Video Transcript: Maximizing Leadership Capacity

Hey, welcome back to how to be a productive board member. In this session,  we're going to focus on maximizing leadership capacity. Let's start by talking  about the leaders capacity as a leader, the leader of the organization, the CEO  or the president, the Chief Executive Officer, the executive director of a not for  profit, the pastor, the senior pastor, whoever that senior leader is, let's talk about their leadership capacity and how as a productive board member, our part of our role is to help that person maximize their leadership. In order to maximize  someone's leadership, we it helps to know their strengths and weaknesses. So  in my role as a board member, I'm always watching the leaders that I serve,  watching for what they do well, watching for what they don't do well, and  watching for what they don't do at all. That allows me to then come alongside of  them and maximize their strengths and compensate for their weaknesses and fill in the gaps that we're not addressing. So let's use start with the leaders  strengths. So President Reyenga at Christian leaders, highly effective leader,  very talented, very gifted. In an earlier session, I talked about four chairs of  leadership on a board, the wealth chair, the woo chair, the wisdom chair, and  etc. And you know, President Reyenga fills almost all of those chairs with his  gifts and abilities, a very gifted leader, and most ministry leaders have some  powerful strengths, and the Lord has used those strengths and those gifts and  those abilities to give the Vision and then grow an organization. Start a ministry,  plant, a church. And so knowing those strengths helps, helps me as a board  member to maximize those strengths. And what do I mean by maximizing those  strengths? Well, I want to help that leader use those strengths, and by  maximize, I mean use them as often as possible. We don't want to distract the  leader from staying in the lane where their strengths are used. If we ask the  leader to do something that they're not gifted at or it's not in the area of their  strength. Sometimes you need to do that, but typically we'd look for another  board member, another staff member, to take up that project or that task. So we  want to keep the leader operating in the area of highest function, making room  for their strengths, we also want to compensate for their weaknesses. If there  are things that we know are falling through the cracks because of the leaders  weaknesses, we hire someone or we task someone with addressing those  things, and we don't focus on trying to build the leaders weaknesses into  strengths. We want to just maximize those strengths. There may be a time and a place where a leader is burdened with improving one of their weaknesses, but  we leave that between them and the Lord. We we want to maximize their  strengths as a board. It's what brought them here. We want we want them to  shine. We want them to succeed, and so maximizing their strengths, making  room for their strengths, compensating for their weaknesses, being a productive  board member, looking for these things and recognizing the opportunities to  compensate for the weaknesses. What are we going to do as a board to keep  this leader from being distracted by an area where they're weak, where their 

weaker skills are being used and it's taking them away from their strength? And  then finally, a question that every productive board member can ask before  going into any board meeting or any conversation with the chief officer of the  corporation, and that question is, how do I help this leader succeed? We want to be board members that the Chief Executive Officer looks forward to talking to we want to be a blessing to them. Now it doesn't mean that every conversation will  be tremendous blessings. Sometimes there are difficult conversations that are  necessary. Sometimes there are challenges that are faced. Sometimes, you  know, leaders are human, and they make mistakes, and so we have to walk  through those seasons with leaders who stumble, or leaders who have  challenges, or the ministry has a challenge, the board member has a challenge.  But through all of that, how do I help this leader succeed in accomplishing the  mission of this organization. This is the attitude of a productive board member  maximizing leadership capacity. Let's review the points from this session. To  maximize leadership capacity. We know the leader's strengths and weaknesses. We make room for the strengths, we compensate for the weaknesses, and we  ask ourselves the question, how do I help this leader succeed? Thanks for  watching this session. God bless you, and we'll see you soon.