leaders have jobs too...

something occurred to me this morning: leaders have jobs too.

i've spent a little bit of time learning about and teaching others to be great leaders. i've taken courses, gone on retreats, read books, listened to interviews, attended conferences, ate lunches with other leaders, etc. all the while being impressed by those guys that are "great leaders". a few names even come to mind. if you've ever spent time in leadership circles they'll sound familiar: Bill Hybels, Jim Collins, John Maxwell, Andy Stanley, Craig Groeschel, Tony Blair, Gary Hamel, Patrick Lencioni, Bono... and they all have jobs.

Bono might be a great leader, but no one would know about his leadership without his efforts through one.org and various other initiatives. No one would dare question the abilities of Tony Blair, or David Gergen, but no one would ever know who they were unless they'd held the positions that they'd held. Even a guy who (you could certainly argue) gets paid to think about leadership all day - Gary Hamel - has to run his strategic consulting company and prepare his lectures at the London Business School.

i have a job too. and i can't forget that. i do from time to time. i pretend that getting caught up in the 'business' of leadership and calling it 'leadership development' is something that is important enough to spend some time on. the problem is, that there's an entire world around me with other things that have to happen too. there's a camp that needs to be accredited, buildings that have to be taken care of, community groups that have to be contacted, programs that have to be developed, policies that need to be written, not to mention the flurry of other little interruptions that will inevitably come my way.

leadership development is fun, interesting, and time-consuming. some of those 'great leaders' we all pay attention to have good things to say. but they've got jobs to do, and so do i. so forgive me if i don't spend entire days dreaming up fun little diagrams that explain grass roots decision-making thought processes, and just use the stuff those other guys have already done instead. i have to start picking out dates for next summer's camps, and crunch some numbers so we know how much our food costs are increasing so we're not caught without the budget to make things happen.

there's a lot to do!