Developing Kingdom Leaders – Tom Yeakley

Leadership Types -1

I’m still on a short break from writing this weekly leadership blog. Below is an excerpt from George Barna’s book, A Fish Out of Water, with his understanding regarding the characteristics of two of four leader types – Strategic leaders and Directive leaders. Enjoy!

Strategic Leaders

• Vision developers & shapers (not vision conceivers & communicators)
• Shun the limelight
• Enjoy intellectual challenges, problem-solving, & foreseeing future results
• Turn compelling ideas into a viable plan of action
• Painstakingly scrutinize reality
• Don’t hesitate to ask the hard questions
• Able to develop creative & complex solutions
• Give detailed answers
• Tendency toward perfectionism & burnout
• Likely to view people’s emotions as something to be exploited than as something to be valued
• Firm allegiance to truth & efficiency
• More loyal to the vision than to people
• Care for people, but mistrust feelings
• Take too long to arrive at decisions
• Capable of juggling many conceptual details, but not organizational details
• Effective at identifying kinds of teams & work groups needed, but not good at recruiting and maintaining them

Directive Leaders

• Project typical leader image
• Vision-casters; create energy around the vision
• Recruiters—enlist people to become part of the solution rather than the problem
• Catalysts of change
• Enable people to believe in themselves
• Effective public speakers & good listeners
• Make decisions on behalf of a group
• Driven by instinct rather than facts
• Can abruptly change their minds
• Do not avoid making tough calls, though can be slow about it due to lack of clarity or peace
• Tendency to burn out
• Self-confidence & courage soothe others during times of high stress or instability
• Little patience with details of the process
• Restless, short attention span
• Favor action over reflection
• Quick to move on to the next challenge
• Demand expedience & progress, but don’t find out what’s going on
• Don’t care for structure; Promote chaos when they attempt to organize people around the vision
• Supremely confident in themselves
• Tend to ignore financial realities
• Want to make things happen now
• Love the chase