Soon after the completion of Disney World in Orlando someone said, “Isn’t it too bad Walt Disney didn’t live to see this!” Mike Vance, creative director of Disney Studios replied. “He did see it—that’s why it’s here.”
Or think of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and the beautiful “Ode to Joy” in it, written by a deaf Beethoven. But he did hear it. That’s why we have it.
The leader has to put down a bold vision that strikes and draws passion in the very heart of those being led.
The power of transcendent vision is greater than the power of the scripting deep inside the human personality and it subordinates it [the scripting], submerges it, until the whole personality is reorganized in the accomplishment of that vision.
Stephen Covey, First Things First
To quote Tom Sine, one of the reasons our personal faith has so little authority in changing the world about us is that we have never really fully connected with God’s transcendent vision.
If you want to build a ship,
don’t summon people to buy wood, prepare tools,
distribute jobs and organize the work;
teach people the yearning for the wide, boundless ocean.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince
In other words, lead from Place.
The Story of Nehemiah
Look at the story of Nehemiah. Nehemiah was an underemployed guy working for a heathen king, Artaxerxes I, in heathan land (Shushan, or modern Shush in what is now southwest Iran). (About like some people I know today.) The year was 444 BC. These friends of Nehemiah were reporting to him about the early waves of Jews returning to the area of Jerusalem. These friends had been spiritually mapping the Jerusalem area and came to give Nehemiah a report. It wasn’t good. The people there in Jerusalem had no vision, no passion, no security. Nothing. The city walls were in shambles, the gates were burned with fire, rubbish and ruins all about, and the Jews who had returned were in disgrace. (Much like America today.)
At this point both Nehemiah and his friends held the same information. Nehemiah’s response to the information, however, is quite different from that of his friends. His heart is with his people. He is broken with compassion, he weeps. He can’t eat, can’t sleep for four months. There was a burden, a concern. He is consumed by his burden.
The story of Nehemiah is one of the most fascinating in the Bible. Leading from vision and servant leadership, he led the nation back to Place in 52 days. The strategy detailed in that book of the Bible might be called Leadership 101. It’s not taught in our schools today – no wonder we don’t have leaders and no wonder the schools are failing.
Leading from Vision
Nothing changes until you upset what is, until you show people that where they are, the status quo, isn’t working. People build a comfort zone, an illusion, so they don’t have to change. They distort facts, lie, and ignore the facts—anything but change from where they are. The leader must upset the equilibrium; that is, create (and what appears to be) chaos. The new leader speaks and acts into the existing order, upsetting what is and creating chaos. This forces the “system” to reorder to a higher ordered system. This doesn’t make sense from our older leadership models; yet there is a new and higher order that emerges from the disorder. The leader is not doing this just for the sake of creating chaos. Rather, the leader is drawing the followers to a new Place. People still trapped in the illusion see what the leader is doing as noise. There is a paradigm blindness on the part of those lost to the leader’s vision.
When the Good News of the Gospel is alive in any person, whatever their kind of work may be, they become an inventive, searching, daring, self-expressive creature. He or she becomes interesting to other people. They disturb, upset, enlighten, and open ways for better understanding.
In the new paradigm, once the vision is put down (and continues to be put down), the leader then focuses energy not so much in planning, putting down programs, building structures, and evaluating; but rather the leader focuses on building relationships (networks, linkages, dynamic connectedness), and releases. There is no control. The result appears to the leader (and even the followers) as non-deterministic; but it really does have a pattern. Trying to control will distort the pattern.
Look what Nehemiah did. Families were given personal visions of building the wall near their house. The leader moves the vision down and involves followers in the shaping of the vision as they see it and their role in it. If you are building the wall near your house, of course you want that part of the wall as strong as possible. You are going to network with neighbors and others (building relationships) to find out how to do that. Community begins to happen.
Compare this concept with what Jesus did. The Church, when it was birthed, moved through the culture and upset everything; but we know almost nothing of the early church organizational structure and programs. And buildings? They met in homes.
The leader has to be a very secure person to lead from the new reality. What happens is very threatening not only to those he or she is trying to lead, but to the leader as well. What if they don’t follow? What if God doesn’t act? The leader has to believe that he or she is on God’s vision and then trust in faith that God will make it happen. The leader sees things others don’t see. Hears things others don’t hear.
Margaret Wheatley, in her classic book Leadership and the New Science, shows how the old concept of leadership no longer works. Just as quantum physics gives us a non-deterministic world at the micro level, the larger world is also non-deterministic from a secular perspective. The leader has to lead from a different perspective. In fact, the leader has to create what seems to be chaos. He or she has to upset the equilibrium. Change doesn’t take place unless the leader can show that the present structure and status quo is not working. This upsets those who follow, and then change can be initiated. The change will not take place until the people are desperate enough.
Jesus was a leader, but what He did was definitely upsetting to those around Him—even to the disciples and religious leaders. He upset the equilibrium. Look at His teachings:
• Losing is Finding
• Weakness is Strength
• Last is First
• Giving is Receiving
• Serving is Ruling
• Dying is Living
• Least is Greatest
• Poor is Rich
• Lose Your Life and You Will Find It
Definitely seems contradictory to “what is” or the status quo. Yet this is the only leadership model that will work today.
What about in your life? How do you lead? Does your church teach you how to lead from vision as a servant?