One leadership behavior that is most important is certainly easier said than done: hold to purpose. Sounds simple enough but, especially as time goes on, it is so easy to lose sight of or lose our grip on our purpose. We get caught up in the activities we are doing or the methods we’ve always used and forget to ask, “how does what I am doing fit with my/our purpose?” Your first instinct might be to ask, “Why is that so important?” And in doing so, you prove the point. Asking a why question is our way of getting to purpose. We instinctively know that purpose is important, but we don’t consciously think about. One of the qualities of adaptive leadership is being aware of our purpose and acting intentionally out of that knowledge.
The first challenge is often knowing what our purpose is. We want to jump to the “what” without necessarily exploring the “why.” When Jesus’ disciples quarreled about who would sit on Jesus’ right and left in the kingdom, they were focusing on the what (and stuck in old patterns) rather than thinking about why Jesus had come. Check it out in Mark 10:35-45.
If they had been thinking about the why, they never would have asked for that. Jesus holds to purpose and reminds them, “You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. ...For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:42, 45).
Crucial for making progress on any adaptive challenge is to hold to purpose. Sometimes that purpose is clear, other times it needs to be rediscovered. We must resist the temptation for quick fixes or for treating the surface symptoms. Instead, let us seek out the why and let the what flow from that as we serve God and God’s Kingdom purposes here on earth!
--Clayton Gladish