Today I am attending the Chick-Fil-A Leadercast along with the entire Rocket Company team. The following series of posts will be the leadership learnings from the day.

The second session’s first speaker was renowned leadership expert Dr. Henry Cloud.  Dr. Cloud’s latest book is Boundaries For Leaders.  Don’t miss out on this resource.

The following are his thoughts:

  • Simplicity, from a neuro-science and practical standpoint, is one of the most important things you can do to get the people to work the plan.
  • The real work is to get the people to work the plan.
  • Create Necessary Endings – This is when the worst thing a leader can do is think there is hope in a situation.
  • The experts prune a rose bush in three contexts – A rose bush creates more buds than it can sustain.  Which of the buds are the best and prune the rest.  The best buds need the resources of the vine.  Some branches are sick and not going to get well.  And there is the dead stuff.
  • The life of the company was in about 20% of its activities.  The best buds need the resources.
  • It is during the leadership pruning that we need courage.
  • There is a point when you have to realize as a leader that you are attached to, and everything you have done is not going to change anything.  They are resistant to change, sick, and not going to get well.  Their season has passed.
  • Sometimes leaders get so invested in something.  That season has passed and it’s over.
  • Why did it take a bankruptcy judge to shut down Pontiac?…The hardest one is when a person is involved.
  • Sometimes it is not best for anybody, or the investment that has been made, because of the logjam they have caused.
  • Hoarders by definition are in denial.
  • A co-dependent is someone who has another person’s life flash before them right before they die.
  • There is a hoarder pattern in business.  They have been taught they have to be the source for everything.
  • How many cultures and teams are stuck in “when we did this” or “when we did that”.  Yesterday is gone.  Throw away the prom dress.
  • Focused Attention – You can have a lot of projects going at once, your brain can only focus at one time.
  • Great leaders lead people in ways that their brains can actually follow them.
  • They create for people focused attention where people’s brains can follow them.
  • The brain must 1.  Attend to what is relevant.  2.  Inhibit everything else.  3.  Create a working memory.  Great leaders do these three things in a multitude of ways.
  • If everything is important, nothing is important.
  • Goals are primarily met not because of desire.  It is what gets prioritized.
  • Your brains work on oxygen, glucose, and the simplicity of relationship.
  • In trauma states they can sue you, take assets ways, or go across the street.
  • What’s it like for you?  What’s it like for you clients?
  • Sometimes the heat of what is going on in bad situations, the brain begins to break down and change.
  • Create structures where you team gets encouragement from the people and the people with you.

Would you like to hear how Andy Stanley, Steven Furtick, Louie Giglio, and Mark Driscoll prepare their messages?

All of this happens on Wednesday, May 16 at 4pm EDT.  And best of all, it’s 100% free. Preach Better Sermons is a free, four-hour, online conference focused on helping communicators prepare and deliver messages that matter.  Some of the best communicators in the world will unpack preaching principles you can use right away.

It’s 100% free and since it happens online, there are no travel costs.  Click here to register for the event now.

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