72 Challenging And Truthful Leadership Quotes From Craig Groeschel’s Opening Leadership Summit Session

After yesterday’s resignation of Heather Lawson and the entire pastoral and elder board of Willow Creek Community Church, Life.Church Senior Pastor Craig Groeschel opened this year’s Global Leadership Summit.  I could not think of anyone who could frame the next two days better.

It was a convicting, sobering and sad time.  For an entire generation, this event and the people involved represented everything good and possible about leadership.  Now it represents the opposite.  Everything truly does rise and fall on leadership as you see below.

Elder: “To all of the women who have come forward, the church should always follow in Jesus’ footsteps to help the wounded find healing, and we are sorry we added to your pain.” https://t.co/3D2Zpxtpif

— Megan Hickey (@MeganHickeyABC7) August 9, 2018

“To the people of Willow Creek, we are sorry we allowed Bill to operate without the accountability he should have had,” Willow Creek Elder announcing that the entire pastoral board would be stepping down over investigation into allegations against former lead pastor Bill Hybels.

— Megan Hickey (@MeganHickeyABC7) August 9, 2018

The following are 72 Challenging And Truthful Leadership Quotes From Craig Groeschel’s Opening Leadership Summit Session.  May his words be sobering, prophetic, truthful, comforting to the victims, and a challenge to us all.

We are gathered today with one very clear and one specific purpose.  We want to help each other become people want to follow.

1. Leadership is simply influence.
2. One of the biggest myths about leadership is you have to be in charge to lead.
3. Leadership is not about title.  Leadership is about trust.
4. I’m not Bill Hybels.  This would normally be his session.
5. As a leader, the only way I know to deal with difficult situations is head-on, with complete transparency, with sincere compassion, and with absolute truth.
6. I am grieving deeply.  I hurt.  I ache.  The realm of emotions I’ve gone through include shock, feeling disbelief, feeling deep sadness, feeling anger.  I felt sickened.  It hurts me and I know it hurts many of you deeply.
7. Long before I am a leader, I am a pastor.  I am a husband to my best friend Amy, my wife, and I’m a father to six children, four of whom are daughters.
8. I am a brother to a little sister who suffered severe sexual abuse.
9. I have deep compassion and aching concern for EVERYONE, EVERYONE involved.
10. It was important to me to reach out to the women who were hurting.  I was able to connect with most of them.
11. We are entrusted with power.  We must always and only steward that power for the good of others.  Any misuse or abuse of power is sinful.  It is hurtful and it is reprehensible.
12. To anyone who has experienced any type of abuse, it grieves me and heart of God deeply.
13. Why are we here… because we know and believe we can make a difference.  We must make a difference.
14. We must stop making excuses and we must make things right.
15. We can make excuses or we can make a difference but we cannot make both.  It’s time to step in and lead boldly and lead courageously.
16. Some would say my involvement or even the involvement of other speakers would diminish the gravity of the situation.  To me it is quite the opposite.  I hope to be a voice of healing, or raising the standards and speaking the truth in love.
17. The world needs strong, consistent, bold, courageous, integrity-infused leaders.  People are longing for leaders who will unite rather than divide.
18. The world is watching, aching, hoping that someone will stand up when so many others back down.
19. Level 5 Leaders have a powerful mixture of profound humility and furious resolve.
20. A humble leader can learn from anyone.
21. We ask for the wisdom when we make the difficult calls and we will apologize when we get it wrong.
22. We will confront injustices and right wrongs.  We will speak up for those who have no voice.
23. We will get better.  When the leader gets better, everyone gets better.
24. Heavenly Father God, we pray for all those who are hurting that you God will bring healing.
25. Leadership – where are you taking me?  Emotional Intelligence – how are you treating me?
26. There is a big difference between a leader who is popular and one who is respected.
27. You may be popular if you are respected.  But you will never be respected if you are only trying to be popular.
28. You always feel valued when you are under trusted leadership… You feel inspired… You feel empowered.  You know there is someone who trusts you.
29. We need a heart to care.  You will never be a leader others love to follow if you are not a leader who loves people.
30. These four words need to be part of every leader’s vocabulary. “I Notice.  You Matter”
31. Good employees don’t leave organizations.  Good employees leave bad managers.
32. I want to appreciate more than I think I should.  Then double it.
33. Never rob your team member of knowing you notice and you care.
34. Some leaders will make you think that THEY are important.  The best leaders make you think YOU are important.
35. We need a passion to inspire.
36. To motivate means I’m pushing you to do something you don’t want to do.
37. To inspire means pulling out of them what is already inside of them.
38. Employees who described themselves as inspired are twice as productive as employees who describe themselves as satisfied.
39. Charismatic speeches is only tool we use to inspire others.  It is not the most popular or most productive.
40. Pride discourages.  Humility inspires.
41. Being generous with recognition is inspirational.  Being empathetic.  Listening to them.  Caring about their personal lives.
42. The one quality that inspires most is a centered leader.  A centered leader is secure, stable, confident… fully-engaged, internally aligned… guided by values, driven by purpose, and obsessed by mission.
43. All you need is one or two well-developed strengths to inspire.
44. We are not spiritual consumers.  We are spiritual contributors.
45. We are not filling churches.  We are filling Heaven.
46. Passion transforms a job into a calling
47. When passion meets inspiration, obsession is born.  We can make a difference.
48. We need willingness to empower.
49. The best leaders unleash higher performance though empowerment, not command and control.
50. You can have control or you can have growth.  But you cannot have both.
51. If we delegate tasks we create followers.
52. We delegate authority.
53. If you cannot keep your greatest employees, you have not allowed them to soar.
54. As leaders, we need to make the decisions only we can make.  Then we delegate decisions deeper into the organization.
55. The better you become as a leader the fewer decisions you make.
56. The strength of an organization is reflected by how deep in the organization people can say “Yes”.
57. The best way to find out if you trust someone is to trust them.
58. If you don’t trust your team you are either too controlling or you have the wrong people.  Either way, the problem is yours to solve.
59. Jesus loved to befriend sinners… He would reach out to those religion rejected.
60. Jesus had a passion to inspire…. I did not come to be served… I came to serve others… I have come that you might life… I came for the sick.  I didn’t come for the righteous but the sinners.
61. Jesus had a passion for those everyone else rejected.
62. Jesus casted a vision that people left higher paying jobs to go change the world.
63. 2000 years later so many of us are still following Him.
64. You need a courage to be real, transparent, not knowing all the answers, even when you’re scared to death.
65. You don’t celebrate as me but celebrate as we because we could do much more than we ever could on our on.
66. We feel so much pressure to be perfect and strong and right.  People aren’t looking for that.  They’re looking for honesty, integrity, and vulnerability.
67. This has been a really painful time and I don’t know if I got it right today.
68. When we get it wrong, we’re going to say “We’re sorry “ because we care about people.
69. The stakes are really, really high.
70. You don’t have to be somebody else.
71. You don’t have to be smart.  You don’t have to perfect.
72. But you do have to be real. Because people want to follow someone real rather than someone who is always right.

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