Diamond Leadership
Have you considered that leading an organization or team is multi-faceted like a diamond? The sides of leadership consist of managing resources, planning, vision-casting, administration, and much more! But your most important resource is people. The people on your team can be a beautiful, effective tool in your hand and, at the same time, be the most challenging facet! Can you relate? Leadership of people can prove difficult and complex, and no leader is exempt. Let us help you!
Every staff member is unique. Backgrounds vary. Levels and places of education differ, and they have a diversity of life experiences. Their strengths and weaknesses are customized, while their potential is unlimited.
What each of these people share is that they are indispensable to accomplishing God’s master plan in and through their unique work. These are the people who comprise the staff. Working individually, they probably will accomplish many good things, but collectively, working as a team, they can achieve even greater things. Executive leaders are entrusted with the task of building this talented collection of humanity into an effective team. Sound exciting? You better believe it! One taste of genuine teamwork and you are hooked for life.
But being hooked on a concept and being successful in its application can be two very different realities. How do leaders and pastors effectively build and lead a growing team of staff members? It is integral to understand, assess, and capitalize on some essential components of leadership—the unique qualities of your team, shaping the heart of a team leader, evaluating the priorities of leadership, developing your lifelong leadership skills, recruiting an effective team, and how to develop and manage a team.
At the outset, consider if your team is fulfilling this working definition of a team: A group of people with complementary skills, ongoing communication, and collaborative spirits who are committed to a shared purpose and hold each other accountable.
Don’t despair if your team is not ideal. From fishermen to tax collectors, Jesus’ disciples were hardly the ideal team. Yet they were bound together in a cause that was bigger than they were. In an upper room in Jerusalem, He imparted His Spirit to make them the most dynamic team in history, one that would turn the world upside down. Just as a “team” of horses pulls a plow across the field before the farmer can plant seeds, so too you are yoked together with your team members to bring about a great harvest. It’s time to strategically get in the harness with your teammates and pull.
God has called you to lead the team. It will require patience, godly wisdom, and an overarching desire to see not only overall objectives fulfilled, but also a desire to invest your life in the development of your team members, to see them fulfill their potential as people and as fellow workers for the mission. Teamwork is God’s design.