Monday, June 28, 2010

WORDS OF WISDOM

To achieve wisdom, you must first desire it.

Everything has beauty, but not everyone can see it.

Lead by example, not by words alone.

Somebody appreciates the unique you.

Stop letting other people stand in your way.

It may be difficult, but it will be worth it in the end.

Tomorrow is another day.

Work with your destiny. Stop trying to outrun it.

You excel at pleasing others.

Learn from your mistakes. Try not to make them again.

Open your mind and your heart to good things.

A healthy body will benefit you for life.

Be thankful, even if your life is not perfect.

To be idle is to be foolish.

Look in the mirror without admiring your reflection.

Go with your gut feeling.

True happiness makes us wise.

Worry does not beget change.

True love is on its way. Make room!

How To Function Effectively in 2010

To function effectively in “The Year of the Greater Light” here are more things you must do. Remember, instructions are for your life. This is God’s Word to you –

1. Give Yourself to the Ministry of the Word (1 Peter 2:2): Spiritual growth comes by the Word. The Word of God is food for our Spirit therefore in this year we must give serious consideration to the Word of God (Joshua 1:8). In this Year of the Greater Light, the Word of God is the only thing that can change your state in life. The word of God has transforming power (2 Corinthians 3:18). When you spend time studying, listening and meditating on the Word of God over a period of time, your attitude, mindset, and belief systems will change. You’ll suddenly realize that you are different and you have become a better person. As you give yourself to the Word in 2010, it will grow and prevail in every area of your life producing in you what it talks about (Acts 19:20). The Word of God is the life in you, the very essence of your existence. (Proverbs 4:20 – 22). Know your prayer and meditation time in 2010. Make your meditation time purposeful and consistent.

2. Pray In Tongues Consistently (1 Corinthians 14:4): One of the signs that follow the new creation is speaking in other tongues. You can build up and improve every area of your life by speaking in tongues. When you pray in other tongues, your spirit is alert and fine-tuned to the things of the Spirit. Praying in tongues exposes your spirit to the mature things of the spirit and causes you to put away childish things. This means that for you to experience serious spiritual growth, you must speak in tongues consistently. The Bible says that when you pray in other tongues, you are building yourself like an edifice “But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost” (Jude 1:20). Praying in tongues helps your spirit to be sensitive to the realities of the kingdom. Praying in other tongues also conditions your spirit to receive from God. It is therefore important that we pray in other tongues in the year 2010 like never before (Ephesians 6:18). Speaking in tongues was one of the secrets to apostle Paul’s success, that’s why he declared to the whole church, “I thank my God I speak in tongues more than ye all” Speaking in tongues is not optional for the child of God for your success this year is dependent on your walk with the Spirit.

3. Get Involved In The House of God (Ephesians 4:11 – 16): Get involved in the house of God, it helps you express the gifts of God inside you. It helps you to find your place and standout as a blessing to the Church and your world at large (John 5:33 – 35). You can be involved in the activity groups in the church. Always volunteer to help in the house of God.

Applying The Love Principle

You can change your relationships for the better if you apply the love principle. It worked for God, it will work for you. Whether it’s your aggressive in-law, your uncooperative brother or sister, love will make you hear their voice differently; it will make you view their actions and motives differently. Take control of the relationship with patience, and see their helpless souls with a new passion. Your strength comes out as you remain unmoved by their words, because they cannot hurt you. You’re untouched by their actions, because they have no effect on you. God stands strong on behalf of His children.

You can have a good relationship with people. There are a number of guidelines people can give you for developing good relationships such as remembering names, keeping a kind smile, giving honest compliments, being prepared to listen to people, and never arguing but supporting their views. These tips are good, but they have their limitations. The Bible says, “There is a spirit in man and the inspiration of the almighty giveth them understanding“ (Job 32:8).

Wisdom is the principal thing. The man with an excellent spirit will do everything in line with the nature of God, not to impress, but because it’s his nature to do right. He is the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:21). Quite a number of people have great problems in communicating. Maybe in spite of tips and guidelines taught on communication you still experience difficulty in effectively communicating with your listeners. To communicate effectively, your words must come from your inner most being; for out of your inward part shall flow rivers of living waters Then your words will not be selfish but kind, not self-centred but considerate. Your smile will be encouraging; filled with life. That is the actual purpose of communication.

