Discover Your Determination

Chapter 1—For the Leader in You

To get started, I will share my five fabulous, fruitful, fundamental, functional, faultless, fearless, and favorite foundations for leaders who love life.

1. Admit when you’ve made a mistake. The first life lesson for leaders who love life is to be able to admit you make mistakes, because people expect leaders to do the right thing. Leaders who love life will, from time to time, make mistakes. That’s life! So the best words you can learn are “Oops!” and “Sorry!” And don’t forget this: “Forgive me. I got that wrong. Please allow me to apologize.” And this: “Sorry. My mistake. How can I fix this?” When you admit your mistake, most people will say, “Oh, that’s okay. I’ve done that too. No worries!”

2. Lead with love. Make it safe for others to use their talents. Protect them by taking the hits yourself, and then confront them privately in a caring manner. When faced with a conflict, act quickly and never let it simmer too long. Support, encourage, and let others know that you are on their team. Listen, learn from them, reward them, and above all, lead. Be the responsible leader of the pack. The result will be that you look good and your organization succeeds because everyone is doing his or her job well.

3. Forgive. Forgiving others for their mistakes is doing the right thing. When you forgive, move on, build a bridge (even with one plank at a time), and get over it. Remember, you may want to cross that bridge one day, so try not to burn it. However, keep in mind there are certain bridges that should be burned.

4. Ask for advice. If you find yourself in a leadership position, still ask for advice. Take counsel with humility.

5. Live by the Golden Rule. These wonderful words were spoken by Jesus in Matthew 7:12: “Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them.”

Chapter 2—One-Liners for Leaders

Only you can determine your attitude.

Leadership is more than a title.

The best way to lose the ability to influence people is to boss them around.

People can choose whether to follow your leadership.

You can tame lions, and even dogs can round up sheep, but if you try to do the same with people, it will turn into disaster.

People will trust you if you believe in them, but they will feel controlled if you try to fix them.

Try understanding and assertiveness instead of force, fear, manipulation, and control.

Lead with love, not for love.

Deal with one problem at a time, and things get resolved.

Build people and not empires, and then people will build your empire.

Criticizing someone will not motivate him or her to change. It hurts and angers the other person.

When you lead by example and encouragement, people will want to do what is right.

Your role as a leader is never to set out to fix people but to serve them.

Never tolerate evil.

People think that if they sack the coach, the leader, or the prime minister, everything will be okay. But maybe not. Think about it.

People like to express their views about their leader’s flaws but rarely express their views of his or her strengths.

By the way, everyone deserves criticism, but it is all too often negative.

Learn to listen. It is worth it.

Take the time and make the effort to understand others’ points of view. They will know you value them if you listen.

There are two good reasons to listen:

1. You learn something.

2. People respond to those who listen to them.

Everyone wants to have his or her point of view heard; your point of view is not the only one.