Tag Archive - train

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3 Expectations that Young Church Leaders need to Change Today

Sunday, March 27, 2016

A lot has been written in recent years about the Millennial Generation and young leaders; most of it negative. At the risk of sounding like the old guy in the room, I’ll admit, it does seem like the expectations of young leaders are a little off the mark. In fact, here are three expectations in particular that I think young leaders need to change today if they want to be successful in the future.

1. Mentoring & Development

Most talented young leaders are looking for someone to invest in and develop them, and rightly so. The only problem is leaders aren’t walking around looking to invest in people. They’re too busy leading big stuff. If you’re a young leader looking for development then don’t wait for someone to come along and take you under their wing. Chase someone who has what you’re looking for until you catch them.

2. Timeline

Most young leaders expect to be placed into significant leadership positions with great influence very quickly. Unfortunately landing that dream job in the church is probably going to take you longer than you think. Yes, you’re probably talented, and yes the church could probably benefit from your leadership influence. But trust is built up close and over time. And trust is the fuel that leadership runs on. Build trust and you’ll accelerate your leadership timeline.

3. Work Ethic

Most young leaders underestimate the amount of sheer work it will take to get where they want to go. Church leadership is not for the faint of heart, or for the lazy. Successfully pastoring in a growing local church setting isn’t a 40-hour a week; punch the time clock kind of a gig. It’s going to take real work, hard work. You’ll have to endure moments of hurt and disappointment. And you’ll have to have the tenacity to not give in. And keep working.

Interested in learning more about leading young leaders in the church today? Check out these 10 Articles that will help your church develop young leaders.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

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5 Symptoms Your Church Needs More Volunteers

Sunday, September 20, 2015

I’ve never worked with a church that has said they don’t need more volunteers. But I’ve worked with a bunch of churches that have trouble getting people to volunteer and stay engaged volunteering.

Through our research at the Unstuck Group we’ve discovered that the average church in America has 43% of their adults and students volunteering somewhere in the church. Follow this link if you’re interested in learning if your church is healthy in this area and others.

While a lot of churches need more volunteers, most don’t know why they need more volunteers, or why it’s difficult for them to enlist and keep new volunteers.

1. Your “span of care” is too broad

If you can’t care for your volunteers, you’re not going to keep your volunteers very long. Because they’ll begin to sense that you want something from them not for them. In business-world Fortune 500 CEOs usually only have seven direct reports. That’s probably a great rule of thumb for ministry-world as well. A simple way to figure this out in your context is to add up the number of volunteers and then divide by the number of staff and volunteer leaders. If the result is more than seven, then you have a span of care issue and you need more leaders.

2. You have too many staff

One symptom I see over and over again in churches that struggle with building an effective volunteer ministry is that they are over-staffed. Instead of paying staff to lead, develop, and disciple people in the church they pay the staff to do the ministry. The research we’ve done at the Unstuck Group working with literally 100’s of churches has shown us that if you’re staffed at a ratio higher than 1:100 (1 FTE Staff Member for every 100 people attending your church) you’re overstaffed.

3. Every decision comes back to your desk

If every decision is coming back to your desk you haven’t figured out how to empower people. Empowering people first starts with clarifying the mission, vision, values and strategy. It means clearly articulating the role for volunteers, helping them understand how to make decisions that help the church move towards its vision, and then moving people from doing tasks to leading their teams.

4 Using people instead of developing people

Many churches I’ve observed view volunteering as roles to be filled instead of people to be developed. Here’s what I know, when you’re primarily focused on the number of volunteers you have and the ratios you have in classrooms you’ll never have enough volunteers. On the other hand when you primarily focus volunteers as people to be developed and discipleship, you’re far less likely to have a volunteer shortage. Because after all volunteering is discipleship.

5. It’s Difficult to get Involved

The number one complaint I hear from people who want to volunteer in churches who don’t is that they’ve tried to volunteer, they’ve signed up, they want to but they don’t know how to get involved, it was hard to get involved (they had to take multiple classes or be a member of the church prior to volunteering), or no one ever called them back. Does your church make it easy or difficult for people to get involved and start volunteering?

Posted in Leadership, Volunteers

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The Freshmen Get Smaller Every Year

Sunday, December 7, 2014

I took a trip down memory lane this weekend. I spent some time back east consulting with a great church in my hometown of Stafford, VA. It’s been 20 years since the last time I was in Stafford. And while I was there I took a minute to drive around a bit; and let me tell you a lot has changed in 20 years! I felt like I could get lost in my own hometown! I went by the house I grew up in and even past the High School I graduated from. First thing that came into my mind? “I remember my High School being a lot bigger than that.” And then another thought raced into my mind. It was a statement from a conversation that I had with Larry Osborne when he said to me, “The freshmen get smaller every year.” In other words every year there is a new freshman class. Every year as you get older they seem to get smaller, weirder, and more clueless. And somehow the older you get the more it seems you were never that small, that weird, or that clueless. But you and I know better, don’t we?

The best leaders I’ve ever been around know there’s great value in hanging out with the “freshmen.” In fact here are a couple of things I’ve seen some great seasoned leaders do over the years to invest in the next generation leaders.

