A Leader

Brigham Young University–Idaho:  A Disciple Preparation Center (DPC)

Elder David A. Bednar

Brigham Young University–Idaho Devotional

August 31, 2004

All of the missionary training centers have the following characteristics in common:

            •  The missionary training centers are rather isolated geographically and are few in number.

            •  Missionaries reside and study in the MTC for relatively short periods of time.

            •  The nature of the instruction in the MTCs is focused and intense.

            •  There are in the MTCs distinctive requirements for demeanor and dress.

            •  Most missionary training centers are located near a temple.

A Disciple Preparation Center (DPC)

Pay particular attention to the three words that make up the phrase: disciple, preparation, and center.

A disciple is one who follows or attends upon another for the express purpose of learning (Oxford English Dictionary On-Line, second edition, 1989). Please note that a disciple both follows and learns

Becoming a true disciple of the Savior and following His ways are the most demanding learning objectives we can ever strive to achieve. No other discipline compares with His curriculum in either requirements or rewards. Discipleship demands the total transformation of a person by putting off the natural man and becoming a saint through the Atonement of Christ the Lord (see Mosiah 3:19). A disciple is one who loves the Lord and serves Him with all of his or her heart, might, mind, and strength.

The word preparation implies the process of making or getting ready; the previous putting or setting in order for any action or purpose (Oxford English Dictionary On-Line, second edition, 1989). And one of the common uses of the word center connotes a point from which things and influences originate or emanate (Oxford English Dictionary On-Line, second edition, 1989). Taken together, these three words, disciple preparation center, suggest to me a place in which followers of the Master learn and are set in order and are made ready—and from which their influence flows into the world.

We have devotional speakers every Tuesday—many of whom are emeritus General Authorities or Brethren who have been released after serving in the Second Quorum of the Seventy. A significant number of those Brethren, after being released as General Authorities, have served as temple presidents. As Sister Bednar and I host these Brethren, I ask each one of them this question: “What did you learn serving in the temple that you wish you had better known or understood or appreciated when you were a General Authority?” I have asked that question to many of the Brethren, and the consistency of their answers is striking! The following response by Elder J. Ballard Washburn is representative of so many of the answers I have received:

I have come to better and more fully understand the protection available in the temple and through our covenants. I have come to better and more fully understand what it means to make an acceptable offering of temple worship. There is a difference between church-attending, tithe-paying members who occasionally rush into the temple to go through a session and those members who faithfully and consistently worship in the temple.

Unparalleled Spiritual Resources

Brothers and sisters, consider the spiritual strength and power that are available in a single location where we find (1) a temple of learning, i.e., this institution; (2) a House of the Lord; and (3) strong stakes of Zion on campus and in Rexburg and in the surrounding communities. I only know of four places which the Lord has so prepared: Provo, Utah; Laie, Hawaii; Salt Lake City, Utah; and Rexburg, Idaho. And with the opportunity and privilege to study and learn here come a tremendous responsibility.

 A disciple recognizes that faith in the Savior is a spiritual gift and appropriately seeks for that gift in his or her life. Faith is not a trait to be developed or a reward to be earned. Rather, it is a gift we receive from God.

Scriptural synonyms for faith include trust, confidence, and reliance. Thus, the spiritual gift of faith enables us to trust in Christ and to have confidence in His power to cleanse, to renew, to redeem, and to strengthen us. Faith means we are beginning to rely upon His merits, mercy, and grace (2 Nephi 2:8; 31:19; Moroni 6:4).

The supernal promise contained in section 19 of the Doctrine and Covenants, verse 23, is ever before us: “Learn of me, and listen to my words; walk in the meekness of my Spirit, and you shall have peace in me.”

A Message to Garcia Will You Deliver It? -Acton Foundation

The Rarest Skill of All: The Ability to Execute People like Rowan—who accomplish missions quickly and efficiently, with minimum oversight—are as rare today as they were 100 years ago when publisher Elbert Hubbard wrote “A Message to Garcia.”

If you have ever managed or been trapped in a dysfunctional organization, you understand Hubbard’s lament of the “imbecility of the average man—the inability or unwillingness to concentrate on a thing and do it.”

“You, reader, put this matter to a test: You are sitting in your office—six clerks within call.

 Summon any one and make this request: ‘Please look in the encyclopedia and make a brief memorandum for me concerning the life of Correggio.’

 Will the clerk quietly say, ‘Yes sir’ and go do the task?  On your life, he will not. He will look at you out of a fishy eye and ask one or more of the following questions:

 Who was he?

 Which encyclopedia?

 Where is the encyclopedia?

 Was I hired for that?

 Don’t you mean Bismarck?

