Due to many challenges in the workplace, there is a call for leaders to be inspiring developers committed to coming alongside others as effective coaches who empower others to become their full potential. According to Gallup’s “State of the American Workplace” (2017) report, “three in ten U.S. employees strongly agree that there is someone at work who encourages their development” and that lack of development is the No. 1 reason employees leave their job (p. 110). Therefore, inspiring development is typically an unwritten set of expectations that workers anticipate. Coaching is one-way managers could become inspiring developers who increase value, development, and productivity.

            Becoming a mentor and being a mentor is at the center of inspiring development and is often empowered by dynamic alliances, integrated praxis, and meaningful learning experiences and environments. At every level, inspiring developers provide performance feedback, coaching, and career development for people and leaders to maximize their growth and success. Understanding crucibles often lead to reconceptualized mistakes as learning experiences by focusing on solutions rather than conflicts, building consensus that leads to the appreciation of diverse perspectives, and transformation through interventional strategies. Effectively developing people and ideas in authentic and appropriate ways through inspiring learning experiences and environments is the mark of an inspiring developer.

            Living in the Connective Era calls upon ordinary people to be developed into world-changing leaders who develop their three sets of achieving styles: direct (intrinsic, competitive, and power), relational (collaborative, contributory, and vicarious), and instrumental (personal, social, and entrusting) to accomplish goals (Lipman-Blumen, 1996). Expressed through these achieving styles, leaders who live out their True North are able to align others around a shared purpose or vision by empowering others to lead authentically (Craig, George, & Snook, 2015). As a leader, my mission statement is to be an inspiring developer who believes in people and invites them into a better story. While my True North guides me to encourage, empower, equip, and ekballo (send) laborers into various spheres of society both locally and globally.

            Transformative servant leaders have the potential to change the world and leave a legacy worthy of the Gospel that will make a generational impact through mentorship and discipleship. As a result, there has been a shift from a transactional leader-follower paradigm to a transformational leadership-followership paradigm where followers carry purpose, beliefs, and desire for organizational success with their leaders (Riggio et al., 2008). By utilizing Craig, George, & Snook’s fieldbook, The Discover Your True North Fieldbook: A Personal Guide to Finding Your Authentic Leadership, leadership development and mentorship will consist of developing a personal development plan that will consist of intellectual development, personal discipline, stress management, values, leadership principles, ethical boundaries, spirituality, building relationships, holistic integration, leadership styles, development, legacy, and future directions. In the process of mentoring, there are three steps in the observation process: gaining self-awareness, understanding the mentee’s journey, and gaining perspective, and the seven critical elements of the learning-centered mentoring paradigm: reciprocity, learning, relationship, partnership, collaboration, mutually defined goals, and development (Zachary, 2012). Developing leaders through a posture of servant leadership accompanied by followership curates a dynamic learning environment for inspiring mentorship and development.

            In such dynamic learning environments, knowledge is power, and there are two primary sources of knowledge: curiosity (knowledge as an end in itself) and control (knowledge as a means to practical ends), which both drive learning and ownership (Palmer, 1983). Through “knowledge arising from love is the reunification and reconstruction of broken selves and worlds” and not by manipulation but reconciling the world as members of the community (Palmer, 1983, p. 8). To learn is to live, and by receiving knowledge, there is an opportunity to apply what has been learned, “it’s impossible to understand teaching without learning, and both without knowing” (Horton & Friere, 1990, p. 57). Transformation of self occurs only when God and self are deeply known, and without deeply knowing God, there is no deep knowing of self (Benner, 2004). Choosing to focus on God without knowing ourselves creates “a gap between appearance and reality” that is dangerous and disastrous in life and leadership (Benner, 2004, p. 22). Ultimately, the fear of change can cause leaders to become stagnate, but learning and processing can energize them like a generator coming back to life (Quinn, 1996). Competence and confidence develop over time and are established “by retelling the important stories in our life from the perspective of our current situation, telling them in unique ways that reconnect our past foundation with our present and future realities” (Quinn, 1996, p. 67). Deep change empowers leaders in four capacities: personal awareness, communal effects, leadership capacity, and relentless persistence resulting in local and global impact. Ultimately, inspiring developers are leaders who have a resilient commitment to the challenges of deep change, effective development through inspiring learning environments, and transformational mentorship.