A PERSON OF INFLUENCE . . . EMPOWERS PEOPLE
A big part of Jim’s business includes meeting fairly often with some of his key leaders, and because they come from around the country and all over the world, he makes it a goal to schedule meetings in various locations. One place that has become a favorite of his and Nancy’s over the years is Deer Valley near Salt Lake City, Utah. Years ago, when they were there with some of their leaders, something interesting happened. Jim will tell you about it:
Deer Valley is really a beautiful setting. In the winter it’s great for skiing, and in the summer it’s got gorgeous forested mountains and meadows full of wildflowers. We really enjoy vacationing there and using it as a place to meet with some of our people.
One year we spent time with a group of about ten couples at some condos in Deer Valley right on the ski slopes. We all had a wonderful time.
When we were ready to leave, we packed up our belongings and swung by the rental office to check out on the way to the airport. But as we worked to get our bill squared away, we discovered that one couple in our party had inadvertently left their room key in their condo.
“I’m going to have to charge you $25 for the lost key,” the desk clerk said.
I have to admit I was a little surprised. We had been their customers for eight years. And we had spent thousands of dollars with them in the past week. “Look,” I said, “I appreciate that you have a policy about missing keys, but the key is in their room. And if we were to go back and get it, we’d miss our flight. Can’t you just forget the charge?”
“No,” he said, “the rule is that I have to add the charge to your bill.” Even when I reminded him of our history with their company and told him that I didn’t feel good about the extra charge, he wouldn’t budge. In fact, he got more rigid, and I got really irritated. As I stood there waiting, I calculated in my mind how much money we had spent there over the years, and I figured out that he was jeopardizing our $100,000 history with their company for a $25 key!
We finally left and paid the fee. On the way to the airport, Nancy and I talked about the incident, and I thought about how it really wasn’t the desk clerk’s fault. The problem was with the owner who had failed to train him properly.
“That kind of thing drives me crazy,” she said. “Some people just don’t get it. You know who’s just the opposite of that?” she asked. “Nordstrom. They’re unbelievable. I didn’t tell you about what happened the other night before we left for Deer Valley. I went down to Nordstrom to get Eric a pair of pajamas. I picked out some that I knew he’d like, but I told the salesgirl that I needed the pants hemmed and that we were leaving on a trip early the next morning. She didn’t blink and offered to have them done that night and drive them out to us at home.
“And that was the only thing I bought!” added Nancy. “It’s not like I had spent a lot of money. She did that just for a pair of pajamas.”
Stories of the excellent service at Nordstrom department stores have become legendary. Anyone who shops there can attest to it. Their employees are exceptional because the company is built on the principle of empowerment. That philosophy of empowering employees is capsulized in the following brief statement that every employee receives when he or she begins working for the company:
Welcome to Nordstrom
We’re glad to have you with
our Company.
Our number one goal is to provide
outstanding customer service.
Set both your personal and
professional goals high.
We have great confidence in your ability to achieve them.
Rule #1: Use your good
judgment in all situations.
There will be no additional rules.
Please feel free to ask
your department manager,
store manager, or division general
manager any question
at any time.1
Nordstrom stores emphasize people, not policies. They believe in their people, they encourage them to achieve excellence, and they release them to do it. As Tom Peters said, “Techniques don’t produce quality products or pick up the garbage on time; people do, people who care, people who are treated as creatively contributing adults.” The managers and staff at that rental office in Deer Valley would benefit greatly from learning that lesson.
WHAT IT MEANS TO EMPOWER OTHERS
An English artist named William Wolcott went to New York in 1924 to record his impressions of that fascinating city. One morning he was visiting in the office of a former colleague when the urge to sketch came over him. Seeing some paper on his friend’s desk, he asked, “May I have that?”
His friend answered, “That’s not sketching paper. That’s ordinary wrapping paper.”
Not wanting to lose that spark of inspiration, Wolcott took the wrapping paper and said, “Nothing is ordinary if you know how to use it.” On that ordinary paper Wolcott made two sketches. Later that same year, one of those sketches sold for $500 and the other for $1,000, quite a sum for 1924.
People under the influence of an empowering person are like paper in the hands of a talented artist. No matter what they’re made of, they can become treasures.
The ability to empower others is one of the keys to personal and professional success. John Craig remarked, “No matter how much work you can do, no matter how engaging your personality may be, you will not advance far in business if you cannot work through others.” And business executive J. Paul Getty asserted, “It doesn’t make much difference how much other knowledge or experience an executive possesses; if he is unable to achieve results through people, he is worthless as an executive.”