Another translation for Communication is ’Koinonia’, meaning ‘Fellowship’. “But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.”(Hebrews 13:16) In other words, God is pleased with the fellowship or communication of believers. Our communication brings edification to the hearer. The real life will communicate to your heart. A man with a recreated spirit talks from the innermost part of his being. His words create impact, portray the virtues of God’s Spirit and bring edification to his listeners. God honours his words.

If therefore, the secret of a successful relationship borders around effective communication, it means that you are designed to prosper in this area because the words that now come out of your mouth are spirit and life. They are not mere words, but active, operative, energizing and effective, full of power to win and for results. You will touch your hearers. They will desire your words like the people that followed our Lord Jesus just to hear Him speak. No man ever spoke like Him, the people stayed with Him for three days without food, just to hear him speak. How wonderful!

Principles of Leadership

Your Power of Consensus: This is learning to convince others to think like you. The tyranny of many governments and monarchs were brought down by the Power of Consensus because Human will is irresistible. There are three most powerful forces in the world and they are Fire, Flood and Mob; Mob, being a resultant effect of the power of the Human will. The human will is so powerful. A perfect example of this is seen in the story of the building of the tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1 – 8). In Genesis 11: 5 -6, God came down to see what the people were building and he said Behold, the people is one, and they all have one language; and this they begin to do and now nothing will be restrained from them which they have imagined to do.

The Energy Of Competition: This gives you the impetus to go on – the fire of competition. Train yourself to love competition because it produces energy. Enjoy competition and be excited about it. There is nothing you cannot do if you train yourself at it. Make friends with those you can learn from. Never be comfortable with average, but be on top always.

The Power of Corporate Wealth: Taxation is a form of corporate wealth that helps you become participators in what’s going on around you. Through corporate wealth, the Government can and should do more for its people. Partnership is another form of corporate wealth which helps you impact your world. Poor people can’t set up a government, they won’t succeed (Proverbs 10:15). Poverty is a curse; it takes the rich to help the poor (Ecclesiastes 7:12a). Think global, the World is yours.

Power:

  • Knowledge (Ecclesiastes 7:12b): Knowledge is important because it gives you power. Know little about everything, be versatile, read, have knowledge. Be studious; seek more knowledge about your field or area of profession. Refuse to be ignorant, be a man or woman of Knowledge (Proverbs 10:14). Have information power because knowledge is power.
  • Be filled with the Power of God (Ephesians 5:18 – 20): It is important that you are filled with the power of God. It is a necessity for your journey in life. Being filled with the power of God gives you the ability to effect a change in whatever situation you might face. You activate this power in you by speaking in other tongues (Jude 20). When you speak in tongues, you charge yourself up and stir up the power of God in you.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Reducing Organizational Costs as a leader

The fundamental purpose for organization is to coordinate a system of talents, resources, and operating structure toward the purpose of attaining a shared corporate vision.

It must be understood that in the pursuit of a vision an organization can be either a benefit or a detriment. In its purest form organization is merely a tool to achieve a specified purpose. Since it is merely a tool the organization can be changed or modified at any time. If it is achieving its purpose then simply improve it as needed along the journey. If it is hindering the purpose one must always remember that as a tool it can be modified or redesigned at any time in order to fulfill its essential role in vision attainment. Simply stated, organization can be a blessing or a curse, an enabler or a hindrance.

One of the stark contrasts between God and man is that God always organizes by creating organisms, and man organizes to create organizations. Since an organization is a tool and is organized by man it can never be allowed to take on the form of a holy thing.

The perfect Biblical illustration occurs when the children of Israel were being plagued and bitten by fiery serpents and dying. Numbers 21:7-9 says:

7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, "We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD and against you; pray to the LORD that He take away the serpents from us." So Moses prayed for the people. 8 Then the LORD said to Moses, "Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live." 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

NKJV

God allowed the structure of the brass serpent to fulfill a designated purpose. However, after the purpose was fulfilled, the people should have destroyed the brass serpent, but they did not. Later it became a curse to them, because when Hezekiah began to purge the kingdom of idolatry the Bible says in 2 Kings 18:4:

KJV4 He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brasen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it: and he called it Nehushtan.

