Personnel Qualifications
When hiring any new employee you can ultimately place all of the criteria you are evaluating into the two major categories of character and competency. In the old days of the Industrial Age model of hiring the priority was given to job competency over personal character.
The process was started with a specific job description and then you would try to find a person with an educational and experience background that matched that job assignment. Their character was a factor but just not the main one.
In the new Information Age character has now clearly moved to the top of the list. Today you find the right person that will be a good fit for your team and over time you know they will find their right seat on the bus.
Jack Welch had three major things he was looking for at General Electric with all new executives. Two of these criteria related to character and only one to competency.
The first test was integrity because he wanted to know they would keep their word and tell the truth.
The second test was for intelligence because it takes smart people to compete in today’s complex global economy.
The third test was for personal maturity which means they can handle the stress and setbacks with equal parts of joy and humility.
The major reason for this significant shift in hiring priorities is that people now have to know how to work well in a highly participative environment. In this culture the mutual goals of the group are the target and not just personal success.
Everyone must have the mindset that what matters is that we succeed regardless of who gets the credit. Competency will always play a part in the hiring decision but today personal character clearly separates the winners from the losers.
Conflict Management
Filed under: Leadership Callling, Personnel Development, Servant Leader
At times we all have difficulty working with other people especially in stress charged environments. It is very easy especially as leader to fall into the bad habit of making negative comments about people especially when they are not present.
This type of conflict resolution will do nothing but add to the problem and ultimately destroy your leadership credibility. When anyone hears you making destructive comments about another person who is not there, they too realize that one day they will not be there either.
The principle that I have adopted is that if I have something negative to say to another person I will go directly to them and talk about it privately. If it is not a big enough deal for me to go and talk privately then it should not be a big enough deal to talk with others.
This one discipline has eliminated at least seventy-five percent of my need to make negative comments to other people and almost completely stopped the destructive habit of public personal criticism of others. Now when I do need to talk with someone about a real performance issue my motives are right and my methods are positive.
Called vs. Driven
Filed under: Core Values, Leadership Callling, Life Balance, Personal Development, Servant Leader
It is very important that we all know the difference between these two power words. If you are not careful and buy into the media’s definition of success you will be driven to get all the perks of this lifestyle.
Driven people see their career as the primary provider of their physical and emotional needs. It gives them power, possessions, position, pleasure and all the emotional significance they want from all the outward success they achieve.
Called people on the other hand see their career as a means to a much more important end and that is impacting other people. They get up every day on a mission to make a difference and the bottom line for them is not profits but people.
I am convinced that called people in the marketplace can be more successful in every way than their driven counterparts. They have a passion that goes way beyond just showing up for work and hitting the numbers.
All of us have a strong desire to look back at the end of our lives and know that we have made a real difference. That difference will not be who has the most toys but who has helped the most people.
Character Matters
I have hired a lot of people over the years from working in the corporate world to being involved with several different large churches. I ultimately take all of the factors involved and put them into one of two categories, character or competency.
Competency is the possession of the skill set, experience or aptitude to do a particular job with excellence. This can be accessed through a variety of performance evaluation tools and talking with references.
Character is the sum total of the moral and ethical qualities of an individual that is based on their core beliefs about life. This takes quite a bit longer to evaluate and many times references will give you only one side of the story.
I make sure I am able to spend a lot of informal time with the person so that I can eventually move beyond the interview script and hear their heart. I also never hire a key person without meeting their spouse.
The priority of evaluating this part of the person must take first place over all other qualifications. As a matter of fact, character has moved to the top of the list in the corporate world.
The first test in hiring anyone at General Electric under the leadership of Jack Welch was the character quality of integrity. He wrote, “people with integrity tell the truth and they keep their word. They take responsibility for past actions, admit mistakes, and fix them.”
Someone has well said, your ability may help get you to the top but it will be your character that will keep you there.
Core Values
If you are going to accomplish anything important in life then you must identify your core values that will determine all of your priorities and goals for your personal life or the organization you lead. If you are a church then here are some values that you might consider.
Authentic—We believe the role of the church is to help represent the biblical truth about God to the world.
Relevant—That truth is to be shared so that people can apply it every day in their real world
Significance—Every person is important and we want them to find value and meaning in life through a relationship with Jesus Christ
Transformation—We want to help everyone grow in that relationship with Christ so they can reach their own unique potential
Community—Connecting with other people in genuine relationships is where personal fulfillment is found
Involvement—Moving beyond ourselves and serving others is what produces lasting contentment
Missional—Every day we can change the world one person at a time through meeting their needs and sharing our story about what Christ has done in our lives
Supply vs. Demand
We all know the basic principles involved in this economic formula and how it affects price. I was recently exposed to a piece of this equation that I had not experienced before.
