9 Golden Keys of Leadership.

Hey, it's Rico Sharp. I want to talk about leadership today. All right, for 32 years I've operated in leadership capacity, and I've learned a lot of things over the years. I've trained leaders to, to be leaders in my company and my business and my church, and I understand that leaders have a very delicate responsibility. And I've learned some things, and I've had to impart these things into others. And I want to name 9 things that is very, very important for every leader, and not only for every leader in leadership, but also for every president, every CEO, and every entrepreneur that will hire people and appoint people into leadership position. First thing is that you have leadership position. Leadership position is more than just giving somebody a leadership responsibility. Leadership position simply means that you have evaluated that a person that you want to give that leadership responsibility to, that they're in the position to be able to be a leader. Like they got their lives together, they're not entangled in different affairs or don't have that level of commitment and that level of dedication that they can devote to your company. Because if you hire somebody that, that may have certain qualities, but they don't have the capacity to operate in that position, then you're, you're trying to make something happen that is never going to happen. You're trying to squeeze water out of a rock, and it's just not going to happen. You have to give people leadership responsibilities that can hold down a leadership position. Somebody whose life is manageable, someone who has governing skills, that, that knows how to govern and manage their own lives, that they, they've showed you that they, they don't have to be perfect, but they do have to have certain qualities that shows they can manage. Then you give them leadership position, because not everybody who's a good worker would be a good manager. Not everyone who, who has a good record in terms of their employment is going to have a good record in terms of their position as a leader. So you got to put the right people in position. Start there, putting the right people in position. All right, that's the first thing about leadership. You got to put the right people in leadership position. You'll learn that real fast, real soon, if you put the wrong people in position. Why is that important? Because the wrong people in position will sink your ship. A leader is someone who leads a ship. A ship is a precious cargo, right? It's something— it's a vessel that transports precious cargo. That's what a ship is, a vessel that transports precious cargo. And a leader is the leader on that ship. Someone in leadership is the leader on that ship. And it's their job to make sure that that ship is able to make it to its destination, transporting that precious cargo that is going to transform lives and improve the way we live in this world. So if you put the wrong people in position, the wrong person in leadership will sink your ship. The wrong person in leadership will bring about hardship on your ship. The wrong person in leadership will cause for you to shipwreck or to experience shipwreck. There's a lot of companies that had to close their doors Because they put the wrong people in position. They put the wrong person in leadership. There are comp— there are people that have caused company to bankrupt and to go into multiple lawsuits because they put the wrong person in position. Qualify the people you put in position. In God we trust, everyone else we qualify. Can I say that again? In God we trust. Everyone else, we qualify. All right, put the right people in position. Number 2, you got not only put the right person in leadership position, but you need people who have leadership potential. How do I know I'm putting the right person in position? Because you can see leadership potential. What is leadership potential? That means they have leadership attributes. leadership qualities, leadership characteristics, leadership commitment. They have a leadership personality, right? They manage and they govern themselves in a way where you can see that they are good and healthy for your company. And that potential that you see, it can grow, it can be developed, it can expand. Because when you put somebody in position that has the potential, they grow with the company, they grow in their job. Not everybody you put in leadership position It's going to come in leadership perfected. So you got to be willing to give people time to grow into and to show that they know how to flow with the company and be an asset to the company, not a liability. But you do want to identify that they do have leadership potential before you give them a leadership position. Okay? Because one of the things that you, you, you, you can do is you, you can develop leaders. You can grow leaders. You can, you can even, believe it or not, you can even grow potential. But they got to have leadership qualities and leadership attributes in order to grow that potential. Then number 3, you put— you, you want to make sure they have leadership perspective. You as a leader want to make sure you have leadership perspective. What does it mean to be a leader? It means I have oversight. It means that I'm managing. It means that I'm governing. It means I have jurisdiction. And so having jurisdiction, being at a higher place on up in the corporate status of the company that I work for means that my focus has to be based on everybody who works up under me as a team that I manage and I supervise and I have jurisdiction over. And my focus must be upon my superiors that I work up under to make sure that I am constantly bridging the gap and bringing everyone together. And that my perspective is to be an asset and to cause for the revenues of this company to increase. I— when they come, when they bring you in, you don't want to come in just to maintain. You want to come in to excel. You want to come in to accelerate the company. You want to come in to promote the company so that the company can— profits can increase and the company's revenue can increase, right? So you got leadership perspective. Leadership perspective is knowing that it's not about me, but it's about the company. It's not about what the company can do for me. It's about what I can do for the company. It's not about how the company can make me rich. It's about how I can make the company rich. Am I going to