How to Raise Leaders for your Business Expansion and not fail

How to Raise Leaders for your Business Expansion and not fail

I can stand anywhere and say that I can open branches and not fail

But then, that is because over the years, I’ve been groomed and trained to raise leaders.

My Principle for Grooming Leaders is taken from the Scriptures

I’ll type in different Versions
___

Psalm 78:72

_New International Version_

And David *shepherded* them with *integrity of heart*; with *skillful hands* he *led* them.

_New Living Translation_
He *cared* for them with *a true heart* and *led* them with *skillful hands*

_English Standard Version_
With *upright heart* he *shepherded* them and *guided* them with his *skillful hand*

Berean Study Bible
So David *shepherded* them with *integrity of heart* and *guided* them with *skillful hands*.

King James Bible
So he *fed* them according to the *integrity of his heart*; and *guided* them by the *skilfulness of his hands*

There are 2 Main Characteristics you must look out for in Anyone you will send out to go and represent you

1. Integrity of Heart
2. Skillfulness of Hand

Skillfulness
Integrity is Innate, but you can test for it to know if people have integrity. Integrity is also over time transferred or cultured by association.
Skillfulness of hand
Skillfulness of hand is highly essential and is not just about giving people roles to Lead… it’s about continually upskilling people to the level where excellence in them will nearly overshadow all
Forms of mediocrity

Now, these two are characteristics… but in terms of delivering leadership, you must look out for these in people

Ability to Shepherd

A shepherd is both hard and soft
_- Thy Rod and Thine Staff_

Rod to Beat back to normalcy, staff to guide and pet

Hard in upholding structure and tenets, soft in empathizing with customers, teams etc, but *not emotional*

In my teams…. I don’t let only the empathic person lead… I look for one that has balance of strength and empathy

A solely empathic person will ruin your business if they don’t develop strength when they were still under you

Even if it’s a woman… you must have built them to a level where even a male finds it easy to submit to their leadership based on capacity and strength

Ability to Feed Other

– This is seen in the ability to identify gaps in a system and supply the needed elements to make things work

Ability to groom those they lead and nurture them to grow like themselves

– Ability to Guide and Lead

You can’t send someone to go represent you when you were the one always supplying them with what to do when they were under you

The evidence of leadership is in that the leader can take self-initiative and get the job done without supervision

But more importantly, they can actually craft visions, gather resources, and get things to work as though it is theirs

All these are summed up in what you’ll call *Ownership*

Ownership is very delicate.

There are times you’ve labored over People, you showed them how you do things and then they turn around to take it as theirs… not for you, but for themselves

This…. is also found in the phrase “integrity of heart”

On the other hand… in grooming leaders, you’ll often have to empty yourself into them

But it’s essential for you to know those who “own your vision” enough to stay with you on the vision journey.

A good percentage of leaders you groom, would actually leave to go do “their own things” and leave you to your “troubles” despite the investment

Some will promise you at the start, but later change their stands because “they now know better” or “they now know more”, or “they now see more opportunities” or “they are no longer young and now have better decisions”

But it’s your work to find those ones whom will own what you’ve seen with you, and stay with you instead of wanting to go build their own things or at least build with you long enough till the visions blossom.

I tell you this… these ones are very rare… symbolically, you’ll likely get only 12 out of Multitudes and yet, one out of those 12, 1 will be a challenge

Your work (not job, cos you’ll do it for a lifetime) is to keep finding those to make up those 12 whom you’ll drive live visions together

Now… someone asks me

Is it possible to find someone like this in your company?

And I say YES

but you won’t find them… you’ll groom them to that point

I personally believe it takes 3 – 3.5 years to fully groom a leader within your company to work in places where you don’t have them under your purview

But during that time

You must have given them multiple roles and you must have given them the 3 tests of Faithfulness

My mentor taught me the 3 tests of Faithfulness and they are thus:

– Faithfulness in Little Things
– Faithfulness in Another Man’s Things
– Faithfulness with Money

I’ll teach these 3 tests in detail later on

They will fail in one way or the other, but you’ll keep showing them those Failures and eventually help them to come into the Shape they need to be, to lead things for you

So, what should you do if you don’t have such persons yet?

DON’T START A BRANCH or ANY OTHER THINGS YET

Except you are certain that the automation you have the ability to put in place, can overcome the people challenge… which is actually rare

Even banks have managers stealing and putting them into trouble

Now, back to the reason I wrote this post

Having branches or new businesses is not for the big boys

It’s for everyone who wants to scale and build Great visions

But one thing “Big Boys” don’t joke with, is *Leadership and Leaders Development*

That’s why Dr. Strive will rarely start something new and hire people outrightly… he’ll go pick someone who has done some 5-10 years…. to come lead it

On the other hand

We ourselves must evaluate ourselves to know whether we have built the capacity to build multiple things and deal with the issues thereof

Because even at the level of all I’ve stated… Jesus had a Judas

You’ll always have 1 out of 12 leaders you’ve groomed, that will disobey and cost you losses

David had his betrayers

But You must have been strong enough to deal with The work of leading large things and leading people leading them

I hope this was useful

Let’s keep building, and build what lasts

Cheers

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Olatunde Victor Adeoluwa
TebsFin App, SalesPlat