Five Things You Should Never Hear From a Staff Member
- Posted by: Todd
- Posted on: Tue, March 04, 2008
- Viewed 65
- (20) comments so far
These are just the quotes. Perry goes into much more detail here.
Here they are:
1. “That’s not my job”
2. “That can’t be done”
3. “All I need is more staff and money to make this happen”
4. “Recognize me!”
5. “My ministry needs ________ to… and if we don’t, then...”
Any thoughts?
Todd
Today, Perry Noble shares five things that he thinks you should never hear from a staff member. Any of you who know Perry, know that he has surrounded himself with an unbelievable team the is united behind the vision and mission of NewSpring Church. I love it when Perry articulates things like this because I think it can be helpful to so many churches that God has given him influence with. Take a look at his list and see what you think:
Comments
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Leonard on Tue, March 04, 2008
I have one too…
How come you never have too… or why doesn’t her/she have too…
Those are killers for a team as well. I have an amazing staff and have never heard or felt any of those things from them.
GR Guy on Tue, March 04, 2008
The only one I might disagree with is #3 . . .
“All I need is more staff and money to make this happen” .
I think there are times when $$$ or lack of staff could be legitimate obstacles. I think that needs to be considered. Leadership can’t ask staff to do something without giving them the resources to do it. Of course, it should also be a goal of the staff to try to come up with creative solutions to obstacles as well.
Eric Joppa on Tue, March 04, 2008
I understand the notion that “that can’t be done” is a statement of a lack of vision or even a fear of hard work, but are there times, and I am asking because I am curious, when someone might try to bite off more than they can chew and they need to hear that they aren’t equipped to pull off what they want?
Case in point, in the summer, around July, our staff sat down to plan our Christmas Eve services. We came up with a great idea for our theme and program, and began to run with it.
We are a church of 250 +/- adults. so the pool of help is smaller than in a larger church, so we went to friends and acquaintances outside our church/staff. The more we talked through our idea and shared our vision with the people we brought in to help, it would change, they would write a script based on their interpretation of our desires. As a result, we kept needing to say “no” to some help and enlist others.
All of this pushed our start of the project and we got to a point that it became less likely that we could finish what we wanted on time, and it would not have been quality. In the end we did something that worked and it was great. God totally blessed the service and it has been a momentum pusher for us.
My point is, that someone had to say, “...I am beginning to think that we can’t do this.”
Is this ever a realistic statement, or is it just a taboo all together?
I try to never use that kind of a sentence. I might say… there might be something that we can do more effectively, or this might work better than that. But isn’t there a time that you have to be able to say, We can’t, or I can’t?
-E
Tye Male on Tue, March 04, 2008
Great list!!! But here’s a twist…
One thing staff should never hear their leader say:
1. My staff….
That’s it.
Rich Kirkpatrick on Tue, March 04, 2008
I like the concepts here. You WILL NOT hear these things if you lead well and have the right people on the team in the right places and if your church is doing really well.
I do think a wise staff person does have to say “no” or “we can’t” but in this way…
“Yes. We can do this. However, this means we stretch ourselves so thin the consequences will hurt…FILL IN BLANK.”
Often, some leaders have a hard time with cost-benefit discussion, but they indeed are legitimate. Yes is the answer, but pastors, please acknowledge the cost of what you are asking—it could be stress on families, taking of resources from key areas of ministry, or simply 90 hour weeks.
Mark Triplett on Tue, March 04, 2008
Great point Rich. I’ve always dealt with others on staff in when I say “I can’t” it really means “I can’t” not “I won’t”. I say I can’t do this because of other commitments or you’ve given me too short on the deadline. When I say I can’t, 90% of the time it’s followed by the phrase, “But let’s see what can be done instead.
I’ve always tried to present options instead of excuses.
Peter Hamm on Tue, March 04, 2008
Here’s one.
“But we’ve always _____________”
Eric Joppa on Tue, March 04, 2008
Mark and Rich,
I agree with you. As I said above, I understand that you don’t want a defeatist of your team, and statements like “that can’t be done” point to that type of attitude, however I think that there times that “I can’t” or “We can’t” are appropriate to say. Other commitments, too short a dead line and a quality output are, IMHO some of those things.
I attended a Christmas Eve service in which the church had a choir. They didn’t normally have one, the guy leading it had never done it before, there were less than 12 in it and less than half could actually sing. That just screamed “this can’t be done!” the entire time.