 What’s the matter with Charlie doing it?

Is he dead?

Is there any hurry?

Shan’t I bring you the book and let you look it up yourself?

What do you want to know for?

 And I will lay you ten to one that after you have answered the questions, and explained how to find the information, and why you want it, the clerk will go off and get one of the other clerks to help him try to find Garcia and then come back and tell you that there is no such man.”

The ability to execute is more valuable than education or talent, because it is far rarer.

it is impossible to build an effective organization without delegating important tasks to talented and capable people. It’s the only way to make a grand vision a reality

Make no mistake about it. You have a choice. You can blame your parents, teachers, coaches or bosses. Or you can choose to start developing the attitudes, habits and instincts so your name will be called when success hangs in the balance.

1. Accept the mission and get started. If offered an assignment where the objective is clear, accept it without asking for further instructions. Then take the first step.

2. Be curious. Most times you won’t have all the answers. Don’t see this as a sign of weakness. Instead, unleash your natural curiosity. Focus on asking the right questions first. Then seek answers.

3. Immediately sketch out a plan. Quickly draft a provisional plan with goals, milestones and deadlines. If you don’t know enough to craft such a plan, decide how to gather the information you need. But in all cases, begin to move forward immediately.

If the objective seems overwhelming or you are unsure of where to start, break it down using the Vision, Strategies, Projects, Tactics (VSPT) framework:

Vision: This is your objective – delivering the letter to Garcia.

Strategies: What are the ways you could achieve this objective? Sometimes there will be many strategies to choose from, other times only one. For Rowan, there was only one strategy: hand-deliver it. Today, other options might be to deliver the message by phone or by e-mail.

Projects: What big things need to get done to accomplish the objective? Create a series of major milestones. For example: Sail to Cuba, trek through the forest, find Garcia, plot a course back home.

Tactics: What do I need to do today to make progress on a project? Make a checklist: Hire a boat crew, find a guide for the trek, arrange for provisions, buy mosquito netting.

Quickly start on these tasks, and before you know it, you will be executing.

4. If you need resources, don’t be afraid to ask. A critical job for any leader is to allocate resources—money, people, his own time even—among competing projects. If you ask clearly for what you need and explain concisely why it is necessary to achieve the objective, a leader will give you the additional resources you need.

5. Enlist help when needed. Don’t hesitate to ask for help from peers, but remember that the responsibility for accomplishing the task is yours alone. (And remember that the best way to get others to help you is to have helped them first.)

6. Report back and show your work. Frequently report your progress with objective measures. Whenever possible, provide samples of your work. Instead of asking how to accomplish a task, show what you have done so far. If you are off course, you’ll get immediate feedback to put you back on the right path.

7. Underpromise and overdeliver. Make it a point to set reasonable goals and always exceed them. If you want leaders to trust you with critical tasks, develop a reputation for getting the job done better, sooner and at a lower cost than you promised.

8. Expect to make (small) mistakes. Accept mistakes as the price you pay to learn. Include an honest assessment of missteps in your progress reports. Embrace them as minor setbacks and correct them quickly. Jot down the lessons for reflection later, after the task has been accomplished.

9. Put results before schmoozing. You want to spend time with those higher up in the organization so they’ll get to know you and appreciate your work. First focus on contributing something of value, and you’ll be surprised by how much attention you receive.

10. Replace the voices in your head with positive action. Turn away from the temptation to dwell on negative thoughts. Dwelling on fears only gives them more power. The best way to rid yourself of a fear is to take positive action. Courage isn’t the absence of fear but rather the ability to act in the face of it.

Developing action-oriented habits will make you indispensable to any organization. But how do you find the inspiration you need for particularly difficult tasks? How do you choose which assignments to pursue and prioritize between urgent and important tasks?

Practice the steps below to hone your talents and develop a sense of “calling,” and you will find the inspiration, discernment and perspective you need to take on increasingly important missions.

1. Begin to see your life as a “calling” toward a Hero’s Journey.

Your life is too valuable to waste. Embrace the idea of a “calling”—a reason that you

were put on this earth. Envision your life as a quest, a series of daily struggles and

larger challenges worth overcoming for a worthy mission.2

2. Develop your gifts and talents into a discipline. Become world-class at something.

Everyone has special God-given gifts. Discover yours and accept challenges that

allow you to practice and perfect these skills. Develop a reputation for mastering a

discipline and extraordinary opportunities will seek you out.

3. Find a “deep burning need” you care about.

Your lifelong mission will be more fulfilling if it serves the needs of others. Look for

opportunities or injustices that speak to your heart. Find where your gifts, tasks you

enjoy and a “deep burning need” intersect and you will have found your calling.