When you become an empowerer, you work with and through people, but you do much more. You enable others to reach the highest levels in their personal and professional development. Simply defined, empowering is giving your influence to others for the purpose of personal and organizational growth. It’s sharing yourself—your influence, position, power, and opportunities—with others with the purpose of investing in their lives so that they can function at their best. It’s seeing people’s potential, sharing your resources with them, and showing them that you believe in them completely.
You may already be empowering some people in your life without knowing it. When you entrust your spouse with an important decision and then cheerfully back him up, that’s empowering. When you decide that your child is ready to cross the street by herself and give her your permission to do so, you have empowered her. When you delegate a challenging job to an employee and give her the authority she needs to get it done, you have empowered her.
The act of empowering others changes lives, and it’s a win-win situation for you and the people you empower. Giving others your authority isn’t like giving away an object, such as your car, for example. If you give away your car, you’re stuck. You no longer have transportation. But empowering others by giving them your authority has the same effect as sharing information: You haven’t lost anything. You have increased the ability of others without decreasing yourself.
QUALIFICATIONS OF AN EMPOWERER
Just about everyone has the potential to become an empowerer, but you cannot empower everyone. The process works only when certain conditions are met. You must have:
POSITION
You cannot empower people whom you don’t lead. Leadership expert Fred Smith explained, “Who can give permission for another person to succeed? A person in authority. Others can encourage, but permission comes only from an authority figure: a parent, boss, or pastor.”
You can encourage and motivate everybody you meet. You can enlarge or help navigate for anyone with whom you have built a mentoring relationship. But to empower people, you have to be in a position of power over them. Sometimes that position doesn’t have to be formal or official, but other times it does. For example, if we went to a restaurant to have lunch with you one day, and we weren’t happy about how long it was taking to get our food, we could never empower you to go into the kitchen to fix our meal for us. We don’t have that authority, so we certainly can’t give it away to you. The first requisite of empowerment is having a position of authority over the people you want to empower.
RELATIONSHIP
The second requirement for empowering people is having a relationship with them. It has been said that relationships are forged, not formed. They require time and common experience. If you have made the effort to connect with people, as we talked about in the previous chapter, by the time you’re ready to empower them, your relationship should be solid enough for you to be able to lead them. And as you do, remember what Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote: “Every man [or woman] is entitled to be valued by his [or her] best moments.” When you value people and your relationships with them, you lay the foundation for empowering others.
RESPECT
Relationships cause people to want to be with you, but respect causes them to want to be empowered by you. Mutual respect is essential to the empowerment process. Psychiatrist Ari Kiev summed it up this way: “If you wish others to respect you, you must show respect for them. . . . Everyone wants to feel that he counts for something and is important to someone. Invariably, people will give their love, respect, and attention to the person who fills that need. Consideration for others generally reflects faith in self and faith in others.” When you believe in people, care about them, and trust them, they know it. And that respect inspires them to want to follow where you lead.
COMMITMENT
The last quality a leader needs to become an empowerer is commitment. US Airways executive Ed McElroy stressed that “commitment gives us new power. No matter what comes to us—sickness, poverty, or disaster—we never turn our eye from the goal.” The process of empowering others isn’t always easy, especially when you start doing it for the first time. It’s a road that has many bumps and sidetracks. But it is one that’s worth traveling because the rewards are so great. If you need a reminder of the value of empowering others, remember this: When you empower people, you’re not influencing just them; you’re influencing all the people they influence. That’s impact!
If you have authority in people’s lives, have built relationships with them, respect them, and have committed yourself to the process of empowerment, you’re in a position to empower them. But one more crucial element of empowering needs to be in place. You need to have the right attitude.
Many people neglect to empower others because they are insecure. They are afraid of losing their jobs to the people they mentor. They don’t want to be replaced or displaced, even if it means that they would be able to move up to a higher position and leave their current one to be filled by the person they mentor. They’re afraid of change. But change is part of empowerment—for the people you empower and for yourself. If you want to go up, there are things you have to be willing to give up.
If you’re not sure about where you stand in terms of your attitude toward the changes involved with empowering others, answer these questions:
QUESTIONS TO ASK BEFORE YOU GET STARTED
1. Do I believe in people and feel that they are my organization’s most appreciable asset?
2. Do I believe that empowering others can accomplish more than individual achievement?
3. Do I actively search for potential leaders to empower?
4. Would I be willing to raise others to a level higher than my own level of leadership?
5. Would I be willing to invest time developing people who have leadership potential?
6. Would I be willing to let others get credit for what I taught them?
7. Do I allow others freedom of personality and process, or do I have to be in control?
8. Would I be willing to publicly give my authority and influence to potential leaders?
9. Would I be willing to let others work me out of a job?
10. Would I be willing to hand the leadership baton to the people I empower and truly root for them?
If you answer no to more than a couple of these questions, you may need an attitude adjustment. You need to believe in others enough to give them all you can and in yourself enough to know that it won’t hurt you. Just remember that as long as you continue to grow and develop yourself, you’ll always have something to give, and you won’t need to worry about being displaced.
