may mumble this, but here's what we're going
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to practice saying together. You're ready, I'll say it first. You decide,
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have you ever said that before? You should practice this at home with
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your kids. I don't know, honey, he looks like a bum to
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me, but you decide. So he didn't have a job, you know,
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no, no, but you know you decide. All right, So
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I'm gonna count to three and we're all gonna take a deep breath and say
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this together. This is maybe the first time you've ever said this. Okay,
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Ready, one two three? It's like, I don't know if I
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can do that. You know, you say, wait, and if I
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if I start quit, if I quit making decisions, hand off the decision
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making. Are I gonna lose something? No, you're giving yourself away,
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You're empowering somebody. Let's let's just say it one more time because that was
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hard for some of you. Ready, one two three? Yeah, you
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decide. I'm gonna let you make that decision, and then I'm gonna back
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you up no matter what happens. Okay, maybe not no matter what happens,
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but I'm gonna I'm gonna back you up. You decide. Now here's
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here's where this does advantage you. And this isn't all about you. This
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is all about other people. But here's the big advantage to getting in the
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habit of empowering people and again making as few decisions as possible, because leadership
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isn't about making all the decisions. Leaderships about is, you know, to
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ensure that all the decisions are right, and the decisions that are made are
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somehow made right. And oftentimes it's not so much that the decision was bad,
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is that the follow up and the follow through is bad. Isn't that
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true? Sometimes the decision isn't bad. But if you don't have consensus and
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people don't come around your ideas, things don't get done. I'm telling you.
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One of the best ways to build consensus and one of the best ways
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to build focus in your organization, division or department is to empower other people
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to make decisions. Because here's something you know, because you've been empowered,
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when you get the power to make the decision, you make sure the decision
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is the what decision, the right decision that's exactly right. So, now
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here's one of the reasons that this is one of the ways this will advantage
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you. And you you've heard this before. Possibly you know this. As
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your organization organizational authority increases, your organizational IE decreases. Okay, as your
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organizational authority increases, your organizational IQ decreases. I learned this a long time
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ago. Some of you understand this. You may not have thought of it
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in these terms, but here's what I mean by that. As you get
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more and more responsibility, and as you have more and more authority in your
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organization, you have more and more things under your authority. You become responsible
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for more and more things. But as you rise up in your division,
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department, organization, branch, whatever it is that you're doing, or your
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industry, you are going to know less and less about more and more things.
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You're going to be responsible for things you don't know anything about. And
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if you are not in the habit of empowering other people to make decisions,
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you are going to feel compelled to make decisions about things you know nothing about.
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Now, if you've ever worked for a leader, a boss, or
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an organization that's led by somebody who has confused their authority with their competency,
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if you know what I mean, by that, since they feel like,
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since I have authority, I have to make decisions about everything I'm you know,
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have authority over and yet they're in compet in areas over which they have
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authority. You know what a disaster that can be. Where are our organization's
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building a building right now about five miles from here? And you know we
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were constantly in the construction business, but I don't know anything about construction.
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I have a degree in theology, So how smart of it would be?
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But ultimately I'm responsible, I'm the boss. So how wise would it be
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for me to show up on the construction site and tell, you know,
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the contractor what I think you ought to do. And we're paying his bills?
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You know we're paying He'd probably look at me and I guess you're the
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balls you have to do that? How stupid would that be? Why?
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Well, I have authority but have no competence. You do not want to
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go to a church that I was in charge of constructing? Okay, A
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hard hat would not be enough. Okay, now you know big example,
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but this is absolutely true in your organization as well. As your leadership increases,
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your organizational IQ decreases because you know less and less because you're responsible for
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more and more things. The way to get there is right now where you
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are, with whatever responsibility, you have to develop the habit of empowering other
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people. And one of the easiest way to do that is to refuse to
22:00
make a decision you don't have to make, and to empower other people to
22:04
make decisions, because one of the best ways to find out who your best
22:07
decision makers are is to allow them to make decisions, even though sometimes,
22:11
of course they're not gonna do it exactly the way you want to do it.