Sometimes you have to say “that can’t be done”. Having an attitude of that can’t be done, is different than thinking thru a course of action, and deciding that it isn’t feasible are very different. That phrase just has a stigma.
any mouse on Tue, March 04, 2008
1. “That’s not my job”
BUT…what do you do with a leader who fails to see that you’re doing your job, up to your ears in it, and insists on assigning immediate tasks that are way outside the scope of your job, just because you happen to be the closest one to him at that second, and will jeopardize the task you are doing at the moment?
3. “All I need is more staff and money to make this happen”
In the technology arena where I play, it does take money. Very often there is a significant dollar amount attached which the leadership doesn’t recognize, and doesn’t want to hear about. So when I say No, it’s seen as a failure on my part.
Brian on Tue, March 04, 2008
A spiritual way of putting number one is, “I don’t want to do anything outside of my giftedness”.
That’s a biggie with me. Why? Because every Christian leader has to suck it up and do things outside their area of giftedness at one point or another. If someone says that, then they are either 1) Way too prideful about their gifts or 2) think they are above menial tasks and are trying to find a spiritual-sounding excuse to get out of it.
Jade on Wed, March 05, 2008
I would the top five would have been different. Other than on a secular level though I have never had staff. So hard to say. I have volunteers though.
The conflict would depend on the situation I guess. As a staff member I hate hearing, “Well you have not been hear long enough to know ____________.”
HBG on Mon, March 10, 2008
Something the staff should never hear: I’m the No. 1 person here.
Lay person on Mon, March 10, 2008
As a lay person, here is my take:
<ol>
<li> If you lead by example in this regard - doing what needs to be done regardless if you’re the pastor/leader or not, you won’t generally hear those who work in the organization say it either. (and you don’t have to say it isn’t your job, you can do it by showing this attitude)
</li>
<li>This is a little tougher as the context is relevant - asking someone to complete a 20 hour task in 4 hours is asking for something that can’t be done. (ok, I’ve seen this) - asking for a task without equipping the person is another way (clear the snow covered walkway without any tools, now, before service starts in an hour - again, seen this type of request asked). Also, asking for things outside the control of the person being asked (say, like IT stuff with external providers, again, seen it)
</li>
<li>While everything is possible with God, humans have limits to what they can accomplish with the provided resources. Asking for a hollywood studio production website with no budget and no workers capable of the graphics means more money and workers are needed. (seen this too…) Likewise, asking for a security detail of one person to cover a 70,000 sq foot building seems like more money and more people would be needed. (as God has yet to clone lay workers in any church I’ve seen nor provide telepathic communications between workers either)
</li>
<li>I totally agree, I greatly dislike seeing people raised up for praise when it is the Lord I come to worship. So, if the pastor’s team makes it a practice for some workers, than other workers will desire the same thing. My recommendation, don’t do it for anyone or do it as a group (the IT team, the helping hands ministry, the parking lot crew, etc) - oh, and, please don’t do it for yourselves - I can’t stand it when a pastor is stuck on himself. this also includes name dropping (i.e. I was talking to blah blah blah, a really famous book author)
</li>
<li>Anyone who does this should be fired. If you’re ministry needs are genuine, God will provide. Letting the pastors know about the direction of the ministry and possible points the ministry could connect with more people to get the prayed about results done is OK, but it shouldn’t ever be a demand.</li>
</ol>
My biggest issue with such lists are that pastors unfit to manage their organizations can use such things to abuse workers - and the workers usually don’t know when they are being abused until disaster strikes. It usually starts of incrementally and eventually ends up with extremely high staff turnover, broken marriages, chewed up Christians spit out of the system and so on. I’m still recovering from the last encounter with such a church (going on two years afterwards). It is hard to trust my current pastor as I second guess the true intentions of his heart (which, so far, have proven to be pure - as I slowly get involved again) - it has made me skeptical and suspicious of clergy.
Oliver on Mon, March 10, 2008
ok- I will try to keep this civil, To be successful, do the exact opposite of that list, and I will guarantee success!. What is funny is that the current conventional business from the marketplace goes against this list. Corporate america is learning what happens when 1. untrained and incompetent people are given job to do they are not qualified for and shouldn’t be doing, 2 management asks the impossible and won’t listen otherwise, 3 projects are underfunded, 4. people are not given proper credit and 5. workers aren’t listened to.
Grant Mathes on Mon, March 10, 2008
The staff members I have had in the past were given these 5 questions or ones similiar. They wer told before they were hired, “You can say any one of these phrases. The moment that you do, you will need to find another job. There is no place for someone who is not willing to work, be a good steward, or at least try to see the big picture.” I am sorry, time & resources are to valuable to be wasted on people who refuse to be true servant leaders.
Grant Mathes
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