HOW TO EMPOWER OTHERS TO THEIR POTENTIAL
Once you have confidence in yourself and in the persons you wish to empower, you’re ready to start the process. Your goal should be to hand over relatively small, simple tasks in the beginning and progressively increase their responsibilities and authority. The greener the people you’re working with, the more time the process will take. But no matter whether they are raw recruits or seasoned veterans, it’s still important to take them through the whole process. Use the following steps to guide you as you empower others:
The place to start when empowering people is to evaluate them. If you give inexperienced people too much authority too soon, you can set them up to fail. If you move too slowly with people who have lots of experience, you can frustrate and demoralize them.
Sometimes when leaders misjudge the capabilities of others, the results can be comical. For example, we read about an incident from the life of Albert Einstein that illustrates this point. In 1898, Einstein applied for admittance to the Munich Technical Institute and was rejected because he would “never amount to much.” As a result, instead of going to school, he worked as an inspector at the Swiss Patent Office in Bern. And with the extra time he had on his hands, he worked at refining and writing his theory of relativity.
Remember that all people have the potential to succeed. Your job is to see the potential, find out what they lack to develop it, and equip them with what they need. As you evaluate the people you intend to empower, look at these areas:
• Knowledge. Think about what people need to know in order to do any task you intend to give them. Don’t take for granted that they know all that you know. Ask them questions. Give them history or background information. Cast a vision by giving them the big picture of how their actions fit into the organization’s mission and goals. Knowledge is not only power; it’s empowering.
• Skill. Examine the skill level of the people you desire to empower. Nothing is more frustrating than being asked to do things for which you have no ability. Look at what people have done before as well as what they’re doing now. Some skills are inherent. Others need to be learned through training or experience. Your job as the empowerer is to find out what the job requires and make sure your people have what they need to succeed.
• Desire. Greek philosopher Plutarch remarked, “The richest soil, if uncultivated, produces the rankest weeds.” No amount of skill, knowledge, or potential can help people succeed if they don’t have the desire to be successful. But when desire is present, empowerment is easy.
2. MODEL FOR THEM
Even people with knowledge, skill, and desire need to know what’s expected of them, and the best way to inform them is to show them. People do what people see. A little parable about a farm boy who lived in a mountainous region of Colorado illustrates this point. One day the boy climbed to a high place and found an eagle’s nest with eggs in it. He snatched one of the eggs while the eagle was away, took it back to the farm, and put it under a sitting hen who had a brood of eggs.
The eggs hatched one by one, and when the eaglet came out of his shell, he had no reason to believe he was anything other than a chicken. So he did everything that the other chickens did on the farm. He scratched around the yard looking for grain, he tried his best to cluck, and he kept his feet firmly planted on the ground, even though the fence around the pen wasn’t more than several feet high.
Then one day an eagle flew over the chicken yard. The young eagle heard its cry and saw it swoop down on a rabbit in the field. And at that moment, the young eagle knew in his heart that he wasn’t like the chickens in the yard. He spread his wings, and before he knew it, he was flying after the other eagle. Not until he had seen one of his kind flying did he know who he was or what he was capable of doing.
The people you desire to empower need to see what it looks like to fly. As their mentor, you have the best opportunity to show them. Model the attitude and work ethic you would like them to embrace. And anytime you can include them in your work, take them along with you. There is no better way to help them learn and understand what you want them to do.
3. GIVE THEM PERMISSION TO SUCCEED
As a leader and influencer, you may believe that everyone wants to be successful and automatically strives for success, probably as you have. But not everyone you influence will think the same way you do. You have to help others believe that they can succeed and show them that you want them to succeed. How do you do that?
• Expect it. Author and professional speaker Danny Cox advised, “The important thing to remember is that if you don’t have that inspired enthusiasm that is contagious—whatever you do have is also contagious.” People can sense your underlying attitude no matter what you say or do. If you have an expectation for your people to be successful, they will know it.
• Verbalize it. People need to hear you tell them that you believe in them and want them to succeed. Tell them often that you know they are going to make it. Send them encouraging notes. Become a positive prophet of their success.
• Reinforce it. You can never do too much when it comes to believing in people. Leadership expert Fred Smith made it a habit to give people plenty of positive reinforcement. He said, “As I recognize success, I try to stretch people’s horizons. I might say, ‘That was terrific!’ but I don’t stop there. Tomorrow I might return, repeat the compliment, and say, ‘Last year, would you have believed you could do that? You may be surprised at what you can accomplish next year.’”
Once people recognize and understand that you genuinely want to see them succeed and are committed to helping them, they will begin to believe they can accomplish what you give them to do.