4. Surround yourself with good people and worthy role models.

Find role models who inspire you. Look to people who are further along in life’s

journey for the right questions to ask. Surround yourself with good people who care

about you.

Hire everyone for a probationary period. Assign difficult tasks and see who performs. Be ruthless in your initial evaluations to save later heartaches. Underachievers may change over time, but only if they make the decision to change themselves. Your assignment is to get the job done, not run a counseling service for underachievers.

Leading is different from executing. It requires the ability to delegate and inspire. But insist that all leaders first know how to execute, and have little patience for those who don’t.

Leadership with a Small "L"

President Kim B. Clark

Brigham Young University–Idaho Commencement

December 14, 2007

Principle #1: Lead by Example

Principle #2: Lead with Vision

Principle #3: Lead with Love

To you mothers and fathers and prospective mothers and fathers, the very most important thing you can do for your children is to love each other and support each other and help each other become everything Heavenly Father wants you to be.  You stand before God and your children as husband and wife, father and mother, equal partners in the sacred responsibility of creating an eternal family.

GOOD TO GREAT Why Some Companies Make the Leap . . . and Others Don’t JIM COLLINS

Commit to a standard of excellence founded around three elements:

1. Disciplined People – getting the right people in the business and then keeping them focused on excellence.

2. Disciplined Thought – being brutally honest about the facts and avoiding the temptation to get sidetracked on non-core ideas.

3. Disciplined Action – realizing what is important to achieve and what isn’t.

Level 5 Leaders share the praise in good times but take the blame in bad times – which means that the people who work with them become incredibly loyal and committed.

Good is the enemy of great.

“You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit.” – Harry S. Truman

When in doubt, don’t hire – just keep looking. Good-to-great companies are willing to grow only at the rate at which they are successful in attracting the right people. They know that any time their rate of revenue growth outstrips their ability to attract the right people, the company is moving towards mediocrity rather than greatness.

Invariably, when the right people are involved, everyone will enjoy their work. The leaders of good-to-great companies often become firm personal friends. Since everyone enjoys associating with the others, meetings are something to look forward to and enjoy rather than endure. That sense of comradeship and shared purpose often flows over into the personal lives of executives and their families.

Good-to-great companies move ahead of their competitors by

pursuing only those projects that have three traits in common:

1. What they can be “best-in-the-world” at.

2. What drives profitability for their business model.

3. What the people are deeply passionate about.

Build a culture of freedom and responsibility, within a well defined framework.

The creation of a “Stop Doing” list. Loads of companies have a “To Do” list – wish lists of things to do in the future. Good-to-great companies have “Stop Doing” lists instead – lists of things the company will stop doing in order to better focus on the hedgehog concept. The best way to institutionalize this idea is to change the annual budget process. Instead of figuring out what resources should be allocated to each activity, good-to-great companies determine which activities best support the hedgehog concept. Those that do get fully funded and strengthened while those that do not are not funded at all and therefore get eliminated.

“No technology, no matter how amazing – not computers, not telecommunications, not robotics, not the Internet – can by itself ignite a shift from good to great. No technology can make you Level 5. No technology can turn the wrong people into the right people. No technology can instill the discipline to confront brutal facts of reality, nor can it instill unwavering faith. No technology can supplant the need for deep understanding into a simple Hedgehog Concept. No technology can create a culture of discipline. No technology can instill the simple inner belief that leaving unrealized potential on the table – letting something remain good when it can become great – is a secular sin.” – Jim Collins

“I believe it is no harder to build something great than to build something good. It might be statistically more rare to reach greatness, but it does not require more suffering than perpetuating mediocrity. Indeed, if some of the comparison companies in our study are any indication, it involves less suffering, and perhaps even less work. The beauty and power of the research findings is that they can radically simplify our lives while increasing our effectiveness. There is great solace in the simple fact of clarity – about what is vital, and what is not. The point is not that we should ‘add’ these findings to what we are already doing and make ourselves even more overworked. No, the point is to realize that much of what we’re doing is at best a waste of energy. If we organized the majority of our work time around applying these principles, and pretty much ignored or stopped doing everything else, our lives would be simpler and our results vastly improved.” – Jim Collins

Aspects of Building Trust

Guy Kawasaki, Garage Technology Ventures

When you meet people, think: “How can I help that person?”

Leadership and Capability

Carly Fiorina, Former CEO, HP

Fiorina explains that leadership is about three things: capability, collaboration and character. She stresses the importance of capability, which is about asking questions and listening to answers. It is also about celebrating new ideas and taking initiative to try new things. She insists that a continuous learning process is important to strengthen an entrepreneur's capability.