I was talking to a church planter the other day, and he asked me what seemed to be like
a basic question, but in truth, it was a crucial question that all of us who lead churches
or organizations need to wrestle with.
He asked me this.
How do you define leader?
Well, stay tuned because today, I'm going to tell you why that's such a great question
and give you my definition of what a leader is.
Hey, guys.
This is Mac Lake, bringing you tips, tools and techniques to help you develop more and
better leaders.
What is a leader?
When this young man asked me that question the other day, I looked at him, I said, "That
is a great question," because I think so many times, what we do is we put someone in
a leadership position and we expect them to do the work but not lead a team.
Our greater expectation is they do the work.
I define a leader as someone who leverages their relational influence with a team of
people to get the right things accomplished through those people, but often, when we put
someone in a leadership position, we don't care if they lead through others.
We just want them to make sure the work gets done, regardless of how it gets done, even
if that means they do it themselves.
Here's what happens.
When you allow that to happen, when you allow a leader to develop those bad habits of doing
rather than leading, then all of a sudden, it weakens leadership.
If we don't establish the expectation of leading through others, then they may become a doer
rather than a leader.
I work with dozens of churches and organizations each year, and one of the biggest things I
hear from them is, "Our leaders are doers rather than leaders.
They're always stuck in the weeds doing things rather than leading through others."
I remember when I was a church planter, I quickly discovered the critical value of lay
leaders.
In the beginning of our church plant, we had no money, no resources, very little time,
but we had some amazing volunteer leaders, who became my most valuable asset.
We established a leadership team of seven point people right from the beginning to oversee
the primary ministries of the church.
While I knew that was a wise thing to do, I didn't have the wisdom or I didn't have
a clue about what I wanted these leaders to do.
About a year in, I wasn't real satisfied with the way they were leading.
I knew something was wrong, and I knew it was my fault.
I realized I had not given them a good definition of what a leader is and what I expect of them.
That's when I sat down and I wrote out a description of what I wanted them to do.
I literally spelled it out for them.
Their job was to be leaders, L-E-A-D-E-R-S.
I told them, "My expectation for you is to provide the following seven things for
your team."
I want to share those with you because I think this spells out really a good definition of
leader and what we should be expecting from our leaders.
L is leadership development.
I said, "I want you to provide initial and ongoing training for the members of your ministry
team.
You're responsible for doing leadership development for your team."
E is empowerment.
I said, "I want you to delegate the roles and responsibilities that ensure your ministry
area is operating effectively.
I don't want you to do it.
I want you to empower others to do the work."
A is affirmation.
Encourage your team members in the use of their gifts, their strengths, their passion,
walk around, catch people doing things right, always affirming them.
That's what leaders do.
D is direction.
I want you to cast a clear and compelling vision for your area ministry that's in alignment
with the overall vision of the church.
E is evaluation.
I told them, I said, "I want you to lead your team through regular evaluations, identifying
your team's strengths, identifying your growth areas, and always working towards a plan for
continual improvement."
R is recruitment.
I said, "I want to see you working with your team members, to continually enlist new
volunteers and adequately staff your area of ministry."
The last one is S, soul care.
I said, "Man, I want to see you guys encourage the spiritual health, the spiritual development
of those on your team."
This is what leaders do.
Providing this simple, little job description, these seven little points gave my leaders
a great definition and clarity of expectation that they needed to lead effectively.
It also gives you a great tool to evaluate and coach them in their leadership role.
Let me give you three things you can do to apply this to your own church or your own
organization.
Number one, make the leader's description a part of your leader's job description.
Just go ahead and insert the L-E-A-D-E-R-S in their job description.
Go over that with your existing leaders and always share it with any of your new leaders.
Number two, use these seven areas for ongoing training topics for your leaders.
Pick one of the topics.
Put together a little training, and focus on that one area, and just do continual development
so they're always growing as leaders.
Number three, use it for evaluation.
Go over these seven points in a one-on-one meeting with them to ask them how they're
doing or share those seven points when you're meeting with them in a huddle and say, "Hey,
guys.
Let's take some time to evaluate ourselves.
Where are we strong?
Where are we weak as leaders in these things?"
Now, listen.
You don't have to use my definition of leader, but the important thing is you're providing
clarity about what you expect for those you put in leadership roles because when you don't
provide clarity of expectations, I promise you, you are going to experience frustrations,
and they're going to experience frustrations, and you're not going to get the leadership
results you want in your areas of ministry.
Make sure you spell out, however you do it, spell out what a leader is and clarify the
expectations for those that are leading in your organization.
Thanks again for joining me today.
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Thanks again for joining me, and I'll see you next time.
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