benefit? Absolutely. Am I going to profit? Absolutely. Are they going to reward me? Absolutely. You'll get the bonuses. You'll get the promotion. You'll get the raises. You'll get the vacations. You'll get the benefits. Everything that they do for you is going to come out of what you're doing for them. So you come in with leadership perspective that my whole focus is to take this company to the next level. If it's a ship sailing from the port, I want to make sure that it reached its destination or its destined port without having any type of incident in between transporting, because I am there with the perspective of being a leader on this ship and making sure that this ship does not experience any type of shipwreckness while it's transporting precious goods. I can't have the ship wrecking on my watch. That's my perspective. I gotta be productive. That's my perspective. Okay, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna deal with productivity in just a moment. Leadership purpose. All right, so you got leadership position, you got leadership potential, you got leadership perspective. Now you understand that you gotta operate in leadership purpose. What is the purpose of leadership? The purpose of leadership is to alleviate unnecessary struggle. The purpose of leadership is to get everybody together on one accord. The purpose of leadership is to bring the best out of the team and the employees. The purpose of leadership is to make sure that the company is maximizing its potential. The company has hired you so that you can extrapolate the purpose and feed it into the minds and hearts of everyone that you have jurisdiction over. The leadership's purpose is to get this ship sailing and producing and multiplying and advancing and doing business with other merchants and being able to be successful in all endeavors. When you are hired As a leader, your purpose is to make an impact, to make a difference. Your purpose is to do some things that nobody else can do in terms of your individuality and in terms of your originality, your uniqueness. Your purpose is to give that company the best, That you have to offer in a way that you can't be duplicated, imitated, or emulated. You are there to fulfill a purpose, and that purpose is to give them all you have to give, right? That's your purpose as a leader. That's the reason they hired you. They didn't hire you just to smile like I'm smiling. They didn't hire you to just show up and clock in and clock out. They didn't hire you just to come in and do some paperwork. They didn't hire you just to come in and have a board meeting and to do a PowerPoint presentation. They hired you to shine. They hired you to make a difference. And that's the purpose, to be productive for that company, right? And then I want to talk about leadership passion, because you got people that got leadership position, leadership potential, leadership perspective, and they understand leadership purpose, but they don't have leadership passion. Their mind is there, their intelligence is there, their book smarts is there, their education is there. You got their head, you got their brain, you got their mind, but you don't have their heart. Can you get things done by having someone's mind? Yes, you can. Can you get it done by having their brain and their intellect? Yes, you can. Can you get it done with their education? Yes, you can. But what makes the, the business more than a business, what makes the company more than a company, and what builds family values and, and family— what builds a family atmosphere, what builds a healthy atmosphere on the job, what builds a healthy environment on the job is when the person in leadership puts their heart into it. When people see you care, that changes everything. When people can get your your heart that shows them that you have their best interest at heart. No one cares how much you know until they know how much you care. So when you're brought into leadership, you don't just bring your, your mind, you bring your heart too. You don't just bring your brain, you bring your heart. You don't just bring your degrees, you bring your heart. You bring your passion, you bring your love, you bring your understanding, you bring your simplicity, you bring your willing to embrace everybody and treat everyone equally. So in other words, you come with a non-biased motive, you come with a non-prejudiced motive, you come with a non-racial heart, you come with the equal opportunity type heart, right? Because that's what you bring, that's what makes the environment healthy. And when it's a healthy environment, it becomes a productive environment, right? And I keep going to that word productive because that's one of the key things I want to get to. But your heart, your passion is something that they need on their job. Your passion means that, man, you, you, you got an eagerness, right? And a lot of energy that is, that is like harnessed on, on the inside of you. And, and you're there to unleash it and to let it out. And you're there to release your tenacity. You're there to be relentless. You're there to bring your resiliency. You're there to bring all of the fiber. And, and everything that you have inside that is going to impact the environment of that workplace and make it so productive and make it so prominent that, that no matter what happens, it's going to profit and prosper that company. And you're going to do good, and people are going to love to work for you. They're going to love to come to work. They're going to love and enjoy being around you because they see they got your heart, they got your passion. You not only care about the company's agenda and the company's vision, which you take to heart, but you also care about the employees that works around you and works up under you, and you take them to heart. And that's important for a leader. And then, so you got leadership position, you got leadership potential, leadership perspective, you got leadership purpose, you got leadership passion. Now you need leadership presence. What does it mean to have leadership presence? Presence means how you show up to work, what, what disposition you show up in, what mannerism you show up in, how you treat people, how you talk to people. Do you come there and, and you have a receptive heart and a receptive mind that you embrace everybody and treat everyone the same? Or are you there to be like a lord over people and to make people do things and to give