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

by Clay Scroggins

Great leaders leverage influence and relationships over title and position.

The best leaders lead like they’re not in charge even when they are.

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.

It wasn’t more authority I needed. Instead, I needed to accept the authority I had and then use it wisely to cultivate influence and make things better. I had confused having authority with the responsibility of leading. I had not yet realized that we don’t need authority to have influence.

But we all know that positional authority alone does not equate to effective leadership. If a leader does not inspire confidence, he or she will be unable to effect change without resorting to brute force. Influence has always been, and will always be, the currency of leadership. This book is about how to cultivate the influence needed to lead when you’re not in charge.

Once you become aware of something, you start seeing it everywhere.

King led because that’s what leaders do. They cultivate influence with a title or without a title.

Collins makes a great point here. Our focus doesn’t have to be simply on persuading those in charge to effect change. You may be able to do that, and you may not. But what you can do is focus on your own area of responsibility and make it great.

need to avoid the trap of thinking we are passive victims with nothing we can do. Each of us can begin to lead right where we are today. Collins continues, “Take responsibility to make great what you can make great. And let others do it in the areas that they can make great. And if the whole company doesn’t do it, you can’t change that. But you can take responsibility for your area.”

When someone has to pull out the gun of authority, something is broken. You only pull out the gun of authority when nothing else is working.

Jesus argues that the best leaders, the ones who align with his vision for leadership, will lead as servants who are aware of their responsibility and who answer to a higher calling.

But the good news is that influence can (and should) be cultivated wherever you are. If you’re able to grasp this truth as a leader today, it can prepare you for the future.

Influence always outpaces authority. And leaders who consistently leverage their authority to lead are far less effective in the long term than leaders who leverage their influence. Practice leading through influence when you’re not in charge. It’s the key to leading well when you are.

I decided I was done using my lack of authority as an excuse to blame others. For too long, my attitude and my responses to problems reflected passivity, a sense that I was a victim of my circumstances. I had believed the lie that leading meant waiting until I had the authority to do whatever I wanted.

But even worse than that, waiting for the authority to lead slowly eroded the gifts of leadership that were inside me. Waiting didn’t make me more of a leader; it made me less of a leader. And this is true for all of us, regardless of who you are. All human beings have a measure of leadership loaned to them.

And the earlier we begin to fan the flame of the gift of influence, the more it will grow. Conversely, the longer we wait, mired in passivity and the sense that we are victims of circumstances and the decisions of others, the more likely we are to diminish and mute the leadership gifts within us.

Each of us has a unique opportunity to create something right where we are. It doesn’t require special authority or a fancy title or having the corner office.

But know that leading without authority is more difficult than leading with authority. It requires a level of self-awareness that few of us are ready to develop. Because leading without authority means you need to have a clear understanding of your identity—who you are as a leader, apart from any titles.

Near the core of what makes a person a leader is their sense of identity.

Leading well without formal authority has less to do with your behavior and far more to do with your identity. Like the ace of spades, who we are trumps what we do every time.

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.

our identities precede our actions; our behaviors flow from our identities. So before we spend any energy on what we do as leaders, we really need to spend some time on who we are as leaders, especially when we are not the ones in charge.

I’ve seen many young leaders admit weaknesses in the name of keeping it real. I love the authenticity of that. But we have to find the balance between authentically admitting our weaknesses and excusing weaknesses. Too many young leaders use phrases like “That’s just who I am” or “They just need to know that’s how I’ve always been” to excuse areas of potential growth.

Because he had broken trust with God, Adam was hiding and didn’t want to be found or known by God. Pretending (or hiding ourselves from God and others) is a spiritual issue. It’s rooted in a failure of trust, a failure to believe what God says about us.

A distorted identity will cause you to think too lowly or too highly of yourself, when the goal is to think rightly.

The temptation of choosing from multiple passports, using a fake ID, or misrepresenting height and weight will never go away, but when your identity is rooted in something, you are much more likely to live and lead from a place of stability and security.

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. Let’s take a closer look at each one.

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. If you’ve never done this, it’s a great exercise to do with a team or a group.

Why do we spend so much time and effort on self-awareness? Because 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.

The degree to which you understand and feel a purpose for your life will affect the degree of security you have in your identity.

In my life, there have been two key values I hold on to dearly, and these beliefs have held on to me in the midst of failures and successes. The two truths that have had more impact on my identity than anything else are: 1. Because I have been created in the image of God, I am a chosen child of the King. 2. For God so loved me that Jesus died for me.

The clearer you are about who you are . . . • the more consistent you will be with others. • the more confident you will be about what you do. • the less concerned you will be with the opinions of others. • the less confused you will be by your emotions.

The reality of this world is such that most of the voices we hear, even some of the good ones, can cloud out the voice we most desperately need to hear—the voice of God. And your identity will be best shaped if you allow your heavenly Father’s voice to be the loudest one in your life. Your identity is the right identity when you let it be defined by what God says about you.

“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 who I AM!”

God was speaking truth into Gideon’s identity, asking him to believe something that would change the way he led.

Let me say it again: your identity is healthiest when what God says about you is most true of you.

Here is a key truth about your identity as it relates to your leadership: 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.

This verse captures one of the most radical truths we can know as a child of God. 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 true.

The distortion I see for many young leaders revolves around one word: ambition. I call it a distortion for a reason. I believe God has placed desires inside of us: a desire for more, a desire to see things change, a desire to make things better, and a desire to lead. But those desires can easily get twisted. And when the ambition inside us is distorted, it affects every aspect of our leadership.

Here’s what I know to be true: we all have ambition inside us. Don’t try to deny it. What you do with that ambition will make all the difference in your ability to lead when you’re not in charge. How you currently think about the ambition inside you is the product of your personal wiring and your past mentors. But what you do with that ambition going forward is on you.

What is ambition? 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.

In its purest form, there’s nothing wrong with ambition. It’s one of the hallmarks of leadership.

I was raised in a church where the desire to do something with my life was too easily confused with the desire to make something of my life. Ambition was outlawed in the name of piety and humility. The people were well-meaning, but the message was clear: kill the ambition before it kills you. When it came to ambition, I thought the rapper Ice Cube said it best: “You better check yo’ self before you wreck yo’ self.”

When our good, God-given ambition is distorted, it can manifest itself in a selfish need to be in charge, to seek recognition, or to exert control over others. Clearly, these distortions of ambition are problematic and flat-out destructive. And that’s why so many young leaders, especially those raised in a Christian environment, are too quick to kill their ambition.

The extreme of killing ambition focuses on an internal solution to the problem, while the extreme of letting our ambition run wild tends to focus on an external solution. We look to blame others for our lack of authority, we contract a critical spirit toward those who are in charge, and we end up sabotaging the very thing we’re seeking.

leading when you’re not in charge does not mean you learn skills to get ahead by circumventing the authority above you. Just as the response of killing ambition mutes something God has placed within you, the response of letting your ambition run wild fails by allowing your ambition—instead of God—to take the driver’s seat.

When God made you, he had himself in mind.

If imitation is the highest form of flattery, this truth speaks directly to our value. You are most valuable because you were created to be like your Creator.

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.