Legacy Leadership: Wisdom Of The Apostle PaulSample

The Real Measure of Leader Effectiveness

We live in a world that is obsessed with metrics. We measure everything, and a leader’s success is often measured by market share, revenue growth, and meeting profit projections. This obsession often leads to an emphasis on immediate results at the expense of long-term sustainability. I call this myopic focus on short-term results the “tyranny of the quarterly.”

In spite of this focus, a substantial body of research now demonstrates that a leader’s impact on these widely used metrics in indirect at best. This evidence indicates that impact the leader has on the traditional outcomes is accomplished by first building the capacity of their followers, both as individuals and as a team. Thus, the real measure of a leader is not the indirect impact they may have on the numbers, but the direct impact of changing the lives of their followers.

Paul understood this, and life change was the standard by which he evaluated his effectiveness as a leader. For him, life change occurred on two inter-related levels. First, there is the change that occurs when people turn to God in response to the preaching of the Gospel. He had a clear understanding that he had been called to “preach the gospel to you in order that you should turn from these vain things to a living God” (Acts 14:15). His God-ordained mission was to take the gospel message to Jews and Gentiles alike, “to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the dominion of Satan to God, in order that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who have been sanctified by faith” in Christ (Acts 26:18).

We see this in the Thessalonians who “turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God” (1 Thessalonians 1:9). In making this change, they had “became imitators of us and the Lord” and “became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia” (1 Thessalonians 1:6–7). They were changed when they abandoned idols and turned to the living and true God. But this initial transformation is only the beginning.

The second level of life change involves the ongoing transformation of developing Christ-like character. Paul prayed that his followers would be “filled with the knowledge of God’s will” and that this would provide them the wisdom and understanding they needed to “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God” (Colossians 1:9–10).

It was with this goal in mind that he labored, striving according to the power of the Spirit within him to present every follower complete in Christ (Colossians 1:28–29). Paul measured his leadership by both the initial change and the ongoing change in the lives of his followers.

Reflect and Act on these questions:
• How is leader effectiveness measured in your context?
• What pressure do you feel to “make your numbers?”
• How might your leadership effectiveness be enhanced if you were to shift your focus to building the capacity of your team?