Leading with a Limp: Take Full Advantage of Your Most Powerful Weakness [Paperback]

Dan B. Allender (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 15, 2008

Put your flawed foot forward.

Pick up most leadership books and you’ll find strategies for leveraging your power and minimizing your areas of weakness. But rather than work against your weakness, why not draw from a deeper well of strength? God favors leaders who make the most of the power that comes from brokenness.

Go ahead and take full advantage of your flaws. The most effective leaders don’t rise to power in spite of their weakness; they lead with power because of their weakness. It is their authenticity in limping leadership that compels others to follow them. Flawed leaders are successful because they’re not preoccupied with protecting their image. They are undaunted by chaos and complexity. And they are ready to risk failure in moving an organization from what is to what should be.

If you are a leader–or if you have been making excuses to avoid leading–find out how to get the most from your weakness. A limping leader is the kind of person God uses to accomplish amazing things.

To go deeper, check out the Leading with a Limp Workbook.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for Leading with a Limp

“There are good books on leadership, but this one is profound. It is better than a ‘how to do it’ book; this is a ‘how to be it’ book for leaders. Dan Allender offers serious wisdom rather than simple platitudes.”
–Mark Sanborn, speaker, leadership consultant, and best-selling author of The Fred Factor

“Not only is Dan Allender a good friend, he is a great leader. In Leading with a Limp, he has shown us how we can effectively lead those allotted to our charge. Read this book...it will bring a lot of things into perspective for you.”
–Dennis Rainey, president of FamilyLife and coauthor of Moments Together for Couples

“After reading this book, the first two words out of my mouth were ‘At last!’ Amid a deluge of spiritual gifts inventories, at last there is someone who understands how God’s strength is made perfect in our imperfections. At last someone has brought spiritual strengths and spiritual weaknesses into conversation. For Dan Allender, the limp is a limpid way of walking that leads into the very presence of God.”
–Leonard Sweet, author of The Three Hardest Words and Out of the Question…Into the Mystery

“Leading with a Limp is not your basic, cafeteria-brand manual on how to ‘do’ leadership. It is a call to openly face your shortcomings as a leader. Dan Allender reminds us that our greatest asset as leaders is not our competence but the courage to name and deal with our frailties and imperfections.”
–Dr. Crawford W. Loritts, Jr., author, speaker, and senior pastor of Fellowship Bible Church in Roswell, Georgia

“Once again Dan Allender has propelled us headlong into the paradoxical wonders of the gospel of God’s grace. Leading with a Limp exposes the thin veneer of respectability we leaders try to stretch over our destructive idols of control and pragmatism. In so doing, Allender invites us to the freeing humility of leading as “the chief sinner” in whatever context God has placed us.”
–Scotty Smith, founding pastor of Christ Community Church in Franklin, Tennessee, and coauthor of Restoring Broken Things

“I often wonder if other people feel the way I do when they read books on leadership. Most of the books are heavy on motivation or strategy or positive thinking. Dan Allender looks at how anyone can move his team–and himself–forward when he is pummeled by circumstances and his heart is fainting. This is real-world stuff, but you’ll have to take off the rose-colored glasses to read it.”
–Bob Lepine, cohost of FamilyLife Today

“Leading with a Limp will have a lasting impact on me; it addressed several issues I’m struggling with at this point in my life and leadership. I thank God for this honest and insightful book!”
–Brian McLaren, pastor, author of The Secret Message of Jesus and A New Kind of Christian


From the Hardcover edition.

About the Author

Dan B. Allender, PhD, is a founder of Mars Hill Graduate School near Seattle, where he serves as president. He also is a professor of counseling, a therapist in private practice, and a popular speaker. He is the author of a number of books, including To Be Told, How Children Raise Parents, The Healing Path, and The Wounded Heart. Dan and his wife, Rebecca, are the parents of three children.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: WaterBrook Press (January 15, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1578569524
• ISBN-13: 978-1578569526
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.6 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #74,495 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dr. Dan Allender received his MDiv from Westminster Theological Seminary and his PhD in counseling psychology from Michigan State University.

Dan taught in the biblical counseling department of Grace Theological Seminary for seven years (1983-1989). From 1989-1997 he worked as a professor in the Master of Arts in biblical counseling program at Colorado Christian University, Denver, Colorado. Currently, Dan serves as president and professor of counseling at Mars Hill Graduate School in Bothell, Washington.

He travels and speaks extensively to present his unique perspective on sexual abuse recovery, love and forgiveness, worship, and other related topics. He is the author of "The Wounded Heart" (NavPress), "The Healing Path," and "How Children Raise Parents" (Waterbrook Press) and has coauthored four books with Dr. Tremper Longman, III--"Intimate Allies" (Tyndale House Publishers), "The Cry of the Soul" (NavPress), "Bold Love" (NavPress), and "Bold Purpose," (Tyndale House Publishers). He and his wife, Rebecca, live in the Puget Sound area with their three children, Annie, Amanda, and Andrew.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars hope for the disenchanted leader, May 13, 2010

By 

Rhys McFadden (Brisbane, Qld, Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Leading with a Limp: Take Full Advantage of Your Most Powerful Weakness (Paperback)

Brief Summary

Allender's purpose in writing Leading with a Limp is to awaken leaders to the simple hard truth...you're in for the battle of your life . His goal is to encourage emerging and established leaders to grow a sense of inner confidence that will enable them to overcome the difficulties and challenges of leadership. His central thesis is that as leaders expose weakness and failure, a common experience for all at one point or another, this actually becomes a wellspring of strength to lead from.

