John C. Maxwell - The Law of Process: Lesson 3 from the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership

1998 and 2007 by John C. Maxwell

This ebook is derived from The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, by John Maxwell, 1998 and 2007 by Maxwell Motivation, Inc., a Georgia corporation.

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Scripture quotations noted CEV are from THE CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH VERSION.
1991 by the American Bible Society. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations noted The Message are from The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English. 1993 by Eugene H. Peterson.

ISBN 978-0-7852-7431-5 (HC)
ISBN 978-1-4185-3831-6 (ebook)
ISBN 978-1-4002-7562-5 (ebook of Chapter 3)

This book is dedicated to Charlie Wetzel, my writing partner since 1994. Together weve written more than forty books, and Ive enjoyed our collaboration on every one. As I have labored to add value to others by identifying and teaching leadership principles, Charlie, you have added value to me and my efforts. Your insights and skills as a wordsmith have been enjoyed by millions of readers. As a result, you have made a greater impact on more people than has anyone else in my inner circle. For that I thank you.

CONTENTS

Thank you to the thousands of leaders around the world who learned and sometimes challenged the laws of leadership, thus sharpening my thinking.

Thank you to the team at Thomas Nelson who gave me the chance to revise and improve this book, and especially to Tami Heim for her strategic leadership and to Victor Oliver who was instrumental in the development of the original concept.

Thank you to Linda Eggers, my executive assistant, and her assistant, Sue Caldwell, for their incredible service and willingness to go the extra mile every day.

Thank you to Charlie Wetzel, my writer, and Stephanie, his wife, with-out whose work this book would not have been possible.

Leadership Develops Daily, Not in a Day

Anne Scheiber was 101 years old when she died in January 1995. For years she had lived in a tiny, run-down, rent-controlled studio apartment in Manhattan. The paint on the walls was peeling, and the old bookcases that lined the walls were covered in dust. Rent was four hundred dollars a month.

Scheiber lived on Social Security and a small monthly pension, which she started receiving in 1943 when she retired as an auditor for the Internal Revenue Service. She hadnt done very well at the IRS. More accurately, the agency hadnt done right by her. Despite having a law degree and doing excellent work, she was never promoted. And when she retired at age fifty-one, she was making only $3,150 a year.

She was treated very, very shabbily, said Benjamin Clark, who knew her as well as anyone did. She really had to fend for herself in every way. It was really quite a struggle.

Scheiber was the model of thrift. She didnt spend money on herself. She didnt buy new furniture as the old pieces she owned became worn out. She didnt even subscribe to a newspaper. About once a week, she used to go to the public library to read the Wall Street Journal.

WINDFALL!

Imagine the surprise of Norman Lamm, the president of Yeshiva University in New York City, when he found out that Anne Scheiber, a little old lady whose name he had never heardand who had never attended Yeshivaleft nearly her entire estate to the university.

When I saw the will, it was mind blowing, such an unexpected windfall, said Lamm. This woman has become a legend overnight.

The estate Anne Scheiber left to Yeshiva University was worth $22 million!

How in the world did a spinster who had been retired for fifty years build an eight-figure fortune? The answer is, she did it one day at a time.

By the time she retired from the IRS in 1943, Anne Scheiber had managed to save $5,000. She invested that money in stocks. By 1950, she had made enough profit to buy 1,000 shares of Schering-Plough Corporation stock, then valued at $10,000. And she held on to that stock, letting its value build. By the time she died, those original shares split enough times to produce 128,000 shares, worth $7.5 million.

The secret to Scheibers success was that she spent most of her life building her worth. Whether her stocks values went up or down, she didnt sell it off with the thought, Im finished building; now its time to cash out. She was in for the long haul, the really long haul. When she earned dividendswhich kept getting larger and largershe reinvested them in additional stocks. She spent her whole lifetime building. While other older people worry that they may run out of funds before the end of their lives, the longer she lived, the wealthier she became. When it came to finances, Scheiber understood and applied the Law of Process.

LEADERSHIP IS LIKE INVESTINGIT COMPOUNDS

Becoming a leader is a lot like investing successfully in the stock market. If your hope is to make a fortune in a day, youre not going to be successful. There are no successful day traders in leadership development. What matters most is what you do day by day over the long haul. My friend Tag Short maintains, The secret of our success is found in our daily agenda. If you continually invest in your leadership development, letting your assets compound, the inevitable result is growth over time. What can you see when you look at a persons daily agenda? Priorities, passion, abilities, relationships, attitude, personal disciplines, vision, and influence. See what a person is doing every day, day after day, and youll know who that person is and what he or she is becoming.

When I teach leadership at conferences, people inevitably ask me if leaders are born. I always answer, Yes, of course they are... Ive yet to meet an unborn leader! How else would you expect them to come into the world? We all laugh, and then I answer the real questionwhether leadership is something a person either is born with and possesses or is not born with and doesnt.

Although its true that some people are born with greater natural gifts than others, the ability to lead is really a collection of skills, nearly all of which can be learned and improved. But that process doesnt happen overnight. Leadership is complicated. It has many facets: respect, experience, emotional strength, people skills, discipline, vision, momentum, timingthe list goes on. As you can see, many factors that come into play in leadership are intangible. Thats why leaders require so much seasoning to be effective. Thats why I felt that only after reaching age fifty was I truly beginning to understand the many aspects of Leadership with clarity.