Developing Leadership and Team - the Key to sustained growth
"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another."(Proverbs 27:17)
"Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labour: If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up." (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10)
John Maxwell famously coined the phrase "Everything rises or falls on leadership." It's true. What is also true is that leadership needs a functional team to operate within.
Forming and then developing those teams is fundamental to growth, and is the visual aid to the culture of the organisation. As the church goes through different growth stages, the function of the team can morph, whilst the culture of the team doesn't, it matures.
Building in progressive leadership development that can identify new potential, empower it and release it transforms churches from being stagnant to being fruitful. Although a curriculum can be formed (mine was the leadership academy) it has to be flexible to keep pace the church's growth and changes in the prevailing culture.
With a myriad of resource, some of the basic teaching that has consistently recurred covers such topics as:
- The difference between leadership and management.
- Managing disappointment
- Level one leadership
- Team dynamics
- Characteristics of leadership.
- Managing yourself
- Developing vision and strategy
- Communication
The above said, sometimes it is helpful for an organisational outsider to analyse the situation and offer potential solutions. I have worked both in the UK and overseas with church leadership training in "one-off" scenarios where I am given a brief, and also in longer-term scenarios wherewith the church SLT a curriculum has been developed and presented over time.
Denominational leaders and Senior pastors references can be found here.