ALONG THE WAY...

If you’ve been following along, you know I’ve spent the last several months writing a book. There was a seed of an idea. I planted it and have been watering it, but most of the work has been happening under the surface: outlining, long writing sessions, all-nighters, drafts and revisions, writing workshops, and more. It’s been a very slow and solitary experience. But that’s about to change. A few months ago, I submitted a book proposal to B&H Publishing. If you’ve never writt

I want to ask you a question I heard recently that that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. I heard it a few weeks ago at a conference in Washington, D.C. for creatives. The theme was Courageous Creative, and I originally went because of the book I’m writing. I got to sit in on a book-writing workshop, hear from world-class creatives, and fill pages of notes with ideas and advice that I’m already putting to work. But one of my biggest takeaways had almost nothing to d

What am I actually hoping will happen with this book? Of course, I hope people read it. I hope it gets published. I hope it finds its way into the hands of leaders. I hope it opens doors and reaches farther than I could ever make it reach on my own. But those are outcomes. What do I actually want the book to do? An author friend of mine has written prayers for several of his books. I’ve always loved that idea. Before a book becomes a product to launch, promote, sell, and meas

When I started writing this book, I thought I was writing it for leaders. All leaders. After all, leadership is universal. Whether you’re leading a church, a business, a nonprofit, a classroom, a team, or a family, many of the fundamental questions of leadership are the same. But something has happened as I’ve written. The clearer the book has become, the clearer the audience has become too. I know who I’m talking to. Kingdom-minded leaders I’m writing primarily for leaders w

Leadership comes with a lot of competing priorities. There are decisions to make. Problems to solve. Goals to hit. People to care for. Strategies to develop. Meetings to lead. Fires to put out. But there’s one responsibility that pays dividends across nearly every part of an organization: Creating culture. Culture can be difficult to define because we experience it more than we talk about it. It’s “the way things happen around here.” It’s what gets celebrated and what gets co

What’s the most important part of leadership? It sounds like a simple question. It isn’t. Our answer to that question eventually becomes part of a larger leadership paradigm, our philosophy of what leadership is all about. And that makes the question anything but theoretical. These convictions sit underneath our decisions, conversations, strategies, priorities, and nearly every other leadership activity. It shapes what we celebrate. What we protect. What we measure. And ultim

A few years ago, I was sitting at a conference when the speaker said something that stuck with me: “I believe lots of people have a book in them, but most die without ever getting it out.” Something sparked in me. Could I actually do that? Could I write a book? I had been writing for years. Writing has always been a part of my work, and maybe more importantly, it’s one of the ways I make sense of the world. I tend to write myself clear. So in some ways, the content of this bo