A Passion for Leadership 8
Peter Corney, the joint editor of ‘A Passion for Leadership’ makes his second contribution in:
Chapter Eight: Leaders and Teams (Peter Corney)
Peter knows, through many years of leading large ministry teams, the challenges but great opportunities presented by team ministry. As Peter says at the start of this chapter, “The NT pattern of ministry is teams! Monoministry is nowhere to be found in the NT.”
Peter provides some useful tips on:
- recruiting teams
- recruiting principles. Eg. Don’t assess based on the CV – check references, thoroughly!
A useful diagram is provided summarising the changing role played by the team leader with increasing size of staff and organisation. A growing church requires the leader to spend increasing time on ministry rather than in ministry. The chapter does not elaborate on the tensions that this typically produces, especially for the congregation (s) but also sometimes for the leader. This is unfortunate as the author has a large reservoir of acquired wisdom in leading churches. Peter does summarise what ‘on ministry‘ includes:
- vision casting
- strategising
- planning
- creating structures for empowerment of others
- recruiting and training leaders
- motivating and communicating with key lay leaders.
He concludes with nine ‘wants’ of team members from their leaders. You can check out your own list against those identified – chapter eight is actually provided on the author’s own web site here.
As Peter says, if you find this article useful, purchase the book!