Anytime an organizational tool becomes elevated to the role of a holy thing it then becomes an idol. Organizational idolatry is as real as any other form of idolatry. Once the tool has fulfilled its useful purpose and intent and is no longer relevant it must be discarded. Otherwise the tendency of people is to elevate it and reverence it beyond its original intent.

Normally an organization begins when a small group of people unite around a common and shared vision. As success occurs, support positions and processes are put in place to forward the progress and maintain momentum. However there is a great risk in growing the organization, because there can come a point in which it cost more time and resources to maintain the organizational system than is expended on pressing toward its vision and purpose. At this point the organization begins to atrophy. At best it becomes stagnant and unresponsive to change as a slow but inevitable death begins to overtake it.

The only way to offset this is to keep the organization relevant, fresh and flexible. One way of doing this is to continually focus on minimizing absolutely all non-essential operating costs of the organization. There are several layers that must be considered when reducing operating costs.

The first layer is the easiest and most obvious, and that is to cut within departmental spending and control expenses. However, this is the low hanging fruit that anyone can spot easily. Once the low hanging fruit is harvested, leadership must then press toward a deeper and more meaningful layer where the real operational costs can be impacted.

I must state that organizational costs cutting cannot be done from the limited management lenses of the accountant. Management by numbers is the shortest path to ruin. Every student of leadership and management understands that although numbers are very important, you cannot lead an organization through accounting principles. You lead an organization by leading people and managing processes. By guiding people to work on the way the work is done a leader can press into the second layer of cost reduction and that is getting the people involved in changing the way the work is done. People can work together to optimize processes, eliminate every form of corporate waste, and reduce operating costs to a theoretical minimum. Only when this occurs will an organization truly achieve operational efficiency.

For this to occur, the operating structure of an organization must become an inanimate tool and lose all sacred implications. It must be understood that although the message can never change, the method must always change. Serious consideration must be given to any process that expends time, energy, or resources (including financial). Any process that does not add-value to the vision can be eliminated. Only value-adding processes should remain.

It is easy to find where the costs of operations can be reduced. All one has to do is ask the right questions. What layers of decision-making and redundant bureaucracy can be eliminated? How much travel can be eliminated and replaced by online meetings? What documents and publications can be sent electronically instead of in traditional print? How can mailing costs be reduced or eliminated? What meetings can be eliminated? How can people be diverted from fundraising to support expensive programs to adding value to the purpose of the organization? Which staff positions can be merged to achieve more with less? What administrative facilities can be eliminated in order to divert funds to the front lines of action?

Another way to identify cost reductions is to look for the problems. Problems are mountains of treasures, because problems identify the opportunities for improvement. Removing layers of bureaucracy, redundant decision-making layers, and complexity can save incredible amounts of time, energy, and finance. Problems are easily eliminated if the proper attention is devoted to discovering its root cause and implementing the appropriate corrective actions.

Organization guidelines and procedures should never eliminate sensibility and decisiveness. One of the best ways to re-engineer an organization is to begin with its manual of operations and eliminate anything that is irrelevant or non-value adding to the purpose and vision. Once this is done the organization becomes a tremendous enabler instead of a permission withholder. It becomes a blessing instead of a curse.

Every dollar absorbed by non-essential organizational operating costs is actually diverted from the true purpose of the organization. Every dollar diverted from organizational waste to mission fulfillment is a dollar wisely invested. As government has effectively proven the less the bureaucracy and costs the better.

How to Make Decision as a Leader

Most leaders must constantly work at making decisions simple. The implication of a decision will always be complex enough, and sometimes we try to solve or deal with all the implications - the how, who, why, how much and so on at the same time we make the decision.

What are the five to ten most relevant, proven facts in this situation?

