21 Oct Engaging Your Staff’s Hands and Heart

Great leaders engage and develop others. Most likely this doesn’t come as a surprise to you. It’s the topic of conferences, mentors, and books everywhere. How do I develop others? It’s a great question. A huge part of being a great leader is finding, developing, and investing in others who can serve alongside you and work to accomplish the vision God has given you long after you’re gone. And a side note, if your vision statement doesn’t outlive you, your vision is WAY TOO SMALL.

But, if you are going to accomplish this as a leader, you must have the right people in the right roles and fully engaged in order to accomplish the vision. Take a moment and read that again.

Leaders must have the right people in the right roles and fully engaged to accomplish the vision.

Now there are quite a few aspects to that statement.

Right People

The first aspect is having the right people for the job. This is talking about the selection process when hiring new staff members for your team. Now, if you’re a pastor you know that this process is one of the most dreaded things that you have to do. Hiring a new staff member is not like picking out a new car or a new phone. It’s a huge decision that can have major impacts on your church both negatively or positively. And frankly, most pastors have little information to go on besides a resume and an interview. And that small amount of information isn’t going to give you the answers to the large, looming questions that you have. Does this person have a strong character and integrity? Will they fit relationally on our team? Do they understand the vision and culture of our church? And will they readily decide to embrace that vision and culture head on or struggle against it? When churches hire the wrong people, it can lead to very messy situations and even church splits. For this reason, you have to take your time and be diligent to make sure you find the right people for your team! Here are 8 awesome tips from the book The Top Ten Leadership Commandments to help you make sure you have the right person.

• New Leader Must Be Balanced

While this may seem like a pretty obvious statement for a new hire, many churches keep focused on skills and abilities and overlook everything else. While it’s important for a leader to be gifted and possess skills and abilities, this will do nothing for your church unless he is also able to maintain healthy relationships with his family, congregation, and other church staff.

• Must Spend Significant Time With New Leader Before Hiring

Most churches focus their time with a potential new hire on interviewing them. But who doesn’t put forward a good face in an interview? If you want to see beyond the resume, you must spend time with the applicant outside of an office. Get coffee, have them be at your side and observe them in different environments.

• Spend a Lot of Time Checking References

Again, past experiences speak volumes as to how the new hire will perform in your church. Take a significant amount of time checking up on references and don’t just ask if they are a good person or if they did a good job because the answer will always be yes. Obviously, their name was given as a reference. Go below surface questions and ask how well balanced they were at their last job.

• Hire for Attitude, Train for Skill

You can always help increase the skills of a new hire, but you certainly can’t change a bad attitude. And once you hire them, that bad attitude is yours to deal with.

• Personal Character

Look for people who have a proven track record, not necessarily of completing tasks, but a track record of character and integrity. They should be actively seeking to learn and grow spiritually and as a person.

• Personal Competence

At the very least, are they qualified to get the job done? While focusing on aspects of integrity and life balance will be of greater importance, you must also ask if they have a certain base level of ability.

• People Chemistry

A new hire MUST get along with the people they will be working with. Period. This person needs to have adequate social skills and be able to easily get along with the people around them. It’s also important that they have a proven track record of being a good team player.

• Perception of Culture

Another important aspect that must be made clear is how the potential hire understands the culture of your church. Chances are, if they already attend your church, they understand your vision and values, but someone coming in from the outside may have a completely different perception of church culture. If they try to accomplish ministry without being on board with the nuts and bolts of who your church is, then they are not going to be set up for success long term.

Right Roles

Now just because someone matches the 8 things outlined above doesn’t mean that you should hire them on the spot. Even a great person will fail if they are placed in a bad environment or if they are not placed in the proper role. In the book Good to Great, Jim Collins talks about not only having the right people on the bus, but having the right people in the right seats. As leaders, you must not only examine the potential hire, but you also need to see if you have a specific role that their talents, abilities, and passions fulfill. If not, then they are not the right person to have in the seat. Placing someone in the wrong seat only leads to frustrations for you and the new hire. In order to get this right, you have to take your time. It’s always better to have a long term vacancy than a long term pain in your butt.

Fully Engaged

Getting the right people in the right roles is the first step in getting them fully engaged. But it doesn’t stop there. If you want to take your team to the next level you must get them engaged with more than just their hands. Hands mean that they’re just doers. You see them as people who get things done whether they be programs, projects, whole ministries, or delegated tasks. They exist to check off tasks on your list. But your staff should not be seen as people to fill slots or positions so that the church can function. They are so much more than that!

Look to engage both their heads and their hearts. Every person on your team has a brain, a unique point of view and they can think for themselves. When you begin to tap into that, you make them feel like they are valued and it can reaffirm that their ideas are helpful. At that moment, you start engaging their hearts and now they have more of a reason to buy-in. They become passionate about it because they are personally invested in it. In turn, they’re gonna give more and do more for your team and organization.

For more on this and to find out what the secret is, check out our video on The Secret!