Doing the Wrong Things Well

“There is a path before each person that seems right, but it ends in death”

(Proverbs 14:12, 16:25)

University president and ‘management guru’ Warren Bennis spent several years researching a book on leadership. He travelled around the country spending time with ninety of the most effective and successful leaders in the nation – sixty from corporations and thirty from the public sector. His goal was to find these leaders’ common traits. As first, he had trouble pinpointing any common traits, for the leaders were more diverse than he had expected.

But he later wrote in his book Why Leaders Can’t Lead: “I was finally able to come to some conclusions, of which perhaps the most important is the distinction between leaders and managers: Leaders are people who do the right thing; managers are people who do things right. Both role are crucial, but they differ profoundly. I often observe people in top positions doing the wrong thing well.” The same can be said for most people.

So, in your Christian life, conduct and service; are you doing the right thing according to His Word and the conviction of the Holy Spirit? Or are you doing the wrong thing well according to your own flesh and desire? Both may achieve many good things for humankind and the world, but in God’s eyes doing the right thing is more important than simple doing thing that seems right for us, or worst – wrong thing well.

THINK BIG. START SMALL. GO DEEP.