How to Lead When You're Not in Charge: Leveraging Influence When You Lack Authority

by Clay Scroggins

create a leadership culture where the people who are responsible for executing a decision are the ones with the authority to make the decision.

Leaders don’t sit back and point fingers. Leaders lead with the authority of leadership . . . or without it. The authority is largely irrelevant—if you are a leader, you will lead when you are needed.

I needed to accept the authority I had and then use it wisely to cultivate influence and make things better.

what you can do is focus on your own area of

responsibility and make it great.

How we see ourselves affects our ability to follow others, our ability to lead others, and our ability to find the future God has for us. And until you know who you are, you cannot do what God has called you to do.

A distorted identity will cause you to think too lowly or too highly of yourself, when the goal is to think rightly. If you think too lowly, you will often see yourself as unqualified or unworthy of leadership, and you will miss opportunities to make change and create something great with the responsibility you’ve been given. If you think too highly of yourself, you will tend to overestimate your abilities and may even take credit for the work of others in an effort to promote yourself. You’ll

tend to hide your mistakes and make much of your successes, and you’ll live in constant fear of being exposed as a fraud. Finding the correct identity is a constant challenge for every human on the planet.

your identity is the conception you have of yourself. It is those core beliefs about yourself that you tell yourself all day long.

There are five basic components of identity, and to help you remember them, I’ve made sure they all start with the letter “P.” They are your past, your people, your personality, your purpose, and your priorities.

How you see your family of origin and the lineage of people from which you’ve come determines the constancy and consistency of your identity.

This is your self-in-time.

How has your past shaped how you see yourself? A worthwhile exercise to help you find your self-in-time would be to chart your life on a timeline by picking five highs and five lows from your past and marking them chronologically.

Your identity is not just a matter of how you perceive yourself based on your past, but it’s also based on how you sense others perceive you today. The people you’re surrounded by in your existing relationships and roles distinctly shape who you

are in the here and now.

The people we are in relationship with greatly affect how we see ourselves.

This is your self-in-relationships.

This is your self-interior.

the more you understand the makeup of your personality, the better you can understand how your identity shapes your thoughts, desires, and decisions, and the better you’ll be able to work with others.

This is your self-agency.

You were created for something or someone bigger than yourself. • You were created to contribute to a greater good. • You were created to bring good to other people. • You were created to cultivate good in other people.

This is your self-determination.

it’s when we exercise our will to make decisions and determine what we allow to define us. We decide what’s most important about who we are.

“I know your weaknesses. I know what you’re

not good at. I know you stutter. I know you’re scared. I know you’re insecure. I know your past. I know about it all. But I don’t want that to define you. You have what it takes! Well, you don’t have what it takes, but because I’m going to be with you, you have what it takes! Now go! And quit worrying about who you are not

and focus on wh...

If you fail to believe what God says about your identity, you will fail to reach the potential he’s put in you as a leader. Your ability to be a fearless leader is squarely rooted in your identity.

Every time we respond in fear, we miss an opportunity to lead, and this failure of leadership is an issue of identity.

If you sense fear in yourself, the best way to face those fears is with a healthier sense of self. You turn up the volume of what is true about you,

When I realize how perfectly loved I am, what is there to be afraid of? If I’m perfectly loved, why not embrace risk? If I’m perfectly loved, why do I need the stamp of approval from others? If I’m perfectly loved, why would I fear failure or the uncertainty of potential

outcomes? Fear thrives in the absence of love. Fear will dominate your identity until you begin to stand under the unending, never-failing, ever-gracious waterfall of love that your Creator has for you. He holds your future. He loves you perfectly. He accepts you unconditionally. Lead like you believe this

to be...

We forget that our thoughts and feelings are our thoughts and feelings. We own them. They do not own us.

You don’t have to allow thoughts of fear, inadequacy, and insecurity to take up residence

in your mind. If you do, they will slowly erode your identity and render you ineffective as a leader.

You are motivated by something inside of you, and you need to know what that is.

I define ambition as that strong desire we have to make something or to achieve

something, even when it takes great effort, focus, and determination.

You and I were made in God’s image. The imago dei. We were stamped with the image of God, and that has been passed down to us from generation to generation from the beginning of time.

When God made you, he had himself in

m...

You are most valuable because you were created to be like your

Creator.

I’m bringing the elements God has provided under my control for the benefit of the little veggies I’m serving, so they have what they need to grow, develop, and become what they’re meant to become.

to subdue, cultivate, and organize something in such a way that it thrives, grows, and flourishes

The lie of kibosh is that God can’t be trusted, so I need to passively wait or take matters into my own hands. But the truth of kabash is that God has given us ambition, and when I responsibly cultivate that ambition and gain influence by answering his call upon my life, I’ll eventually have the authority to do what he wants me to

do.

Great leaders, young and old, understand that God is the one who gives authority and that having influence is the path toward authority, not the other way around. As we learn to trust that God is the one to establish authority, we fi...

To kabash is to bring something under your control so you can make it more effective, beautiful, and useful.

A kabash leader doesn’t need authority, but he or she cultivates influence through relationships.