22:15
So this is kind of step one and becoming a beyond you leader.
22:18
It's not all about me. Just because I have the authority doesn't mean I
22:22
have to exercise my authority. Just because I have the power doesn't mean I
22:26
have to use my power. Just because I have the influence, you know,
22:29
I have the responsibility of making a decision. I don't have to make
22:33
all the decisions. You decide. You decide, you decide. Here's another
22:38
idea becoming a beyond you leader is to get in the habit of working for
22:42
your team. Here's what I mean by that. Every once in a while,
22:45
you're gonna give people responsibility, and they're gonna have, you know,
22:49
they're gonna have to leverage their influence in the organization to get things done.
22:52
But you have more power, You have more influence. So one of the
22:56
most empowering things that you can do, one of the easiest ways to take
23:00
a step toward becoming a beyond you leader is to ask this amazing question.
23:03
And again, I don't think in terms of you asking the people that report
23:07
to you. Think about how empowering this would be if the person or the
23:12
board you reported to ask you, here's the question, and we'll say it
23:17
out loud in just a minute, what can I do the help? What
23:21
can I do to help? I just imagine for a minute. Don't elbow
23:25
anybody, but imagine your supervisor, your boss walking into your office or sitting
23:30
down to the opening of your cube and looking you in the eye and saying,
23:33
Okay, what can I do to help, to which you think,
23:37
no, no, see, I work for you, I'm here to help
23:38
you. But yeah, But what if the person with the power looked into
23:42
your world and the things that you're responsible for doing, saying, hey,
23:45
look, I can't do your job for you, but how can I leverage
23:48
my influence. How can I leverage my power? How can I leverage my
23:53
position to help you do what I've hired you to do? I'm telling you
23:59
this is extraordinarily, extraordinarily empowering. Every year I ask my direct reports I
24:04
have, excuse me, my leadership team. I have or four direct reports,
24:07
but I have a leadership team about twelve people, and so every year
24:11
they turn in their you know, three or four or five things that they
24:14
want to do for the year, and I look at those, we discuss
24:15
them, we all talk about them, and then I ask them this question.
24:18
I see, now now that I know what you're going to do,
24:21
now that we've all agreed on what needs to be done, how can I
24:23
help? And I ask each one of them to email me two, at
24:26
the most three three things that I can do in the course of the year
24:30
that would help them do what we've all agreed they need to get done.
24:33
Because I'm really good at a few things, not good at many things,
24:37
but I'm good at a few things. So the question is, how can
24:40
I leverage my talent to help you get done what needs to be done?
24:41
How can I leverage my influence in the organization to help you get done what
24:45
you need to be done. In other words, how can I work for
24:48
you? Because I believe that what you're doing is so important it needs to
24:52
get done. And I have more influence than anybody in the organization. So
24:56
what can I do to help here? I am Here's what I'm doing.
25:00
I'm saying, I want to loan you my influence. I want to loan
25:04
you my power. I want to loan you my position. I can't do
25:07
eight things for you in the course of a year. But what are the
25:10
two, one, or two or three things that if I were to step
25:12
into your world and work for you for that day or in that environment,
25:15
would make a big deal. Would be winding your sales, and they always
25:19
come back one or two or three things, and if you could just do
25:22
this, it would make a big deal. I'll do that. I'll work
25:25
for you. I'm going to empower you because this isn't about me. This
25:29
is about us, and ultimately this is about you. This is about the
25:32
next generation of leaders. So let's just say this one out loud as well.
25:34
You ready, one, two, three? If you ever ask the
25:41
people that report to you that question, I'm telling you this is an empowering
25:47
question. Let me tell you why you don't ask it, and we're gonna
25:48
move on. You don't ask it because you're afraid they might have an answer.
