So, what’s your foundation?
Starting with a great foundation in life can lead to great things!
First, let me say what an honor and privilege it is to be a Monthly Mentor with and for you. Obviously, you are here because you want to learn and grow from the knowledge and wisdom of others. Congratulations! Developing a level of self-awareness, following through on that desire to learn, and taking action is the starting point of personal development. Understand one thing: learning and development happens over time, it doesn’t simply happen in one day. Commit to consistent learning, and I guarantee that you will be headed for great things! And again, I’m glad to be on this journey with you.
Success is where preparation meets opportunity
What I’d like to discuss with you now is some fundamental beliefs that I’ve come to understand and use with great success in life. And the values and beliefs I hold dear today have been acquired through study and the influence of others in my life.
What I’d like to talk to you about is Leadership, and why it’s so important to develop a strong Leadership understanding. Now, you may be thinking…”I’m not a Leader”. Have an open mind and follow me for a few minutes. You may just change your mind on that.
If you do a search on Leadership in Google, you’ll come up with about 779,000,000 results in less than a second. What I’m going to share with you today is one perspective on Leadership, one that I can relate to and that served me very well for years. It’s simple, easy to exercise, and easy to put into action every day. Am I suggesting that it’s the only perspective on Leadership that should be studied? Absolutely not! It’s one that works for me. I hope you can relate to it as and use as part of how you develop your own idea of what works. And by the way…Leadership is a skill. One that can be learned and developed!
I became a business partner with and Certified Member of the John Maxwell Team in 2015. Dr. Maxwell is currently viewed as one of the world’s most foremost authorities on Leadership and Personal Growth (as voted by his peers in the industry). He’s written more books (over 100) and has spoken to and influenced more people around the world (multiple millions) than anyone alive today. The great thing is, I was able to meet John personally over 20 years. And that’s when my real study of leadership principles started to take off. Again, congratulations! You have a head start on me.
The Maxwell Philosophy on Leadership
I’m going to share with you the fundamental foundation that we at the John Maxwell Team believe in and live by. Stay with me here. I’m going to hit this from a high level overview. In future articles I’ll go more in depth.
This foundation that I’m talking about is made up of four pillars/beliefs:
- Everything Rises and Falls on Leadership. It all starts there. Sure, things like accepting personal responsibility for your actions is important, as is your attitude and things like that. However, growth and real positive development occurs when it is developed under strong, positive leadership.
- Leadership is INFLUENCE, nothing more, nothing less. Everyone influences someone! If you don’t think so….think of your social media friends, contacts, followers, etc. What you say, how you act, what you post, are all influential. Think of your family, your school mates, your co-workers. Don’t think you have influence? Think again. The question you have to ask yourself is: “do I provide a positive influence, or a negative one?” You know the difference. Pay attention to it from here on.
- The highest FORM of Leadership is SELF Leadership. This should get rid of any idea of not being a leader. We are always leaders of ourselves. We control our thoughts. We control our own actions. We control what we do and how we do it. We control how we influence those around us.
- The highest PURPOSE of Leadership is to ADD VALUE to others. Let’s face it, we live in a very selfish world where we try to get and take as much as we can. I’m going to tell you a little secret right now. There’s more to life than take, take, take. TRUE fulfillment in life comes when you have relationships and interactions that are beneficial to both or all involved. There was an infamous influencer of people, Zig Ziglar, that said: “If you help enough people get what they want, they’ll help you get what you want”. The moral of the story is, giving and serving others with the motive of helping others will lead to great things for you, as well as them!
Like I said earlier, this is a high level view on the Foundation of Leadership that has worked well for me in application for over 2 decades.
I truly hope this serves you well. I’ll talk with you soon!
About the Author: Jamie PERSSE is the Founder and Principal Consultant at JC Persse Consulting based in Hastings, New York. As a life-long student and practitioner of leadership and personal and professional growth, in early 2015 Jamie pursued his passion of being a coach and mentor to help people develop. Since then, he has become business partners with, and a certified member of, the world’s largest and fastest growing team of speakers, trainers, and coaches in the world, The John Maxwell Team. You can visit his website at www.jcpersseconsulting.com.
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