Love Works Wednesday Link Up Week 1
“Love isn’t a feeling but an action, an action by which leaders and entire organizations can experience almost unimaginable success and personal fulfillment.”
Joel Manby – Love Works
A couple of months ago, I read and reviewed Love Works by Joel Manby. (Click here to read my overall review). A blogging friend of mine, Bill Grandi (The Cycleguy), recently challenged readers to consider linking up with him for several weeks with posts related to this excellent leadership book. I thought I would give it a try. To read Bill’s introductory post regarding this series, click here.
For today, Bill and I (and anyone else who’s linking up with us) will be posting about the first two chapters (A Hard Day’s Night and The Jedi Masters). Check out Bill’s take by clicking here.
Since I already read the book, I thought it would be interesting to highlight some of the sentences I underlined when I read the book initially:
- “I wanted, in short, to be the same person all the time: at work, with my family, at my church, and when I was alone.” (p. 21)
- “Love isn’t a feeling, but an action, an action by which leaders and entire organizations can experience almost unimaginable success and personal fulfillment.” (p.22)
- “Profits are a product of doing the right thing – over and over again.” (p. 22)
- “Leadership is about the bottom line AND…and loving the people you work with. and making your community a better place. and feeling a sense of satisfaction at the end of every day. and leading employees who can’t imagine working anywhere else…. The bottom line is best served when leaders lead with love.” (p. 23,24)
- “It’s not okay to achieve profit growth and destroy our culture as a ‘great place to work for great people.’ It is also not okay to focus on being a ‘great place to work’ without achieving our financial objectives.” (p. 29)
- “For the culture to survive, it must be defined AND adhered to or the organization could lose its way.” (p. 29)
- “Treating someone with love regardless of how you feel about that person is a very powerful principle.” (p. 31)
- “Agape love is the foundation for the best and noblest relationships that humans are capable of. It is deliberate and unconditional love that is the result of choices and behaviors rather than feelings and emotions.” (p. 32)
I am a leader. I’m definitely in a leadership position in my company as an operations manager. My team members include project managers, engineers, technicians, union pipe fitters, and miscellaneous support staff. I’m in various leadership roles in my church. I’m a youth leader, I co-lead a small group with my wife, and I lead a Foundations class once or twice a year. I’m in a leadership position at home. As a parent, my wife and I have the responsibility to lead our children.
Leadership is an interesting thing. It takes energy, thought, and action. When you hear the word leadership, what comes to your mind? Power? Fame? Notoriety? Influence? Wisdom? Many words probably come to mind, but love is not the word we usually think of when we hear the word leadership. However, when you see how Joel Manby frames love and leadership in the first two chapters and in the quotes above, you get the sense that love is essential in order for leadership to be truly successful.
As we kick-off Love Works Wednesday, I want to challenge you to think about your leadership from a whole new perspective. Whether you lead in the business world, the church world, or in another pocket of the world, try leading with love. Not love the feeling, but with love the action. Lead in a way that puts other first. Lead in a way that represents how you’d honestly like to be treated by others. Over the next eight weeks, Bill and I will continue to explore love based leadership. I hope you’ll read along, jump into the comments, and maybe even change the way you lead. Until then, consider getting a copy of Love Works for yourself, and see how this book might change you and your leadership.
What is one thing you can do differently this week to lead people with more love than before? How you have you been led with leadership by others?