From Elder Neal A. Maxwell and his book “A More Excellent Way”:
Leadership should seek to create a climate in which the leader and members of the group bring forth the best that they have to offer. Sometimes, of course, the best which individuals have to offer is not of a high quality but we must assure them as to the acceptability of their offering. Our task is avoiding unnecessary mediocrity, too, and our tolerance of poor performance by ourselves or poor performance by ourselves and others is, at times, not tolerance at all, but lazy leadership. By setting Church standards clearly and helping ourselves and others to grow these standards in mind-stretching and ability-stretching ways we will experience infinite variety in outcome, but for the individual, this can result in closing the gap between what he is and what he might be.
One of the great qualities Jesus had was his ability to demand of his disciples quality in thought and action, which, while temporally uncomfortable, finally produced a cohesive kind of loyalty based on a sense of accomplishment which all followers very much need to have. One wonders if the tolerance of unnecessary mediocrity in others isn’t at some deep level of consciousness, a way of protecting ourselves or excluding ourselves for our own personal mediocrity. In human relationships there are too many tacit, silent deals in which one person agrees not to demand full measure, if the other person will agree to mediocrity when excellence may be possible. In any event, the unwillingness of most leaders to set standards, to administer feedback when standards are not met, stands in the way of the development of excellence on the part of the followers with inevitable loss in follower satisfaction. The leader who makes no demand of disciples cannot really lead them at all. The sense of new excitement and new challenge generated by the gospel will be blunted by leaders who shield followers from the full demands of fellowship.
The impact and excitement of the gospel ought to produce, not just initially in our lives, but in a continuing way, is one of the special challenges facing leaders in the Church. If we simply inherit our faith along with our genes, without examining, nurturing, and experiencing it, how can we realize that the gospel truly is “good news?” ~ Neal A. Maxwell, A More Excellent Way, Salt Lake City, Deseret Book, 1967) p.34-35
