Leadership: Learning to Say “I Don’t Care”
- Posted on March 24, 2010
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James McDonald has a great post on his blog about how each leader should acquire a sense of, what he calls, 'holy indifference'. These are things that a leader should not care about. The first one: Don't care about criticism from people you don't know...
Here's what James says about this subject:
I don’t care about criticism from people I don’t know. Criticism is helpful and good and I have benefited greatly from it, but hardly ever from a stranger. People close to me give helpful criticism. People I know who differ from me, but who I am in relationship with help me see what those too close might miss. But I just don’t care about grenades thrown by folks I’ve never met and who am not in community with. I could care; I could get wrapped up in responding to every attempt to detonate, but I just can’t waste my caring on that, there are many other more important things to care about.
I wholeheartedly agree. I think an important part of the power of criticism (positive or negative) is being in relationship with the person you are criticizing. If there is no relationship, then put the criticism aside. The truth is... if they're concern is, indeed valid, someone you are in relationship with will bring it to your attention.
What do YOU think?
Todd
You can read more of James' thoughts here...
Comments
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Brian L. on Sat, March 27, 2010
I am most willing to listen to criticism - if it’s from someone actually involved in the ministries of the church.
I am NOT willing to listen to anonymous criticism (or from those who criticize from afar - as in bloggers and such - that’s only happened once). My policy is that if i receive an anonymous letter criticizing me, I won’t even finish reading the letter - it gets tossed. If a person doesn’t have the guts to at least put their name with their concerns, it doesn’t deserve my attention. I’ve told this to my congregation as well.
I’ve told my board that if they get an anonymous letter, they have two choices: 1. Demand a signature from whoever gave it to them (if it was given personally); 2. Sign it themselves and make it their issue. I do not allow anonymous letters to be presented to the board. And even if it’s not anonymous, they must follow Matthew 18 before bringing it to the board. I won’t even allow it on the agenda if it hasn’t gone through proper channels first.
Dictatorial? I don’t think so. Making sure Jesus’ directions are followed (He did know what He was talking about, right?) has to be a priority in these things.
The bottom line is that “faithful are the wounds of a FRIEND, not “faithful are the wounds of gutless anonymous whiners…”
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