Conflicting Leadership Roles

Migel is starting a new church and he's frustrated. "I feel like I can't win," he says. "Things are changing fast, yet we don't have the people to run things. We've got to get some systems in place, but there's no time or people to do it. So, I work on building capacity, but things fall apart in the meantime, and when I 'invest' in people, the other ministry slows down."

Migel is experiencing the conflicting nature of leadership roles. He must lead in multiple ways that are in conflict with each other.

Four Leadership Roles
Four roles, the necessary ingredients for leadership. You can't avoid any of the roles. And you must do them all at the same time.

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Questions for Decision-Making

It's said that 90% of decision-making is based on emotions. I see most decision-making as a product of our underlying motivations: we want something, or we want to avoid something.

Motivations based on social status, security, or pleasure lurk under the surface of the decision-making process. By drawing out motivations you can help people to make better decisions.

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The Power of "In Here" Coaching

Change is essential in life. Growth is change, so is decline. There's no avoiding change.

We all want change, but we want others to do the changing or at least change first! It reminds me of Sallah from Raiders of the Lost Ark: "Asps, very dangerous - you go first." Without knowing it, we can expend a great deal of energy avoiding change.

Goals and problems can be approached from many different directions. Some approaches seek to change things "out there" and some to seek to change things "in here," that is, inside the client.

Read the whole article here, then come back and leave a comment.

My Journey into Coaching

This month I'd like to share a bit of my journey into coaching. I'm not naturally good at coaching. It was out of desperation to lead in empowering, non-directive ways that I began to learn how to coach.

Read the whole article here.

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The Myth of the Expert

In the cross-cultural ministry world, many field leaders and workers hold to the Expert Theory. This theory says that if a person hasn't become fluent in the local language, planted an indigenous church, or out-performed and out-lasted others in ministry, then they are not qualified to lead others.

Some try to use the Expert Theory to determine who is qualified to coach others.

My perspective is different. Read the whole article here, then leave a comment below.