When you're building a team, network marketing or other, it's inevitable your team's going to go through challenges and struggles.

Every team has members who stumble and fall.

And they will look to you for leadership, advice, and encouragement.

But here's the thing…

How you handle the situation will determine if your team members want to continue building their business, with or without you.

1.  Overbearing

Now, back to the bike accident…

An overbearing parent will run over, coddling, saying…

“Oh my gosh, I think he's bleeding, he might have broken his leg! Are you better? Let's go get ice cream, let's go get a sucker, you need a Band-Aid?”

Now, there’s nothing wrong with that parent, but what does it create in your child?

 A dependency...

As soon as something happens, YOU are going to come to the rescue.

And look…

Our team members are going to have struggles

They might send you a message saying…

“Nothing's working, I'm doing everything and nothing's working.”

You're going to get those messages.

How many times are you right there; you're Batman, you are the vigilante that comes in and protects your team members from getting hurt.

“Oh, I'll do this for you or that or whatever.”

Okay, we've done it, right?

On the other end of the spectrum…

2.  Indifferent

There are the parents, who when your child trips, falls, crashes on their bike, they're bleeding and you say…

“You're fine, stop your whining. Get up, run it off. Rub some dirt on it. Suck it up!”

What does this create?

An in-dependency.

They're not going to let you know when they have problems because you don't care.

How many times have we done this with a team member?

They’re being whiny, and maybe you haven't necessarily told your team member this, but the second you get off the phone you say…

“Oh my gosh, that person is so whiny! How come they're on my team, how come they can't do anything? Why are they the way that they are? How come they're on my team!?

I used “why” on purpose there.

You know how much I despise that word, but how many times do we do that?

And then…

Suddenly we're wondering the reason they're not talking to us

They're not letting us know what's going on in their business any more.

All of a sudden it's crickets when you try to get a hold of them.

I've been known to do that before, and I hate that I've been that person in the past, because I've done it with people I absolutely love.

It's NOT the way a leader should handle the situation.

Now here's the middle ground…

…and this is where I challenge you to play from here on out, using the third, most-effective leadership style...

This is going to take time.

3.  Empathetic 

So what is Empathetic?

When the bike crash happens, how much more effective would it be if you walk up—you're not running over there, but instead you're walking calmly—you get down on their level and you say…

“That looked like it hurt, did that hurt? Are you going to be okay? Yeah, it looks like there's a little bit of blood. Guess what? Mom's fallen off her bike before too and she scrapped her leg so bad, look at the scar. Stand up. You good, you got this, right? Let's get back on that bike.”

What does this create?

It creates empathy.

For those of you who don't know what that word is, it's letting them know that you've been there.

You’re feeling where they're at.

As a leader you need to have empathy with every single situation that arises in your team.

The thing is, the only way that you're going to be able to have empathy is if you've been through it.

Would you say you've been through or are going through a struggle right now?

Empathy is how a true leader develops leaders in their team

By saying, “Let's ride this together,” you’re saying…

“You're not in this alone.”

You're not taking the problem away.

You're letting them go through that problem and the crash or the mistake.

You're not trying to do it for them, nor are you saying, just come on, you can do this, just jump back on.

Understanding where they're at, saying…

“Look, I know, I've been there, here's what I did, too.”

You're relating to that individual.

This is where you need to be guys.

Another thing I need to mention is that one of the biggest things is…

When you take a problem away from a distributor and don’t let them walk through the experience…

This is huge because…then they're not going to be relatable to other people when they start to have their own team members that go through the same thing.

They're not going to be able to lead them and say…

“Yep, this is what I did. Been there, done that.”

If you're taking the problem away from them, you’re not helping them become leaders.

It's easy for us to try to bubble wrap - we don't want to see them struggle.

Sometimes I want to bubble wrap my new teammate, because you know they're going to be going through this journey.

It's an uphill battle to get to where you want to be, no matter where that is.

John C. Maxwell says in The 15 Laws of Growth…

"Everything worthwhile is uphill"

There are always going to be obstacles, you're going to stumble, you're going to fall, you're going to scrape your knees, but if you can be that leader who says…

“It's okay. Now let's put your foot on this rock, let's do this together.”

You're going to develop a leader that has empathy for their team

…so that they know how to develop leaders as well.

They're also resourceful, so they don't feel like…

“Oh man, I need Christine all the time.”

But they will ask us questions.

But they know that I won't take their problem away but I'll work with them together.

It's a very, very powerful thing...

...working with people that understand that other people are human beings.

Things are going to happen.

It's not always going to be done the right way

No worries, learn and apply the Empathetic style and think...

“I'm not going to over-react. I'm going to develop strong leaders.”

You are not telling, you are encouraging, you are sharing your experience, showing them what you did when you went through it.