25:53
You don't ask it because if they have an answer, it's going to
25:56
require time. If you don't ask it because you're afraid that you might have
26:02
to get involved in something, ask it anyway. That's how you become a
26:06
beyond you leader. This is how you loan in your power to and empower
26:10
people around you. Third idea, we'll hit this real quick. The third
26:12
idea is something we call in our organization empty your cup. Here's what I
26:15
mean by that. I don't have everything it would take to fill your cup
26:21
in terms of your leadership ability, what you need to know, your skill
26:25
set. There's not enough in me to fill your cup. But my responsibility
26:29
isn't to fill anybody's cup. We say in our organization, we say,
26:30
in our organization, our responsibility is to empty our cup. Our responsibility is
26:36
to find ways to pour into the people around us what we do know,
26:40
not because it's all there is to know, but because it's all we know,
26:44
it's all I know. So we look for opportunities and we use this
26:48
terminology all the time. What can I do to fill their cup? Now,
26:51
I'm not going to tell them everything they need to know. They're already
26:52
smarter than me. You know, they read more than me, they're better
26:56
educated than me. But I want to make sure while they're working with me,
27:00
while we're working together, at some point, I have an opportunity to
27:03
empty my cup, so that when they go on to whatever they do or
27:06
whatever they continue to do in this organization, they will have the advantage of
27:10
knowing everything I know about what I've asked them to do. One of the
27:14
most empowering things you can do is a beyond you leader, is to look
27:18
for opportunities to empty your cup. And here's the thing. I've learned this
27:22
the hard way by encouraging our younger staff to do this. You are smarter
27:26
than you think. You know more than you think you know. You are
27:30
not as behind as you may feel like you are behind. You have something
27:34
to offer, and sometimes it's as simple as sending an email out with an
27:38
article you read and say, hey, I just read this article. Thoughts
27:41
you might enjoy reading this. I'm just giving you. I'm passing on to
27:45
you something that's helped me. Here's a book i've read. Every once in
27:48
a while, I'll get you know, three or four or five of our
27:51
middle management kind of people. People who don't report to me, people who
27:52
never spend time with me, but people who I think are really sharp leaders.
27:56
You know, men and women who I think, gosh, so glad
27:59
they're in this organization. And I want to make sure they know what I
28:00
know about something. And I'll say, Hey, I want us to spend
28:03
a few weeks together and go through a book together. Hey, I want
28:06
us to meet for breakfast for three or four or five Thursday mornings or every
28:10
other Thursday morning, and I want you guys to come up with three questions
28:12
and just we'll meet. There's no agenda. You set the questions, I'll
28:15
answer the questions. I buy breakfast. It's just in the way. It's
28:19
just an opportunity to make sure I'm not going to fill their cup. It's
28:22
not even my responsibility. I'm looking for a way to empty mind. The
28:26
guy that did this for me years ago is a guy named Charlie remfrom Charlie
28:30
had an outdoor business, very successful guy. He just saw something in me
28:33
in my late twenties and said, Andy, let's have breakfast, and so
28:37
that began and every other Tuesday morning breakfast that went on for years. And
28:41
I'll tell you what. Charlie would walk in. He'd be in a suit,
28:44
he'd have cuff links, he was all decked out. He was very
28:45
successful in his cool BMW that you know back you know, back when you
28:51
know there weren't even that many in the city of Atlanta, didn't seem like
28:52
he just had it all going on. He'd walk into the original House of
28:56
Pancakes and I was working for my dad, really didn't know what I was
28:57
going to do with my life. And Charlie would sit down and he'd come
29:00
in and say hello to everybody in the restaurant. I'd get there early because
29:03
I got my questions, you know. And he'd sit down and he'd smack
29:06
this big old gold ring on the table and he'd say, Andy, what's
29:08
you working on, Big, what's you're working on? Big? I'm like
29:11
nothing, I don't know nothing, and I'm thinking, okay, like big
29:17
in my world, as I took forty kids to six Flags and I got
29:19
them all home safely, is that Big? You know? He's on his
29:22
way to New York to do battle with the bankers because his company's upside down,
29:26
and he's talking about things. I don't even understand. What's you're working
29:30
on, big, Andy, Come on, what you're working on? Big?
