How To Lead When You're Not In ChargeSample

Choosing positivity alone will not cultivate influence with your boss and those around you. However, a positive attitude coupled with the skill of thinking critically is a powerful combination. Critical thinkers bring value to whatever position and situation they are in. The danger, though, with critical thinking is that it turns into a critical spirit. The line between critical thinking and a critical spirit is razor thin. 

Critical people carry a clipboard to grade others, but critical thinkers carry a towel to help others. If anyone had the right to grade others, it was the perfect, sinless Son of God, but Jesus never held a clipboard. He carried a towel. Jesus didn’t come to condemn the world; he came to save it. He was far more interested in helping others than in grading them.

So think positively. And be a critical thinker as well. Be known as a value-add, a problem solver. As you pursue the skill of thinking critically, keep that image in mind, the picture of Jesus on his knee, towel in hand, washing the filthy feet of his closest followers. The Creator of stars and galaxies gave us a picture of what we need most—to be served and washed clean in our heart of hearts. Jesus did for us what we needed most and deserved least. He could’ve graded us, pointing out where we had failed and missed the mark, but he didn’t. Instead, he introduced us to the radical concept of servant leadership by grabbing a towel and dropping the clipboard. Thinking critically is crucial to becoming a leader who leads when you’re not in charge. And as you learn to think critically, never forget that the towel is the way God leads us, and it is always more powerful than the clipboard.

1) What are you doing to add value to the team that you’re on? 

2) In your attempt to be a value-adding critical thinker, has any part of you become cynical, negative, or pessimistic?