Designed to Perform

I had the opportunity to ride in a Jaguar for the first time last week. A Jaguar is one of the world best luxury cars. “The company’s vision is simple: to produce beautiful fast cars that are desired the world over.” I walk up to the car, put my brief case into the trunk and entered the door of this sleek black sedan. The seats are a soft leather and very comfortable. We buckle in and head off to our destination.

The ride was very uneventful and nothing worth really writing about because the ride was less than 5 miles long from one parking lot to the airport where I was dropped off curb side. No real opportunity to put the car through its paces, no opportunity to really ‘see what it was made for’. It did nothing more than any other car or even a minivan could do and with the same amount of fun and excitement.

As a manager of people that is one of the hardest things to do with the people that work for you is to put them in a position to do all that they were designed to do. To trust them with all that is within them and let them really put their skills through the paces. Sometimes until you turn someone loose you really don’t know what they are really capable of. Sometimes until you are put into a place where you are truly challenged you don’t know yourself what you are really capable of.

So don’t be a Jaguar that is only making airport runs, get out on the test track and see what you are made of. You are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14).