Differences between Good and Bad Leaders during crisis by John C. Maxwell

Extracted from Leading Through Crisis by John C. Maxwell in A Visual Leadership Summit 2020

When I tell Leading Through Crisis, I really wanna talk about this title for a moment because it's highly possible that you're sitting there you're saying "Wait a minute I'm not a leader. In fact John I wish you would just talk about how to get through crisis because that's where I am. I'm not leading anybody. I just want to get myself through this crisis".

My life is Leadership because I'm talking literally to tens and tens and tens of thousands of leaders. By the way, you say "I'm not a leader". Yes, you are.

How do I define Leadership as influencer nothing more nothing less. You have to understand that if you have any influence with anybody if you are a parent, you are a leader. If you're neighbor, you are a leader. Anybody has influence with others they have some leadership within them. So, this is for all of us.

I know you're gonna get a lot of benefits out of it but I know for Leadership. In fact, I know a statement every rises and falls on Leadership. That's true, but let me tell you about the crisis. Because everything rises and falls on Leadership. In a crisis, if you are a Bad Leader, the fall in a crisis is a much faster. It exaggerates in a negative way because crisis has tendency to exaggerate everything positive or negative. So, in a crisis, if I don't lead well, instead of me just slowly taking my team down, I can fall pretty fast with them. If you're a Good Leader during the crisis it's not that same extreme in a positive way.

In Bad Leadership the fall is fast. In Good Leadership the leaders just hold everything steady. We're not growing, we're not getting better but we're just holding steady knowing that this too shall pass.

The main difference between Good and Bad Leaders is most easily observed during a crisis shows leaders up. A leader is supposed to show up in a crisis but what happen is crisis shows the leaders up.

Often, I ask this question because it's always an interesting to me because my whole world is Leadership. I'll ask somebody "Why do you want to be a leader?". Well, they'll give me all kinds of answers but I just want you to know. The crisis brings the best out of me. I can tell you when the difficulties arise I want to lead.

There are times when things are going well, then to be honest with you I don't really have to lead much or my team can lead and sometimes do much better than I do. But during crisis during difficult times I look this crisis and I say "I was born for this. This is my time, this is my moment to help people to add value to people because that's what I wanna do" and that's what I wanna do for you today.

(Will be continued posting the title with "How can I become a Good Leader in hardship/ Crisis?" on this blog...)