Was on a conference call last night with a number of leaders part of Backstage Leadership. A few leadership thoughts from the call: - The Global Church is vibrant, colorful and alive. As a leader, you need to see it up close outside of the US to gain a proper perspective.

- When it comes to leaders I admire, the most common trait among them is courage. And a close runner-up is humility.

- Seasons of calling are just as important as life-long callings. And maybe more. Not everyone will necessarily have a true and specific life calling. You might have seasons of calling. That is okay.

- As a leader, you have to scale your vision appropriately. And especially those of us who are idea creators. We think every idea we have has a global reach. Not true.

- Choose one or two ideas and execute on them fearlessly. If you try to execute on all of your ideas, you'll probably not accomplish much. We each have to be focused on the execution of ideas, not just the creation of ideas.

- Every great organization has a few areas where they are incredibly picky and their standards are so high it becomes annoying. This is a good thing. Know the areas you are so passionate about that you are willing to be obnoxious and annoying on.

- Being remarkable and doing things with excellence is about being intentional. Being remarkable isn't about being big. Or about things that are expensive. It's about a mindset and a standard. It's not about lots of money and a huge staff. In fact, many times as you grow, you lose the intensity required to be remarkable.