4. TRANSFER AUTHORITY TO THEM
The real heart of empowerment is the transfer of your authority—and influence—to the people you are mentoring and developing. Many people are willing to give others responsibility. They gladly delegate tasks to them. But empowering others is more than sharing your workload. It’s sharing your power and ability to get things done.
Management expert Peter Drucker asserted, “No executive has ever suffered because his subordinates were strong and effective.” People become strong and effective only when they are given the opportunity to make decisions, initiate action, solve problems, and meet challenges. When you empower others, you’re helping them develop the ability to work independently under your authority.
As you begin to empower your people, give them challenges you know they can rise to meet and conquer. It will make them confident and give them a chance to try out their new authority and learn to use it wisely. And once they’ve begun to be effective, give them more difficult assignments. A good rule of thumb is that if someone else can do a job 80 percent as well as you do, delegate it. In the end, your goal is to empower others so well that they become capable of meeting nearly any challenge that comes their way. And in time, they will develop their own influence with others so that they no longer require yours to be effective.
5. PUBLICLY SHOW YOUR CONFIDENCE IN THEM
When you first transfer authority to the people you empower, you need to tell them that you believe in them, and you need to do it publicly. Public recognition lets them know that you believe they will succeed. But it also lets the other people they’re working with know that they have your support and that your authority backs them up. It’s a tangible way of sharing (and spreading) your influence.
6. SUPPLY THEM WITH FEEDBACK
Although you need to publicly praise your people, you can’t let them go very long without giving them honest, positive feedback. Meet with them privately to coach them through their mistakes, miscues, and misjudgments. At first, some people may have a difficult time. During that early period, be a grace giver. Try to give them what they need, not what they deserve. And applaud any progress that they make. People do what gets praised.
7. RELEASE THEM TO CONTINUE ON THEIR OWN
No matter who you are working to empower—your employees, children, colleagues, or spouse—your ultimate aim should be to release them to make good decisions and succeed on their own. And that means giving them as much freedom as possible as soon as they are ready for it.
President Abraham Lincoln was a master at empowering his leaders. For example, when he appointed General Ulysses S. Grant as commander of the Union armies in 1864, he sent him this message: “I neither ask nor desire to know anything of your plans. Take the responsibility and act, and call on me for assistance.”
That’s the attitude you need as an empowerer. Give authority and responsibility, and offer assistance as needed. John and I have been fortunate to have been empowered by key people in our lives since we were kids. Probably the person who has been the most empowering in John’s life is his father, Melvin Maxwell. He always encouraged John to be the best person he could be, and he gave him his permission and his power whenever he could. Years later as they talked about it, Melvin told John his philosophy: “I never consciously limited you as long as I knew what you were doing was morally right.” Now that’s an empowering attitude!
THE RESULTS OF EMPOWERMENT
If you head up any kind of organization—a business, club, church, or family—learning to empower others is one of the most important things you’ll ever do as its leader. Empowerment has an incredibly high return. It not only helps the individuals you raise up by making them more confident, energetic, and productive, but it also has the ability to improve your life, give you additional freedom, and promote the growth and health of your organization.
Farzin Madjidi, former program liaison for the city of Los Angeles, has expressed his beliefs concerning empowerment: “We need leaders who empower people and create other leaders. It’s no longer good enough for a manager to make sure that everybody has something to do and is producing. Today, all employees must ‘buy in’ and take ownership of everything they’re doing. To foster this, it’s important that employees should make decisions that most directly affect them. That’s how the best decisions are made. That’s the essence of empowerment.” When it comes down to it, empowering leadership is sometimes the only real advantage one organization has over another in our competitive society.
As you empower others, you will find that most aspects of your life will change for the better. Empowering others can free you personally to have more time for the important things in your life, increase the effectiveness of your organization, increase your influence with others, and, best of all, make an incredibly positive impact on the lives of the people you empower.
EMPOWERING PEOPLE
• Give others more than just something to do. If you lead a business, a department, a family, a church, or any other kind of organization, you are probably preparing to hand off some responsibilities to others. Before you officially start the process, carefully plan your strategy for passing the baton by using the following checklist:
Describe the task: 
Name the person to whom you will give it: 
What knowledge does the task require? 
Does the person have the required knowledge? 
Yes No
What skills does the task require? 
Does the person have the skills required? Yes No
Have you modeled how you want the job done? Yes No
Have you given the person the authority and permission to succeed? Yes No
Have you publicly given the person your confidence? Yes No
Have you privately supplied the person with feedback? Yes No
Have you set a date to release the person to continue on his or her own? Yes No
Repeat this process with every task you intend to delegate until it becomes second nature. Even when someone you empower is successful and established in performance, continue praising, encouraging, and showing your confidence publicly.