The core assumption upon which everything else in this book is built: to the degree you face and name and deal with your failures as a leader, to that same extent you will create an environment conducive to growing and retaining productive and committed colleagues

A pericope discussing God's requirements in relation to a leader's character, approach and attitude to power, pride and ambition follows to frame up a discussion regarding the need for leaders to develop a humble, self effacing, transparent and authentic reluctant leadership as an exposure of their weakness and a revelation of God's goodness .
Major Features

According to Allender, learning to lead with a limp is the consequence of appropriate, open and effectual disclosures made in the midst of six challenging realities: crisis, complexity, betrayal, loneliness, weariness and glory .

He develops a model by overlaying two lists, one the antithesis of the other, over six challenge realities in an attempt to describe a three dimensional matrix that equates to the multifaceted web of relationships and responses a leader has to negotiate . These positive effectual or negative ineffectual responses equate to possible response to each of the realities.

Negative/typical ineffectual responses to challenges:
1. Crisis - Cowardice,
2. Complexity - Rigidity,
3. Betrayal - Narcissism,
4. Loneliness - Hiding,
5. Weariness - Fatalism.
6. Glory - Secrecy


Positive/options for effectual solutions to challenges:
1. Crisis - Courage,
2. Complexity - Depth,
3. Betrayal - Gratitude,
4. Loneliness - Openness,
5. Weariness - Hope.
6. Glory - Disclosure

Allender then details the paradox of a well-documented successful failure. This is actually a clever parody of the biblical narrative of Isaac, Rebecca, Esau and Jacob. Allender uses this narrative as an example of ineffectual responses being turned around. The middle chapters are dedicated to dealing with each of the challenges, a chapter for each, in the light of both effectual and ineffectual responses.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Leading with a Limp counters a common leadership theory that encourages leaders to operate out of strengths and minimise weaknesses - effectively encouraging leaders to live a life of denial.

Finally, here is an author that doesn't shrink back from the harsh realities of leadership and the associated challenges and difficulties involved. Allender's stories gloss over nothing. He provides meaningful insights, understandings and avenues of response so that even the most battle weary leader may find resources beyond the normal in the goodness, providence and grace of God to live with integrity, embrace failure and weakness, and keep leading effectively.

Allender's theology of leadership makes sense of the suffering servant of Isaiah (Isa 52:13-14), God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble of James and Peter (Js 4:6, 1P5:5), The greatest of all shall be your servant (Mk 10:43) and The first will be last and the last will be first (Mk 10:31) of Jesus teaching and the treasure in jars of clay (2 Cor 4:7) and my [God's] power is made complete in weakness (2 Cor12:9) that Paul articulates.

For the insecure leader, frequent disclosures of habitual failure and weakness may give rise to a self-indulgent form of narcissism or be a mask for other attempts at self-fortification. Allender addresses this with the exhortative qualification, don't just acknowledge failure...dismantle it...publicly .

Allender's frank and honest accounts of the experiences and situations leaders encounter are powerful stories that for some may be potentially overwhelming. Those in a bad place emotionally or susceptible to melancholy may find the book a bit depressive, but in Allender's mind that's probably a good thing. There is not a lot of salve on the surface here. It is more like a cup of cement with a clarion call to harden up through surrender! Having said that, if there is any salve, it is that failure isn't final and weakness doesn't discount a person from leadership - it qualifies them. According to Allander, as failure, weakness and vulnerability is embraced and effectually disclosed, it becomes the stimulant that spawns growth, builds confidence and instils strength in those who are prepared to learn to lead with a limp.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dealing with Flawed Leaders, January 19, 2009

By 

J. Nolt - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Leading with a Limp: Take Full Advantage of Your Most Powerful Weakness (Paperback)

If you ever feel isolated and alone as a leader, this book is for you. If you ever wonder how you can lead in the midst of your many flaws as a person, then this book is for you.

Dan Allender does a fantastic job helping the reader become more comfortable with the weaknesses he/she has as a leader. Most leadership books are how-to...this is not. This is not simple steps to becoming more effective. This book is more of a gentle consolation. More than instruct you it sympathizes with you...and in the process, guides you. The takeaways are realizing other leaders are just as flawed as you. When you begin to realize this and lead in the midst of your weakness, not avoiding them, you become a more trustworthy leader.

Allender encourages us to stop avoiding the shortcomings we have, to face up to them, and to lead in the midst of them in a way that is courageously humble. A must read for all those in leadership who think if their weaknesses are exposed no one will follow (actually, it's quite the contrary).

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Recommended To My Group of Thousands, December 2, 2009

By 

Marnie Swedberg "www.Marnie.com" (Minnesota) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Leading with a Limp: Take Full Advantage of Your Most Powerful Weakness (Paperback)

As the leadership mentor to women from every continent, career path and denomination, I have often wondered how to effectively communicate the contents of this book... and here it is! Dan has done it!

"Leading with a Limp" is loaded with profound, practical and practically never-verbalized truths that every God-appointed leader needs for success.

Balanced, beautiful, provoking and dead-on!

A few of my favorite sentences from just one page:

"A broken leader is no longer driven by the need to impress people or to secure their approval. A broken leader has already known shame, so there is little fear of being found out or further exposed as a failure...

"The opinions of others are both data and delight, but she doesn't live and die
by the way others judge her.

"Strong approval is a delight and is a humbling reminder that even a blind squirrel occasionally bumps into an acorn...

Love it! Love it!

If you are a leader, read this book!
If you are the trainer of leaders, require it!