29:30
I'm like nothing. A week after week after week, Charlie sits down
29:37
and asks me that question. It finally dawned on me. Charlie thinks I
29:40
can work on big stuff. Charlie thinks, in my life, it's the
29:44
kind of life that may one day have responsibility for the big stuff. And
29:48
Charlie is still a dear friend of mine after twenty five, twenty six years,
29:51
and every once in a while, when we're doing something big, we're
29:52
raising a bunch of money or giving away millions of dollars for stuff, or
29:55
building a new building, I'll get a text for Charlie. He'll say,
29:57
now that's big. Now I'm telling you. Twenty six years later, and
30:03
I'm still talking about Charlie Renfro because he saw in me the potential as the
30:06
next generation leader, and he decided, I've got a little bit of time
30:07
for that one guy. No agenda, I'm just gonna walk in and you
30:11
asked me the questions he taught me. The principal of the five hundred pound
30:15
gorilla. Five hundred pound gorilla. You know. Principle is when there's conflict
30:18
and where there's issues and there's people you want to avoid, you walk up
30:22
to the cage, you open the cage, and you invite the five hundred
30:23
pound gorilla into the room. And there were times I was trying to avoid
30:27
conflict and avoid people, and this statifically he say, who whoa, whoa,
30:30
whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's five hundred pound gorilla.
30:33
Andy, you go down there, you open that cage, and you invite
30:36
it into the room. Don't you run from that? Twenty six years later,
30:38
I'm still talking about that, still something. Every once in a while,
30:41
I look at my wrist and it says, what would Charlie do?
30:42
That's you know, my wristband is ww CD. What would Charlie do?
30:48
I mean Jesus too, but Charlie. You know Charlie, he told me
30:52
what to do. Now, my point is this, you can do that
30:57
for somebody. You can do that for somebody. I know what your objection
31:03
is. You know, well, any when I'm the boss, I'll start
31:06
doing this when I'm the boss. As soon as I'm the boss, you
31:07
know, I'll I'll start doing this. Okay, let me just tell you
31:11
why this isn't true. If you don't start it now, you won't do
31:14
it then, because once you are the boss, you will think you became
31:17
the boss by hoarding and not helping. You'll think you became the boss because
31:22
it was all about you, not beyond you. But if you start now
31:26
becoming a beyond you leadership, a leader, if you commit now to becoming
31:30
a beyond you leader, if you just take some baby steps, if you
31:33
start thinking out the box, outside the box, if you find those one
31:37
or two people that have extraordinary potential in your organization and you begin to invest
31:41
in them, you will have something to show for your leadership just beyond the
31:47
things that you accumulated. You are going to accumulate the rewards of your success
31:51
just because you're leaders I mean, that's going to happen. The question is
31:53
who are you bringing along with you? The question is who's coming along behind
31:56
you? The question is who are you around almost every single day and a
32:00
little bit of leverage, a little bit of empowerment, would go a long
32:04
long way. I'll just close with this. If your leadership isn't all about
32:09
you, it will live beyond you. If your leadership isn't all about you,
32:16
it will live beyond you. Now listen, But if your leadership is
32:22
all about you, it will not live beyond you other than the fact that
32:27
you will serve as someone's bad example. And there's not a person in this
32:32
room, there's not a person listening or watching that wants this. You have
32:37
the potential to be a beyond you leader, and the time to begin exercising
32:40
your beyond you muscles is right now where you are, with the influence you
32:46
have, where you are currently employed, the industry, you're currently working in,
32:51
the job that you currently have. So for the rest of the day,
32:53
you're going to be inspired. For the rest of the day, you're
32:55
going to get more principles, more information. But at the end of the
32:59
day, our heart desire is that you would become a leader, a leader
33:02
who fearlessly and selflessly empowers those around you as well as those who are coming
33:09
along behind you. This is going to be a fantastic day. Thank you
33:13
so much for allowing me to get a kicked off