Leadership

The Death and Life of Change

Leadership One comment

I have a confession. I enjoy change.

I’ll give you a minute with that.

…

Weird, right?

I do. I love it. It is not always easy. In fact, it is rarely easy. But it is almost always purposeful.

Think about it. When has a change in your life only resulted in negative consequences? I know, you might initially go to the negative consequences. I do too.

I had to move and now I rarely see my friends. It’s terrible. But I have learned so much about myself in the last 7 months. It has been hard, but I have grown.

Maybe you got married and now your holiday traditions are changing. I imagine that is difficult. But, look at what you have gained.

Maybe your car finally quit on you. You love that car. You don’t want to give up the memories of that car. It’s hard to move on. But your new car doesn’t shake violently on the highway and can carry on the tradition of that 1987 Oldsmobile you love so much.

There is a difference, of course, between change and waste. To be honest, if I’ve gone awhile without any change in my life, I will rearrange my furniture just because. I need a change of scenery, a new perspective. But it would be silly to throw out all my furniture and start from scratch every time I got the itch for change. Who could afford that? (If you can, let’s talk.)

The same is true in life. When you move, you don’t throw out your old friends. You adjust how you live in those friendships. And, hopefully, you add new friends. When you get married, you don’t trash all of your family traditions, but maybe the way you carry them out is adjusted to reflect that two have become one. Maybe new traditions are birthed out of two family histories merging. When you have to trade in your car, you don’t stop going to the places the Oldsmobile carried you. You just have a different vehicle to carry you to your destinations now and it can carry you further distances without spewing radiator fluid all over the pavement.

The old way isn’t bad. My current furniture arrangement works great in my little apartment. No one would look at it and think, “You should really change this set up.” But, I know, in a month or two, I will need some change and, even though my furniture is heavy and I live alone, I will have to do some hard work to find a new perspective to allow for creativity to live in my space.

In every arena, change is hard. We hold onto our routines, our traditions. They feel safe, familiar. The floor plan is working, why change it? It’s too difficult to change things. It hurts. It feels like we might lose something. And it is true, we might. It is guaranteed, actually. When you marry, you lose something. You die to self. When you move, you lose something. I lost the comfort of coming home to roommates, the ease of driving 5 minutes to spend time with a friend.

But if we don’t change? If we are unwilling to continue to rearrange when the time comes? We lose something in that as well. We lose the promise of growth. We lose the goodness of new horizons. We die, but not on purpose.

Tradition is good. Change is good. They are not opposites. Change uses tradition to propel us onward. It takes the thing we value and gives it new life.

What changes are you resisting? Which ones are you embracing? Do you, like I do, enjoy change?

Own It

Current Events, Leadership Leave a comment

Super Bowl XLIX. I slept through most of it. Have mercy upon me. I had just spent 40 hours with fifteen thousand 18-25 year olds expending the energy of a high schooler after 30 ounces of Red Bull and sleeping like a college student (read: not much). I did catch the last quarter and some incredible drama along with it. If I had my druthers, we would be discussing that childish brawl, but most of the world cannot seem to get over that Seahawks pass.

I do not blame them. From the little I understand about football, it was not their most brilliant moment. Perhaps, at least for this season, it was their least. They would have had multiple chances to turn that possession into a touchdown had they run. They had a timeout in their pocket. Marshawn Lynch is on their team.

My head is reeling at the moment as endless gospel truths attach themselves to this scenario. The most obvious of which is, why try to deal with sin by your own methods when Jesus is there. Just get the ball to him. Victory is guaranteed.

As obvious as it is, that is not what I want to examine today. Instead, let us consider the response to the infamous pass.  There are countless articles accessing the situation, placing the blame, giving their professional opinions about why it made sense or why it was the most ridiculous moment of the entirety of football history. I have nothing to add about the value of the play. I am somewhere near the bottom of the list when it comes to having the qualifications to break it down play by play. However, the leadership lessons that are delivered to us through this moment in time are priceless.

Pete Carroll. He’s a great leader, and it has nothing to do with the calls he makes in the game. No, he’s a great leader because he allows the people on his team to do their jobs. I’m sure he offers his suggestions, but then he stands back and lets them make the call. Sometimes, that leads to a mess and a loss. Other times an incredible victory. Can you imagine if that play had been successful?! Everyone would be talking about how amazing it was. Perhaps they would use the word risky. Stupid would not be part of the conversation. But, Carroll let his team make their choices and their choices to run that play, run that speed, pause too long, ended in a win being ripped from their grasp.

I read an article today that took time to explain everyone’s fault in the matter. Lockette didn’t want it enough. Lynch should have muscled his way into the play (Gimme that ball. Argh!). Bevell made the call. Carroll didn’t stop them. Wilson didn’t change the call or pass the ball fast enough or low enough. It’s what we do, right? Our plan didn’t work?!? Whose fault is it? And those of on the sidelines are the worst! We like to talk about how it would be different if, in some alternate universe, it had been up to us.

Carroll had a totally different response. He didn’t tell the reporters how Lockette should have picked up the pace or Lynch would have just taken the ball if he really wanted to win the game. No. Instead, the coach said, “I told those guys [on the team] it was my fault.”  It was my fault…my fault…my…fault. Does that seem to be echoing in anyone else’s head?

In leadership, this is one of the most difficult things to do. When your team makes mistakes that cost you a win, when things go wrong and it reflects on how you do your job, to turn to the watching world, the armchair quarterbacks, and say “It was my fault.” To set aside for that moment, the analytics of who could have done more to make it work, to not give into the knee-jerk reflex to protect self, and to step into the path of the hurling tomatoes and poison-tipped microphones and own it…it takes humility. It takes dying to self. It takes more than what most of us have wired into our bones.

I know that more is happening behind the scenes. I’m sure they have watched the tapes and they will breakdown what each person should have done differently. Lockette will be spiriting his guts out in offseason to make sure that next time he is at the ball first. Wilson will be working on controlling his passes and getting more accurate shots out faster. Bevell will go back to the tapes and boards to develop better plays. Lynch will continue to be a beast. And as a good leader, Carroll will insist on this work. He will not let them ignore their responsibility to do their jobs well. He will expect them to work at it, to improve. But he will not let the world stone them. He will not throw them to the wolves. He will stand in the line of fire and claim until the flames die down, “It was my fault.”

I want to be that kind of leader. I want to expect my team, in whatever realm it may be, to do their jobs well. Then, I want to stand back and trust them. And when things go wrong and victory is snatched from us, when the armchair quarterbacks want a scapegoat, I want to be the kind of leader that says, “Here I am. It was my fault.”