On your church staff team, who decides what? It seems like a simple question, one which should have obvious answers. However, as I’ve worked with churches, I’ve seen massive disequilibrium and confusion. This can be caused by many things, including out-of-whack (or non-existent) org charts. It can be a team-based problem, like when a new, inexperienced staffer feels that the simple fact that they have opinions entitles them to make directional decisions for the church.
However, the problems are often caused by the senior leadership themselves. Here are a few bad examples – I’ll call them The Funnel, The Lid, and The Fog.
The Funnel is usually the Senior/Lead Pastor, although he or she can sometimes be an Executive Pastor (or even a very controlling elder or deacon). What makes The Funnel the Funnel is that EVERY decision of consequence flows through them. Funnels usually have entrepreneurial bents, and many times are actually pretty smart and good at a wide variety of things. Founding Pastors often fall into this category. Here’s the issue: one person only has so much expertise, and can only make so many decisions. Things tend to be “same ‘ol, same ‘ol” and they don’t happen very quickly.
The bigger problem is that unless the senior leader stops being The Funnel, they will almost always also become The Lid. The Lid is a funnel who has grown the church to the maximum size possible for themselves to personally manage. Rather than turning over some decision-making to team leaders, they “ball hog” and the church gets stuck. The lower-level leaders have nothing to lead, being only allowed to implement. Leaders with nothing to lead eventually leave…
Lastly, The Fog. In this case, no one knows what’s being decided. Staff hear about things for the first time in the service or church newsletter – even things that directly impact their ministry areas. No one likes this, for reasons that should be very obvious.
More tomorrow…
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