Chapter 3: Encouragement
Remember, the primary role of leaders is to lead other people perhaps a team, a construction crew, a classroom, or a church. One of the greatest privileges and responsibilities of leading is to touch human lives.
I teach leaders to find the 1% positive. What does that mean? I once heard a story of an unusual teacher who took over a class of bad apples in an inner-city school. They were the worst of the worst. After spending one semester with this little old lady, these tough kids all got straight A’s. The principle was thunderstruck. He wondered how she accomplished such a miraculous turnaround.
He wanted to find her secret. So, he asked. Here was her secret…She was baffled by a class register that listed every student and columns of pertinent information about each. She confused their locker numbers with their IQs. So, on the first day, she said, “Wow! How did you kids get to be so brilliant? Please tell me why you’re so smart.”
The famous German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once said, Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he should be and he will become what he should be.
One passage in the Bible gives an interesting nuance about leaders - those who extract the precious from the worthless. Jeremiah 15:19
Are you an encourager? Leaders must truly CARE about those they lead. Out of that care, they must search for that 1% buried in the heart and that precious 1% that can make all the difference in that person’s life path. When they find it, they must water it with encouragement. Sometimes, leaders have to be patient and drill below the surface of those they lead in order to find the 1%.
Encourage your team! I’ve come to understand a clear pattern for leaders. It is this: care = respect = leadership. When you care for and about someone, you will begin to respect what their Creator built into them. That care and respect causes them to see you as a leader.
Remember, that inside the word encourage is courage. It takes courage to gaze into the eyes and heart of some people in order to extract the precious from the worthless. It also takes courage to ignore what other voices are saying about people. Encouragers must ignore those (sometimes, even their parents, family, friends) that call a person bad names like stupid, failure or, the one they called me…STUTTERER. Leaders must be encouragers. They have the power to call an inner gift from out of obscurity into prominence.