More thoughts on leadership accountability
I never cease to be amazed at our penchant for self-deception–especially when it clouds our view of reality in regards to our leadership. A leader I once worked for often told me. “Don’t ever believe your own press–good or bad. When the Lord helps us to accomplish a few things a crowd may gather & start patting us on the back. If we’re not careful we can soon lose our focus and start believing that we are indispensable or entitled to special favors–don’t ever believe it! It’s never really about us, but it’s ALLWAYS about HIM and the people He has called us to serve.” I’ve found his advice to be so true.
Leaders today, if they are to be truly trustworthy, should be both honest and accountable. The successful leader often is able to surround himself with persons who learn to help accomplish his mission and insulate him from distractions. Sometimes the leader loses touch with reality or for various reasons may begin to lose his way. He needs those around him to help him stay on course and not lose his bearings. He desperately needs someone to give him honest and accurate feedback in regards to his actions and their impact upon his team and those he would try to lead. The problem is that few people, save perhaps those who have a negative motive, would be honest or courageous enough to overcome the discomfort and even danger that could be needed to confront the leader…especially if the leader was in their direct chain of command. In some organizations to tell the leader the truth could be misunderstood. Unfortunately, the higher a leader rises in an organization the more he is in need of someone to ‘speak the truth in love’ and the less likely someone will give him honest and immediate feedback regarding his words and his actions. This kind of open two-way communication is desperately needed in order to ensure the leader gets honest feedback and does not yield to the temptation to become careless with the truth.
So who will be the leaders accountability team. How can we, if the need arises’ tell the emperor he has no clothes. I’d like to suggest that modern technology and culture has brought us a potential tool to help deal with this…..more to follow.
Courage | Robert A. Moore, Jr. October 14, 2009
1 Comment to “More thoughts on leadership accountability”
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By Ray Waldo, October 14, 2009 @ 7:27 am
During my two interruptions in pastoral ministry, I learned a lot about the type of “insulated leadership” that you describe. I found that the same things that I had said previously from the pulpit sounded quite different when sitting on the pew.
I believe that when a pastor is able to give all of his time to the church (a very desirable situation that I endorse), he or she has a tendency to get isolated into what I call the “glory world.” It is a place where we have time to study God’s Word and pray and get in touch with God – every day. And, although that is possible (and desirable) for EVERY Christian, it is not the norm.
The people we minister to each Sunday have spent the entire week fighting the devil – in the person of their supervisor and/or co-worker or someone that they have to deal with every day. When Sunday comes around, he/she is spiritually exhausted and the most spirituality that they feel they can muster is to just get up, get dressed and go to church. And maybe, the pastor can help them get through another week that is coming up in the morning!
When we see these folks, we (having been in our “glory world”) expect them to be just as spiritual as we are (let me interject here that we too sometimes are not as “spiritual” as we feel we must demonstrate to the congregation) and ready to jump right into worship with “both feet.” And it just ain’t gonna happen! (Can I get a witness here?)
I posted an article on the Chief Shepherd that expands these comments. If you would care to read that one,
http://chiefshepherd.com/2009/10/glory-world/