Churches worry constantly about leadership.

So much energy has been devoted to church leadership, in fact, that two unfortunate messages have been communicated.

One misguided message is that clergy need to be "fixed." Better attitudes, better diets, better health, better teamwork skills, better preaching -- on and on it goes, often under the guise of "clergy wellness," but with the underlying theme that if the church just had better clergy, all would be well.

Churches worry constantly about leadership.

So much energy has been devoted to church leadership, in fact, that two unfortunate messages have been communicated.

One misguided message is that clergy need to be "fixed." Better attitudes, better diets, better health, better teamwork skills, better preaching -- on and on it goes, often under the guise of "clergy wellness," but with the underlying theme that if the church just had better clergy, all would be well.

The other misguided message is that lay leaders need to be "fixed," too. There's less agreement on their faults, like not keeping the clergy in line, not managing money well, not keeping major donors happy, but the message, again, is that lay leadership is a mess.

I agree that "leadership development" is one of the "Seven Key Factors" in nurturing healthy congregations. But I think the fix-it strategy misses the point.

Congregations are complex human systems. Leaders matter, but changing one leader or an entire leadership cadre won't accomplish much. The entire system needs to become healthy, not just the key leaders.

Rather than "fix" anyone, I'd suggest trying these principles:

·         Healthy organizations are "flattening" the organizational chart. Even traditionally pyramidal organizations like the military and corporations find that teams perform well when allowed freedom to function responsibly outside typical command-and-control structures.

·         A healthy church needs an ability to identify contextual changes promptly and to respond to them. Teams and individuals "close to the ground" see more and respond better. 

·         A healthy church avoids centralized control. Instead, the healthy church encourages an open system, where information and ideas flow freely and rapidly, and people organize themselves to deal with needs.

·         Communications need to be open and transparent. No secrets or "in-crowd" knowledge.

·         A healthy church expects its leaders to be innovators, not change-resisters.

Tom Ehrich is a writer, consultant, and leader of workshops. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. The church wellness project may be found at www.churchwellness.com

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wrote on August 14, 2007

Title: Elder This article really makes a point and one which should command a great deal of attention among those who are presently ' change ' oriented. The whole movement to seek change or perhaps better stated induce change, perhaps, in most cases for change's sake is indeed misguided and causing more internal schism and unrest within our churches than it is helping or healing. Incredible time, energy and financial resource has, and is being, directed toward ' change ' and is sending skewed messages which atre in many cases counterproductive. Lets get back to the tried and true basics and begin to grow a new cadre of confident, capable leadership, lay and clergy, that can of their own volition move their churches in new and positive directions and in the process build and renew a bond of trust between those leaders and their congregations. Great article and I hope it gets the readership and attention it commands....JIm Babcock

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