DOWNLOAD MODULE: The 5 Levels of Leadership: Level 4 – People Development
The 5 Levels of Leadership:
Level 4 – People Development
The Level 4 is the people development level.
This is what I live for. This is what I strive for. This is what excites me.
Something magical happens when you begin to understand the most appreciable assets you have in any organization is the people of that organization and you began to commit yourself to develop the people within that organization because how do you grow a company?
You grow an organization by growing people.
And when you grow them, they increase their capacity. When they increase their capacity, they begin to increase the capacity of what you can do and what you can accomplish.
Let me just share with you quickly three thoughts on developing people just very quickly.
Recruitment
1) The key to developing leaders and the key to developing good people is in recruitment.
The better person you bring in the door, the higher odds you can do well with them.
I remember having lunch one time with Lou Holtz and Lou Holtz said John I've had bad players on my football team and I've had good players on my football team.
He said just to be honest with you I’m a better coach with good players. Of course he is.
Let me say something. 80% of your success of equipping people to be successful is in the front door on who you bring in.
I wish I had time to develop that for you because what happens is unless you and I have a clear picture of what we’re looking for, we don’t know when we see it. Happens all the time.
People come to me and say John, I’m looking for some leaders for my company. What do you suggest?
The first question I ask is what does the leader look like?
Give me the characteristics.
Give me the qualities.
Please, paint the picture for me.
What does that leader look like because you’ve got to have that clear picture so when you see that person, you know that they're the one that you want.
Recruitment is key.
Positioning
2) Is positioning.
The ability not only to bring the right person in the front door but also put them in the right places.
Collins would say get them on the bus, get them on the right seat.
Position is huge.
What I've discovered is that successful people have always positioned themselves well.
When you see a successful person, they're successful because what they have done is they found their strength zone and they found their niche and they stay right in that sweet spot and they just work that sweet spot.
You’ve never heard anybody being interviewed that was successful that you came up and you interviewed and they said the secret to my success is I've never discovered what I was good at or the secret to my success is I've always worked on – I've just worked in my weakness – no they're always in their strength.
They’ve already discovered what they're good at.
Successful people have discovered what they're good at.
Successful leaders discover what other people are good at successful people position themselves well.
Successful leaders position other people well.
And at level 4 that's exactly what happened. The leader is always looking at the people. Observing, watching.
Just like last week I went back to my first school. I graduated from Ohio Christian University in a little town in Circleville, Ohio and it’s a little school and I go back every year and I give them a day to speak and they get all the proceeds and keep the money.
And so because I grew up in that town, I told one of my friends that played ball with me. I said Tim, let the team know, let the high school kids know that I’m going to be in town and let’s have a dinner afterwards and we had over 50 people came together.
I hadn’t seen many of my high school mates since I graduated from high school back in 1965. We had a wonderful time.
We laughed and talked and told stories for two hours and coach Nef our basketball coach, he came back, hadn’t seen him for years.
And when I saw him, I thought of myself, and I though back in those scrimmage in basketball because the first scrimmage, every year coach Nef would take the first team and he’d say now I’m going to let you play the second team but there's one condition.
The first team is not going to play their position. And he’d take Dug Roth who was 6’8 and put him at a pint guard. I remember he stacked me one year under center and he put all the first team players out of position on offense but he left the second team play in their position.
And the second team always beat us in the scrimmage.
Why’d they always beat us?
And he would stop and he’d say let me just explain something to you.
No matter how talented you are, if you're out of position, you’ll never reach your potential.
What was coach Nef teaching us? He was coaching us and he was teaching us that it’s key to get positionally correct and it’s also as the leader key to get your people in the right position and level 4, that's what happens.
Equipping
At level 4, you recruit well. You position well and then you equip well.
Now you take them and say okay, I understand what their strength zone is. I understand what their gift in this is.
Now I’m going to equip them.
I’m going to come along side of them and I’m going to develop them and I’m going to train them and I used a very simple for many, many years a simple five step equipping process.
It really works.
Step 1, I do it.
That simple. You can't teach somebody what you can't do yourself. We may teach what we know but we reproduce what we are. So if you're going to reproduce yourself, you got to be at yourself. So the first step is I do it.
Step 2 is I do it and you're with me.
I take you with me. Now we’re going to spend time and together I’m going to be your mentor. I’m going to be your coach. You’re going to watch me.
You’re going to observe me.
You’re going to see me in different situations. We’re going to make sure that it works. You're going to be able to ask me questions.
Step 3 is now we turn it and I hand the ball off to you.
Now on step 3 you do it.
You do it and I’m with you.
Now I’m watching you and I’m tweaking you and I’m helping you to get better.
I’m just really fine tuning you.
Step 4 is you do it.
You just do it.
You don’t need me anymore.
You know how to do it, you do it and you do it well and many times, people think that equipping stops at step 4 but it doesn’t. There’s one more step that's absolutely essential.
Step 5 is you do it and somebody’s with you.
You’ve never really trained and equipped somebody until they can multiply themselves. That's where all compounding is.
That’s where all compounded of time, money, influence, the whole process.
Compounding begins when you can trains somebody who is training somebody.
I know that well because 14 years ago I started a nonprofit organization called Equipped that is now the largest leadership organization in the world and we’ve trained in equipped over 3 million people in 154 countries and the key to that is we don’t train anybody unless they make a commitment to train somebody else. It has to continue to go on.
That’s level 4.
It’s a beautiful level to be on.
It’s the level where you develop people.
About John Maxwell
John C. Maxwell is an internationally recognized leadership expert, speaker, coach, and author who has sold over 19 million books.
Dr. Maxwell is the founder of EQUIP and the John Maxwell Company, organizations that have trained more than 5 million leaders worldwide.
Every year he speaks to Fortune 500 companies, international government leaders, and organizations as diverse as the United States Military Academy at West Point, the National Football League, and the United Nations.
A New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Business Week best-selling author, Maxwell has written three books which have each sold more than one million copies: The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, Developing the Leader Within You, and The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader. You can find him at JohnMaxwell.com and follow him at Twitter.com/JohnCMaxwell.