When I began this past school year, I was reminded by good friend Nathan Eklund that I should get two jars for my desk and fill one of them with 10 marbles. He told me that the jar with the marbles should be viewed as the capital that I had built up as a leader in my building. The other jar should be viewed as the withdrawals that I had made from my capital. He then asked me to reflect on my first two years as a building principal and honestly evaluate how many marbles I should have in my capital jar. The truth is, I was operating in deficit spending. I had made so many withdrawals in my first two years and had no marbles left over. It was at that point that he told me I needed to STOP and build up some more capital.
While reading my daily John C. Maxwell EQUIP devotional the other day, I was reminded of this exercise and felt compelled to blog about it because it is so very true. In the devotional, Maxwell wrote, "A leader's history of successes and failures makes a big difference in their credibility. It's a little like earning and spending pocket change. Each time you make a good leadership decision, it puts change into your pocket. Each time you make a poor one, you have to give some of your change to the people."
This is such an important leadership principle, because unlike our government, we cannot operate in deficit spending. The fact of the matter is that in my first two years as a principal, I didn't get this principle, and I was alienating the people I was charged with leading. As hard as I tried, I couldn't build any capital because I had withdrawn so much. I was bankrupt and because of this, I was an ineffectual leader.
As Maxwell states, "All leaders have a certain amount of change in their pockets when they start in new positions. From then on, they either build up their change or pay it out. Bad decisions cost them until they run out of change. It doesn't matter whether the blunders were big or small, when you're out of change, you're out as a leader." While this is certainly true, there is a component that is missing here. Maxwell speaks of bad decision making, but another area that costs capital is the failure to build relationships. It was this area that was draining my capital. I felt my decisions were sound and would move my school forward, but I forgot the most important part which, as the old adage goes, "people don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care." I spent my capital doing what I thought was right for my school without considering the fact that I was losing capital because I hadn't built the relationships first.
As I reflect back on this experience thus far, I feel that I have started to build my capital back up. I feel more secure in the relationships that I have forged with my staff members and I think they understand that I truly have the best interests of my school at heart. If I were to gauge how many marbles I have now, I would say that I am at a solid 6. The only thing I need to do now is get the jar to hold them. I guess that is what summer is for.
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