  • Right up front, distinguish proven facts from what are simply your assumptions. Assumptions are what we believe to be true. They can be very faulty foundations on which to build your decision. A proven fact is "Last month the house down the street sold for X dollars." An assumptions is "I think houses in this neighborhood will generally sell for about X dollars."
  • The most frequent violation of sound decision making is tryi9ng to decide before all the facts are known. Somehow in our minds we have a need to decide now, a need to bring closure, a need to have things settled. Because an undecided situation often brings us stress, our minds compel us to make a decision too quickly before all the facts are in. "Once the facts are clear, the decisions jump out at you." Find out the facts!

How will this decision impact all the people involved?

  • Who are the main players? Who else will be affected? People in other departments? You spouse and children?

What will be the long-term impact of this situation?

  • What will be the long term impact of this decision?
  • How would this decision affect people a year from now? Five or ten years from now? By the time the children leave home? By the time I retire?
  • The more reversible the decision and it's consequences the freer you are to move faster in making it.

What legal, moral, or ethical concerns are involved in the decision?

  • Be clear on these factors, especially if it's a big decision involving major commitments of money, time, and energy and affecting a number of lives.
  • Understand the difference between these three categories. Legality is based on a coded law. Morality is based on a moral code or trust. Ethics are based on an accepted local or cultural standard.
  • Sort out these terms and their application to your decision making process, since some decisions you make could be legal and yet immoral or ethical and yet illegal.

Have I written down the basic issues involved in this decision?

  • Simply getting everything on paper can be very helpful. The bigger the decision, the more helpful it is.

What are the trends related to this decision?

  • A trend line is one way to help you establish a context for sound decision making. As trends change, the context changes. Therefore, the meaning of each fact you're considering also changes.
  • What are the trends related to the major decision you're making? Are prices going up or down? Is demand greater or less? Are complaints fewer or more frequent?

What other lingering questions do I have?

Maybe you've been ignoring some of the questions or concerns in you mind. Bring them out into the open and be sure you deal with them before you make the decision.

Principles To Guide Your Life

What are some of the principles that greatly impact our lives and help us become mature, growing, productive people? Listed are principles to guide your life:

  1. Your attitude determines your altitude.
  2. It’s not what happens to a person, but what happens in a person that makes the difference.
  3. Every problem has a hidden possibility and a seed of victory in it.
  4. Failure is not final. Learn from it and go on.
  5. Limitations are guidelines, not stop signs.
  6. Expect the best and express the best.
  7. There is not much difference between success and failure. The successful usually gave just a little bit more.
  8. Each person can increase a little. You can improve your attitude, relationships, priorities, determination and credibility a little each day.
  9. Helping others succeed helps you to succeed.
  10. Be yourself – that’s who God made.
  11. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.
  12. Live what you teach.
  13. Pay now and play later.
  14. Giving is the highest level of living.
  15. Success is having the respect and love of those closest to you.
  16. We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.
  17. There is no success without sacrifice.
  18. No matter where you’re starting from on your journey of life, you have some things going for you.
  19. Successful people develop positive daily habits that help them to grow and learn.
  20. It’s lonely at the top… so you’d better know why you’re there.
  21. If you need the people, you can’t lead the people. A co-dependent relationship seldom grows or moves forward.
  22. Are you gonna get any better, or is this it?
  23. Opportunities are seldom labeled.
  24. Circumstances do not make you what you are… they reveal what you are!
  25. Look carefully at the closest associates in your life, for that is the direction you are heading.

How To Gain Loyalty As A Leader

Some of the things you can do in your own congregation to rectify any lack of loyalty are:

1. Teach the difference between faithfulness and loyalty.

2. Remind your people that, according to their new nature, they already want to be loyal. Unless they are outright rebels, disloyal acts come out of ignorance and/or weakness of the flesh.

3. Let them know, in light of their sharpened understanding, you are expecting them to be loyal. They will be what you expect them to be.

4. Be careful about whom you appoint to places of responsibility. Look for loyalty, not just faithfulness.

5. As a leader, practice those qualities of leadership that will help people become more loyal to you. Remember, you are representing Jesus to your people. We are faithful to Jesus because He is our Master and Lord. We are loyal to Him because He is our Brother and Friend.