Page 219 - The Bible On Leadership

Leadership Development 205

same for Esther. That’s the difference between coaching someone and
telling them exactly what to do. The former develops leaders; the latter
only creates a clone of the original.

DEVELOPMENTAL ASSIGNMENTS AND

ACTION LEARNING

Most management experts agree that traditional seminars have their
place, but that most learning takes place back on the job through actual
job assignments, or through ‘‘action learning’’—experiential exercises
aimed at solving real-life problems that have immediate relevance to the
company. Noel Tichy observes that ‘‘winning leaders . . . push people
not just to memorize the organization’s values but to wrestle with them,
to internalize and use them.’’ He advocates putting people ‘‘in progres-
sively more difficult situations where they have to make decisions, and
then give them feedback and support.’’ 11
Jay Conger adds that ‘‘challenge, hardship and derailment,’’ if experi-
enced at the right time and in the right amounts, also create and
strengthen leaders. Burt Nanus and Warren Bennis believe that ‘‘nearly
all leaders are highly proficient in learning from experience,’’ and Mor-
gan McCall observes that ‘‘it’s what a person has to do, not what he or
she is exposed to, that generates crucial learning.’’
In the Bible, anyone who wished to lead needed to be properly in-
structed, but the closest thing to a seminar room was the tent in which
Moses mentored Joshua. Most of the development took place through
challenging assignments that usually involved a great deal of ‘‘action
learning.’’
Earlier, we discussed Timothy, a young apostle whom Paul dis-
patched to the church in Ephesus. Paul knew that this assignment
would force his young prote ´ge ´ to stretch, but he felt he had picked the
right developmental assignment for him. He advised Timothy to ‘‘stay
there in Ephesus, so that you may command certain men not to teach
false doctrines any longer nor to devote themselves to myths and endless