Creating a Leadership Culture

Back in April several members of our leadership team had the opportunity to sit in on a Q&A session with the lead pastor of a church that is much larger than New Life. During the session someone asked, “Which do you think is more important as church leaders: casting vision or setting the leadership culture in your church?”

Without hesitation the pastor said, “Culture kicks vision’s butt every, single time.” I’ve thought about that statement frequently over the past several months, because leaders often tell one another that casting vision is the leader’s most important task. After all, if the company doesn’t know whether it’s headed, how is it going to get there? If the church doesn’t know what it means to “win,” how will it know if it has? Vision is vital when leading any organization, because the people within the organization need to know why it exists before they will get on board with how to get there.

Having said that, the leadership culture within an organization determines what are and are not acceptable allegiances, attitudes and efforts, and since those are the only three things we can control, developing a culture that lends direction to what is and isn’t acceptable is crucial. For example, if you’re leading a business, and your R&D department has the attitude that no matter what they do they will always be behind your competitors, you have a major problem. If you’re leading a church and your youth ministry department or leader has decided that the best way to get young people to come is to align with the most popular rock bands (or whatever kind of music is popular in your area), and to reflect their attitudes and beliefs, you may well attract a crowd, but to what end?

One of the things we say often at New Life is that any paid leader must come “with the batteries included.” We learned that phrase from Michael Hyatt, but the concept is easy to understand. If someone is being paid to lead in your organization, whether it’s a business, a community organization or a church and you have to push them to exert the necessary effort to succeed that’s a major problem. That kind of attitude and effort is contagious. It will poison a culture if it’s permitted to exist. Sometimes we don’t want to appear to be harsh or uncaring, particularly in the church, so we permit that kind of behavior to continue longer than it ought to be permitted, which isn’t long. We hope the person will change, or perhaps we even challenge the person to change, but we don’t set specific standards and enforce them, so the person continues to poison the culture with his or her weak performance.

If you’re thinking this sounds cold coming from a pastor, remember this: the Church of Jesus Christ represents the God of the universe, and one day each of us will give an account of our leadership to Him. (I know you might not believe this statement, but for those of us who do, what more do we need in order to be motivated to develop a culture of excellence in every area of our churches?) That means if we have responsibility for a direct report who is not motivated, or who is exhibiting behaviors that are in direct contradiction to our organization’s culture we must address those behaviors sooner rather than later. (That last statement is part of an organization’s culture, because over time it becomes clear to staff whether there is accountability for their behavior and actions, whether the expectations are clear and will be enforced, or whether the policies and procedures are just pieces of paper that have been developed to satisfy an agenda item in the organization’s to do list.)

If you haven’t given much thought to the concept of your organization’s culture, it is essential that you sit down and do so. This is something that will take time, because you must come to clarity on what constitutes a win for you, and what personal qualities as well as processes and procedures are necessary and acceptable in obtaining that win. One of the things we realized we want to have as part of our culture at New Life, but don’t have yet is an ability to celebrate our wins. We attain wins often, because we have identified what they are, but after we accomplish one our tendency is to move on to the next goal rather than stopping to celebrate. We addressed that during our 15th anniversary in July, and did a great job of celebrating, but taking time once in 15 years does not constitute a culture of celebrating our wins. We’ll continue to address that area until it becomes part of our culture and then we’ll add it to our staff culture document. Yes, we have a staff culture document. More on that tomorrow.

Here’s to leading better, by taking time to consider our organization’s culture and if it’s the one we want, or we need to make adjustments–today!