1. Surround yourself with Young Talent

Not so they can admire how experienced and how incredible you are. You don’t need groupies. But so you can invest in them. Spend time with them, let them ask questions and simply talk about leadership. Let them see you lead up close and personal. And then debrief with them about what you did and why. Share with them your greatest leadership struggles, challenges, failures and successes.

2. How Young Can you go with your Next Hire?

When you are getting ready to make that next hire ask yourself, “How young can we go with this hire and not jeopardize the job that needs to get done?” It’s a simple question that will force you to think differently about bringing young talent onto the team. And frankly, it’s a question that I wish I started asking a long time ago.

3. Invite Young Talent to the Adult Table

Thanksgiving was just a couple of weeks ago. And if your house is similar to mine you had a kids table and an adult table. In leadership the same is often true. One of the most simple and overlooked opportunities to develop young talent is to periodically invite young talent to the adult table. Let them sit in Sr. Leadership meetings and see how the top leaders in your organization or church think, problem solve, interact with one another, make decisions and well, lead. This kind of access is an incredible gift to a young up an coming leader.

4. Remember to Tell Yourself the Truth

No matter how good you were as a young leader, you weren’t as good as you remember yourself being, you just weren’t. And neither was I. The further you and I get away from being a young leader the more we think, “I was never that small, I was never that weird, I was never that clueless.” Tell yourself the truth and instead of criticizing the freshmen why don’t you choose to hang out with them and invest in them?

Photo Credit: Russ Allison Loar via Compfight cc

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

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3 Challenges that Every Young Leader Faces

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Young leaders face all kinds of challenges. But there are 3 challenges in particular that all young leaders face early on. If not handled well these three challenges can lead to stress, anxiety, insecurity and frustration. Add all of that up and you’ve got a recipe designed to not only undermine your current leadership role but keep you from growing as a leader.

1. Leading People who are Older than You

It can be very intimidating as a young leader to be given the task to lead people who are the age of your parents or grandparents. The Apostle Paul understood this leadership challenge when he wrote to a young leader by the name of Timothy:

“Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.” I Timothy 4:12

Paul challenges Timothy to realize that he is personally responsible for how he behaves as a young leader regardless of what others may think. That he is responsible for what happens in him as a young leader, regardless of what is happening to him. The best approach I’ve seen young leaders take is to take on a posture of humility and then deliver on what they say they are going to do. In other words, produce. Let your play on the field do your talking for you. There is no faster way to earn respect and trust than to do what you say you’re going to do, follow through, and show yourself trustworthy.

2. A Shallow Leadership Well

Often young leaders don’t know what to do because they haven’t done it before. Leadership isn’t learned in a classroom it’s learned by leading. The unfortunate thing is young leaders come with an inherent lack of experience. And the only way to get leadership experience is to lead. But you can deepen your leadership well and, “go to school,” so to speak on others experience. Listening to leadership podcasts, reading blogs on leadership, reading books on leadership, getting in a leadership coaching network, surrounding yourself with other leaders, get face-time with experienced leaders ask questions and then just listen. Get as much “leadership” poured into you as you can as a young leader. These are all things you can do as a young leader to deepen your leadership well.

3. Impatience

Young leaders simply don’t have enough “time in” to understand the value of timing. I get it. I too used to get frustrated about the whole, “finding joy in the journey,” thing. I wanted to make a first down, score a touchdown and win! There’s nothing wrong with ambition, a love for progress, and a deep desire to move people from where they are to where you know God wants them to be. But the right decision, at the right time, executed right way; by the right person is the right thing. Impatience has a tendency to mess all that up.

Interested in learning more about Young Leaders in the Church? Check out these resources:

1. How to Identify Young Leaders in the Church

2. How to Develop Young Leaders

3. Leadership Lessons I Wish I Understood as a Young Leader

Photo Credit: NikonGirl1969 via Compfight cc

Posted in Leadership

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How to Develop Young Leaders

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Volumes have been written about investing in and developing young leaders. While there are a lot of great resources out there I think often times we over-complicate what it means to develop young leaders. In fact here are four simple steps that Sr. Level Leaders can take to invest in the next generation of leaders.

Invite Them to the Big Table

Remember sitting at the kids’ table during Thanksgiving dinner growing up? A simple way to invest in young leaders is to invite them to the big table. Give them access to attend Sr. Leadership Team meetings and see how seasoned leaders work with one another and make high level leadership decisions.

Take Them With You

One of the easiest and most overlooked opportunities Sr. Leaders have to invest in the next generation of leaders is to simply take them with you. Meetings, trips, speaking engagements, training opportunities, etc. Just let them be around you and watch you do what you do, the conversations you have and the decisions you make. Then let them ask questions and debrief what they observed.

Resource Them

Resource them with books, articles, blogs, and trainings that support the thinking, behaviors, and culture your church is trying to build. But don’t leave it there. Make sure you take the time to discuss key leanings and applications.

Give Them Opportunities

The best kind of training is on the job training. And leadership isn’t learned in a classroom…it’s learned by leading. Identify, create, and give young leaders the opportunity to lead small projects.

Having Difficulty Identifying Young Leaders on Your Team? A good place to start is before every hire you make or every volunteer you place begin asking yourself, “How young can we go with this next hire or volunteer placement and still get the job done?” Questions like this will begin to shift the thinking of your Sr. Leaders. Which will result in changing the behaviors of your church or organization.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing
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