out commands? Or are you there to pull up your sleeves and say, look, I'm going to work alongside of you? My presence is that when I show up, I come to be part of the team because I understand it makes— it takes teamwork to make the dream work. And see, when you have good presence, you, you don't, you don't You do things to show examples. You do things to be an end sample. An example is pointing out something that happened as a result of somebody doing things wrong or doing something negative, but an end sample is me jumping in and becoming part of the solution and becoming part of, of the progress. I'm going to get on the assembly line with you and I'm going to make this happen. I'm going to stay over with you and work overtime with you and make this happen. I'm going to come in with you and, and help work together, and we're going to do this as a team. And And that's my presence. When I show up, I bring my presence. And my presence is important. And when you have the right presence in the workforce or on the job, when people see you, man, they flock to you. They gravitate to you because they know that you're easy to be entreated. They know that you're well respected. And because you're well respected because you give respect and you give respect well. So to be, in order to be well respected, you gotta give respect well. He or she that wants friends must first show themselves friendly. You gotta show them that, hey, you can talk to me. I'm not going to put you down. I'm not going to beat you up. I'm not sitting back with a lightning bolt in my hand or, or some type of stun gun ready to sting you and to zap you with electricity or with a high volt every time you, you like mess up. I'm here to help grow the company and I want to help grow you too, right? So my presence is that you can receive me and you can receive from me because I'm in this with you. We are in this together and we're in it to win it. Right? And so now you got leadership position, leadership potential, leadership perspective, leadership purpose, leadership presence, and then you have leadership power. What does it mean to have leadership power? It means that you operate in a place of authority. You operate from a commanding position. You operate from a place where you know who you are. You're, you're, you're confident in yourself. Right. You're, you're like at peace within yourself. You're not intimidated by other people. You're not on the job to try to take something that doesn't belong to you. You've been given authority and you operate in that authority. You've been given jurisdiction and you operate in that jurisdiction. And when you operate in your gifts and you operate in your talent, you operate in your skill, you know what you're doing? You're releasing power. You're releasing the power and the force and the energy in that company to make things happen, to bring plans together, to make ideas come together, and to bring what we consider goals and dreams and visions that are in our head. You bring them into fruition. You do that with your power. You do that with your power. And then we enter into this phase called leadership productivity. That's where we are now producing. Our numbers are rising. Our profit margins are growing. We're producing on a greater level. We're making things happen. We're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. We're able to increase in our revenues. We're able to grow more as a company. We can buy more buildings. We can build more buildings. We can hire more people because we're being productive. The company is growing. The company is expanding. The company, the company is opening up new locations. The company is franchising itself because of you. You're, you're being productive. You're bringing about increase to the company. You're increasing the profits. You're increasing the the favor of the company that the company has in the eyes of people in society, you're being productive. And listen, and finally, when you are productive, then you enter into leadership promises. So let's go back to these now before I finalize or conclude with leadership promises. You start out, you put the right people leadership position. Number 2, you got to have the right leadership potential. Number 3, you got leadership perspective. Number 4, you got leadership purpose. Number 5, you got leadership passion. Number 6, you got leadership presence. Number 7, you got leadership power. Number 8, you got leadership productivity. And number 9, my pet peeve, is leadership promises. This is why I saved this one for last. What is the leadership promise? It's just like this. When they hire you in, they basically make an agreement with you that if you take us to the next level, we're going to take you to the next level. If you bless us, we're going to bless you. If you reward us, we're going to reward you. If you grow us, we're going to grow you. If you profit us, we're going to profit you. If you cause us to prosper, we're going to cause you to prosper. If you make millions for us, we're going to give millions back to you. If you make us look good, we're going to make you look good. If you help us to retire at some point, we're going to help you to retire at some point. We're going to pour back into your life from the investment that you've made into this company. We're going to treat you good. We're going to set you up. You're going to make the money you want to make. You're going to live the life you want to live. You're going to experience your own dream. You make our dream come to pass, we're going to make your dream come to pass. You bring our vision into reality, we're going to bring your vision into reality. This is leadership promises. When you've done everything that every company that you work for wants you to do for them, guess what, y'all? They're going to turn around and do it back in your life. And you're going to enjoy the things that's coming back to you. It's like sowing a seed and reaping a harvest. It's like making a deposit and getting a withdrawal. You put it in, you're going to get it out, right? You sow it, it's going to come back to you as a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over back into your life. This is Rico Sharp, and if you're having any type of leadership seminar or you want somebody to do leadership training for your leaders, listen, I'm your man. I know what it takes. I've been training leaders for over 30 years. God bless you. God bless you.