Leading Ideas:  Getting Unstuck (part 2) “ID-ing Catalyzing Leaders”

Orginally published on Monday, December 08, 2008 at 9:19 AM
by Alan E. Nelson

In the last LeadingIdeas, I pointed out that the primary reason that churches find themselves stuck is because they’ve marginalized or run off their catalyzing leaders. These are the people who have the God-given ability to sense where organizations are stuck and are able to strategize ways to move them forward. The typical scenario is that managers or do-gooders get selected to serve on the church board, people who’ve never really led much in their lives, but find themselves in a situation where they can “be in charge.” If and when a catalyst is nominated to serve on the board or even considers the outside chance of volunteering for the role, he looks at the current board, doesn’t spot any other catalysts, and then graciously excuses himself. Fat chance they want to spend endless hours in board meetings, nit-picking over paint chips or micro-managing ministry budgets.

So how do you find these elusive, catalyzing leaders, when you’re surrounded by teaching, relational, and managerial types? The problem is a big one because the old adage is true, “it takes one to know one.” When non-catalyzing leaders try to find catalyzing leaders, they nearly always come up with their own kind. So here’s a cheat sheet of sorts to help you discern who has a catalyzing wiring in your congregation, so that you can seek them out one on one for some loving arm-twisting. Since these people almost never respond to cattle calls from the pulpit or bulletin announcements, and healthy ones rarely volunteer to help (unhealthy controlling types sometimes do), you’ll need to do some personal recruiting. Sounds a lot like Jesus’ approach to disciple-inviting, doesn’t it?

Here are 5 traits for identify catalyzing leaders:

1. They currently supervise at least 10 people in their work; 20 or more is even better. Don’t just look for talented individuals, sole business owners who sell insurance or run a ma and pa type store. People who manage more than a handful of others often have the catalyzing gene.

2. Interview the person and listen for past experience in terms of being in charge of clubs or groups. For example, “I was student body president of my high school.” “I was the captain of our debate team.” “I was the youngest to be promoted to district manager in our company.” In our work with young leaders in KidLead, we’ve found that catalyzing leaders tend to emerge early in life, as early as preschool when socializing distinguishes the followers from the followed.

3. They’ve successfully established ministry teams at church. When you give a catalyzing leader a task, he or she will round up a group of people and gidder done. Others will tend to overwork themselves, stress out over limited resources, and fail to attract others to the cause. They’ll say things such as, “Nobody showed up. Everyone was too busy. People just aren’t committed.” Use your local church as a laboratory to test for those able to catalyze others and accomplish things through teams.

4. They’re talked about when absent or are looked to when in a group. This is the EF Hutton symptom, “when they talk, others listen.” This person may not be brash, outgoing, or an extrovert, but they do carry a presence about them that is noticed when they are absent. Listen for names that get mentioned frequently and look for those who are asked about by others.

5. Look at those in your church who get things outside of the church. Catalyzing leaders can’t not lead. Because most churches don’t have enough room for them to spread their wings, they gravitate toward community, parachurch, or business arenas that recognize and reward them with opportunities. Google, read the paper, and interview those in your church who may be sitting in the back or attending sporadically, to see who is making the chips fly on the outside .

You may find one or two of these indicators in people who aren’t catalyzing leaders, but most catalyzing leaders will have at least four of them, if not all five. When you ID them positively, do your best to cast a personal vision. Better yet, find three or four of them and get them all together at one time. They’ll recognize the trait in each other and when they realize they’re not alone in the church, they’re more apt to hope things really can change. Then, let them go. Don’t tie them down with protocol and constraints. Let the horses run.

Alan E. Nelson
http://www.alanenelson.com
http://www.kidlead.com

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Hi... I'm Todd Rhoades. I'm a Christ-follower, husband, father and I love to connect leaders with other leaders. Hopefully you'll find something here at MMI you like and will return often. If you want, you can find out more about me or follow my every step on Twitter.

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