Henry Cloud - 9 Things a Leader Must Do: How to Go to the Next Level—And Take Others With You

9 Things
a Leader
Must Do

DR. HENRY CLOUD

9 Things a Leader Must Do

Copyright 2006 by Henry Cloud

Published by Integrity Publishers, a division of Integrity Media, Inc., 660 Bakers Bridge Avenue, Suite 200, Franklin, TN 37067

Helping people worldwide experience the manifest presence of God.

Published in association with Yates & Yates, LLP Attorneys and Literary Agents, Orange, California.

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Some of the names used in illustrations in this book are not actual names; identifying details have been changed to protect anonymity. Any resemblance to persons alive or dead is purely coincidental.

Unless otherwise marked, Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Cover Design: The DesignWorks Group
Interior Design: VisibilityCreative

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cloud, Henry.
9 Things a Leader Must Do/Henry Cloud.
p. cm.
Summary: A simple roadmap to help leaders, and those who want to become leaders, arrive at greater levels of personal growth and corporate influence--Provided by publisher.

ISBN-13: 978-1-59145-484-7 (hardcover)
ISBN-10: 1-59145-484-0 (hardcover)

1. Leadership--Religious aspects--Christianity. 2. Leadership. 3. Leaders--Religious life. I. Title. II. Title: Nine things a leader must do.

BV4597.53.L43C56 2006
158.4--dc22
2006021309

Printed in the United States of America

06 07 08 09 LBM 6 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS

by John C. Maxwell

9 THINGS A LEADER MUST DO

One of the things I admire about Henry Cloud is his passion for helping others. His books and speaking have improved the lives of so many people. He is successful and he reaches out to others to help them become successful emotionally, spiritually, and professionally.

I have been studying and teaching leadership my entire adult life. I can see that as one of the foremost experts on relationships, Henry brings a unique and compelling perspective to the topic of leadership. His observations come from the heart and are rooted in his interaction with peoplemany of whose stories he shares in this book.

I especially appreciate that Henry looks at leadership from the inside out and includes his signature message of taking ownership for who we are and how we interact with others. And he provides specific actions we can take to grow and improve in each of the nine areas he presents.

As you read with an open heart and mind, I pray that with Gods help you will go to the next leveland take others with you. That, after all, is what leadership is all about.

John C. Maxwell

INTRODUCTION
DJ VU LEADERS

It seemed like I was stuck in a rerun of The X-Files or The Twilight Zone. I would be in a business meeting or a consulting situation or the company of other individuals who had in some way distanced themselves from the pack when it came to success in business. I would think, Wait a minuteIve met this person before. But I knew I was meeting the individual for the first time.

But the experience kept repeating itself. Each time it had that familiar ring of I know you from somewhere in the presence of a new acquaintance. At least they reminded me of someone I had known before. But who could it be?

Then one day I noticed something. I was working on a business deal, and a particular situation came up. One of my friends in the deal said he would take care of the thing we were discussing. He offered a way of handling it, and we moved on to the next issue. But I had that same feeling of dj vu about what was going on. Whydoes this seem so familiar? I asked myself.

Then it hit me. What I felt had nothing to do with my friend or with anyone else in the room. It hadto do with what my friend did. It was the way he handled the situation. Thats what I had seen before. I had seen someone else do that same thing only a week earlier. The man I was with at the moment and the person I had been with the week before, in similar circumstances and facing a similar dilemma, had responded in exactly the same way. It was as if all these people were the same person, ina way.

But here is the interesting thing, and the thing that added to the confusion: All these people were very different from one another. A good number of them were in business or other arenas of leadership, but they had different backgrounds, different personalities, different economic circumstances, and different abilities. However, they were the same in that they shared this particular way of handling life and work. And that commonality, I realized, was the dj vu I kept experiencing.

THREE REALIZATIONS

As I reflected upon the people who possessed this pattern of behavior in common, something else became evident: They were all successful in what they did. They moved forward. They did not stay stuck in the same mistakes over and over again. They reached their goals and found what they were looking for in their work and lives. There must be a connection, I thought, with their success and this pattern that I kept observing. Pondering this phenomenon, three realizations came into focus for me.

Realization number one: The answer to Who is this person?was not a person at all. It was a way of behaving. I realized that I was not looking at a person; I was looking at a pattern. A way of behaving. Now that I recognized the pattern, I decided to look for it even more. A path that successful leaders took, given a certain set of choices.

Realization number two: People who found what theywere looking for in life seemed to do a certain set of things incommon. I began to identify several ways of behaving and responding that successful leaders had in commonways they handled themselves, their relationships, their work, and their lives. There was no identifiable personality type common to these people. Rather, there were several identifiable ways that these people did business and lived life, and for the most part they all practiced them.

Realization number three: If you were not born with thesepatterns for leadership in place, you can learn them. After looking at these people over and over again, it was clear to me that they got these principles from different placesfamily, mentors, therapy, seeking, spiritual awakening, disaster, and so on. There was no consistent pattern for acquiring them that I could put my finger on. But that said something greater than if I had found a special history they all shared. Since there was nothing in common about these peoples background or IQ, these patterns did not reside in any one type of person. These patterns transcend all backgrounds, talents, and limitations.

Thus, they exist on their own and are available to all ofus. They are not things that one person possesses and another does not, like a talent. Instead, we can all learn these patterns that work every time and lead to better lives. My firm belief is that once you do learn this pattern, your life and the lives of those you lead will never be the same.