The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality the last is to say thank you in

between, the leader is a servant. - Max De Pree

Everyone has a gift. Whether sculpting, painting or shooting a free throw, each individual has
something that makes them special. My specialty is bringing out what is special in other. My
gift is leadership. While this gift has been evident my whole life, I recently had an experience
which served to refine it.
Beginning my sophomore year in high school I elected to participate in a particularly challenging
class call Ignite. Ignite is an elegantly simple class; the students are split into three teams,
elect a leader, and have the school year to construct a rocket capable to reaching an altitude of
one mile. As has happened many times before, I was chosen by my peers to lead our group.
During that year the thirteen students in my group would help shape and mold my understanding
of leadership.
Our instructor held to a hands-off, project based learning model, leaving the groups to find their
own path to the one mile goal. In a class full of high school students with varying levels of
interest and dedication, this laissez-faire teaching style put significant pressure on the group
leaders. Taking my role to heart and treating this assignment as more of a job than a class, I
immediately began researching and delegating tasks to my team. With the assignments nailed
down, I shifted my focus to my own work and assumed my team would see how hard I was
working and perform to that same level. This was proved foolish, however, when winter break
came and a progress meeting with my team revealed that less than half of the students had made
significant progress toward our goal.

Undaunted, I committed my winter break to studying rockets and developing the leadership that
had once come so naturally. Between physics papers and science experiments, I poured through
books by Donald Trump, Vincent Peale, Max De Pree, and others, trying to learn as much about
motivating and leading people as I was about aerodynamics. I quickly saw a pattern in the
writings of effective leaders; the best leaders are also great helpers.
Just before winter break ended my step-father unknowingly reinforced this point. He told me to
look to the life and teachings of Jesus Christ for an example of great leadership. Jesus led and
motivated people not by being a tyrannical dictator, but by being a servant. Rather than
demanding his followers serve him as they should have, Jesus instead chose to serve others.
When I returned to school, I brought with me my new perspective on leading my team. I sought
out each of the students under my leadership and endeavored to learn about them, their
personality, their strengths, and where they needed extra help. I ended each of these meetings
the same way; by reminding them that we are a team, that I was there for them, and that I would
do anything I could to help them succeed. Though many of my classmates initially wrote me off,
each of them slowly came to realize the sincerity in my offer, and our team began to gel. In the
end, our team succeeded. We were given the opportunity to present our designs to NASA
engineers and our rocket became a model for future classes.
My team started out fractured because each person was only worried about themselves, but when
I began making myself available to each of them individually, serving their needs, and
encouraging their gifts, we came together and became more than the sum of our parts. Like Max
De Pree said, the bulk of leadership is service. Everyone has a gift, but the best leaders are those
whose gift is to bring out the giftings of others.