Last week I returned from a business trip from Phoenix with a stop in Atlanta with a lot of thunderstorms in the area. When I walked into the terminal I knew there were major problems because there were twice as many people there as should be this late in the day.
After checking the departing flight board three times my flight to Birmingham had been delayed to 11:45 p.m. which translated to me that it would probably be canceled. So I decided with seemingly thousands of other people to go and rent a car to drive instead.
It was obvious that demand was out the roof by the number of people trying to get cars. When I finally got mine the rate was extremely high for a compact with no room for negotiation. I wrote if off to supply and demand economics.
When I entered the Hertz lot I was shocked to see hundreds of available cars on the lot. I had experienced for the first time that at least I was aware of the economics of high demand and high supply.
When any company takes advantage of a high demand situation by artificially driving up prices they are digging their own graves. One day the pendulum will swing and the demand will be low and everyone will remember the day Hertz placed greed above customer service.
Charge a reasonable price with world class service and your organization will be able to weather any storm and thrive when others are failing all around you. If you want people to stick with you during your hard times you had better treat them well when they are in the midst of theirs.
Sweat the Small Stuff
We all love the great Bible story of David killing the giant Goliath. There are many incredible truths in the several chapters that are dedicated to this event.
The most significant one for me is that if we take care of the seemingly little responsibilities in our lives God has a way of taking care of the major ones. The reason David had no fear of this monster of a man is because with God’s help he had already killed a lion and a bear.
All major public victories that everyone sees are preceded by the smaller private ones when no one is watching. The other side of the same truth is sadly all major public failures occur because of a series of small compromises that seemed so unimportant at the time.
If you don’t think this is true just ask Eliot Spitzer or John Edwards and they will be glad to share with you how quickly this can happen. How could these highly intelligent, powerful and dynamic leaders let this happen to themselves and most of all to their families? Someone has well said an unguarded strength is a double weakness.
Sweat the small stuff and the big stuff will take care of itself.
Growth Barriers
There are many things that can keep a church from growing and reaching its potential. The most obvious is for whatever reason God is not able to bless the work and all you are left with is human effort and nothing supernatural can happen.
The list of other real issues includes lack of resources in the areas of staffing, programming and facilities that will prevent you from reaching the next level. Oh by the way, every significant increase of 500 people creates an entirely new list of different challenges that must be addressed in all of these areas.
Sometimes the problem is that a church gets out of balance in any one of these areas to the detriment of all the others. The most obvious is over building your site and incurring too much debt that strangles everything else you are trying to accomplish.
The single most significant issue beyond the blessings of God is the constantly changing role of the pastor and the people. In most small churches the pastor does the ministry and the people run the church. For any church to reach its potential the pastor must do the leading and the people must be equipped to do the ministry.
In my experience far too many times when this ongoing transition breaks down the primary blame is placed on the people and their unwillingness to follow. The hard cold truth is the reason they are not following is there is not a leader in place that has the character and integrity to say clearly come follow me as I follow Christ.
Customer Service
Every growing business needs to generate new clients and increase market share. That is why so much money is spent on marketing to try to reach additional customers and open the front door to additional revenue.
However, I have come to believe that closing the back door and increasing retention of existing customers is the most important factor in market share. In one area marketing, we are trying to attract and add new units while customer service is seeking to retain and multiply the impact of people who are already on board.
I would move significant budget dollars away from marketing until I had a world class customer service reputation. I would have real people on the phone that will stop at nothing within reason to satisfy the problems that I am having with your products or services.
The incredible bounce factor out of outstanding customer service is not only do I retain a significant percentage of existing clients; they become the most effective sales force for my organization by talking within their network of influence to generate the new customers I need to continue to grow.
The next time someone is trying to convince you to automate your customer service or outsource it to someone who answers the phone in India forget about it. Move the personal touch to the top of your marketing plan to support your existing customers and they more than any direct retail marketing plan will help you grow your company.
The Juice is Gone
I freely acknowledge that this post is not going to be for everyone. However, if you are a growing Christian and working in the corporate world it may be exactly what you need to hear.
As we mature in our relationship with Christ we start to see things the way He does and not the way the world does. Most people at work are motivated by power, pleasure, position and pride.
Even for us as Christians we get caught up in what kind of car we drive, the clothes we wear and the houses we live in. Our success status can even be defined by where we are in the leadership ladder at church.
When we grow to the point of real spiritual brokenness we move beyond success to significance. This means that we realize that the only lasting thing that really matters at work are the people and not the profits or performance reviews.
For the first time in our lives all the things that used to be important no longer motivate us in light of eternity. We often ask ourselves a thousand years from now will this really matter. Now we have moved from Success to Significance to Surrender. The old juice is gone.
Now your career has become your calling. No, you do not need to quit your job and go to seminary because you are headed for Africa. You need to live your new Christian life right where you are with reckless abandon for the glory of God.