How to Lead When You're Not in Charge Study Guide: Leveraging Influence When You Lack Authority

By Clay Scroggins

The greatest myth of leadership is that you must be in charge in order to lead.

Great leaders aren't paralyzed by not being in a position of recognized authority. Great leaders lead with or without that authority and learn to unleash their positive influence wherever they are.

In this six-session, video-based study (DVD/streaming video sold separately), dynamic author and pastor Clay Scroggins shares his first-hand experience working under Andy Stanley at North Point Community Church. He explains the nature of leadership and what it takes to lead yourself and others well with or without that impressive title.

In this study you will:

• Learn to leverage influence instead of authority
• Create a game plan for leading yourself well 
• Change the energy of your team by choosing positivity
• Cultivate influence by thinking critically, not being critical
• Avoid the trap of passivity when you feel out of control
• Learn an effective way to challenge people in authority over you

 

How to Lead When You're Not in Charge Study Guide will free you to become the great leader you want to be so you can make a difference right where you are—whether it’s in your workplace, community, or church. Even when you're not in charge.

Sessions include: 

1. The Oddity of Leadership 
2. Lead Yourself 
3. Choose Positivity 
4. Think Critically 
5. Reject Passivity 
6. Challenging Up 

 

Designed for use with the How to Lead When You’re Not in Charge Video Study 9780310095934 (sold separately). 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zondervan
• Release date: Apr 24, 2018
• ISBN: 9780310095941

Clay Scroggins

Clay Scroggins es el pastor principal de la Iglesia Comunitaria de North Point, que proporciona liderazgo visionario y direccional para el personal y la congregación de la iglesia local. Como el campus más grande y original de los ministerios de North Point, clasificado por la Revista Outreach en 2014 como la iglesia más grande de Estados Unidos, el NPCC tiene un promedio de asistencia de más de 12,000 personas. Clay trabaja para Andy Stanley, uno de los líderes más grandes del planeta, y entiende de primera mano cómo manejar la tensión de líder cuando no estás a cargo. Comenzando como pasante de instalaciones (también conocido como vicepresidente de nada), se ha abierto camino en muchos niveles organizativos de los ministerios de North Point y conoce muy bien el desafío de la privación de autoridad. Clay es graduado de Ingeniería Industrial en Georgia Tech, así como una maestría y un doctorado con énfasis en la Iglesia en línea del Seminario Teológico de Dallas. Vive en el condado de Forsyth, Georgia, con su esposa Jenny y sus cuatro hijos.

Book preview

ABOUT THE STUDY

I’ve always wanted to be a leader. I imagine you have as well. For me, it began in elementary school. I wanted so badly to be the captain of the Safety Patrol. There was something alluring about the bright sash I got to wear. There was something powerful about being able to stop tons of steel and plastic with a raised hand. I just knew if I was captain of the Safety Patrol it would change the way people saw me, and it would even change the way I saw myself.

When I was in high school, I ran for class president. I had this idea to mix up famous hip-hop songs with my campaign slogans. I did a mashup of Back That Thing Up and Vote for Clay for President. Unfortunately, it worked.

That intense desire to lead followed me into college and my first job. To a certain extent, that desire is natural. We all want it to some degree or another. And that’s because we associate leadership with autonomy. If we’re the leader, we get to call our own shots. We get to shape our own universe. We’re answerable to no one. And only when we have that kind of total freedom can we reach our full potential as leaders. That’s what we assume.

But here’s the dirty little secret we’re going to explore in this study: autonomy is a myth. Every person who climbs the leadership ladder must eventually face the truth that everyone is accountable to someone. Even the CEO with the corner office, corporate jet, and multimillion-dollar salary is accountable to the board of directors and the shareholders of the company he or she leads.

Autonomy is a unicorn. It doesn’t exist. If you spend your life or career chasing it in your spheres of influence, you’ll never reach your full potential as a leader. You just won’t.

But here’s the good news: there’s a better way. When you abandon the hunt for autonomy, it can shift the focus of your leadership fundamentally. It can open the door to your full leadership potential.

That will require changing some of the ways you think about leadership, as well as some of the things you currently do as a leader.

That’s what we’re going to explore during the six sessions of this study.

HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE

GROUP SIZE

This study can be used by groups of all different sizes. But we think the ideal is a group of eight to twelve adults or four to six married couples. Why? Because that’s a large enough group to provide the diverse opinions that drive dynamic conversation, but small enough that group members can hold one another accountable.

Accountability is absolutely crucial to the group dynamic. Reading this material, watching the videos, and having some discussions probably won’t create a big, sustainable change to your leadership. That’ll only happen if you apply what you learn. And you’ll probably succeed in application only if you have a group of people who are willing to encourage you and hold you accountable.

MATERIALS NEEDED

Here are the things you’ll need for this study:

• This guide

• The accompanying videos

• Something to write with

• A copy of the How to Lead When You’re Not in Charge book (optional for the group meetings but recommended for the between-sessions study; one copy per couple is fine)

That’s it.

TIMING

The suggested time for each group session is 90 minutes. This can be broken down as follows:

Conversation Starter: 10 minutes

The Conversation Starter is designed to tee up the session’s topic, while helping you to get to know one another a little better. This is especially helpful if your group is new.

Video Teaching: 15 minutes

After the Conversation Starter, watch the session video together. It will present the content that you’ll discuss as a group.

Group Discussion: 45 minutes

Spend most of the session having