As CEO of my own life: am i learning the character to both lead and follow?

 

CEO model -right or wrong? Team model -right or wrong?  Senior pastor - right or wrong?  Pope or all popes - right or wrong?  Seems to me that there is a lot of thinking going on about leadership in the church and in my sphere of reading/blogs/conversations a lot of thinking in emergent church conversations about how leadership may need to change in order to influence/inspire post-modern people.  For me i have had good/bad experiences in a variety of different models and when it comes down to it it seems to have more resonance with the character of leader/followership that i have exhibited/experienced more than the model itself.

I used to walk past the picture above a lot which was hanging in the Channel 4 building - having a new route to work I am not sure if it still there but it asks for me a pertinent Q that i want to explore in this post: how much of both those statements is true of me - and how often are both true at the same time in a conflicting sense of apathy/paralysis?

I will not follow...

Here's some reasons why this is true of me at times...

• i'm right and everyone else is wrong [to some degree, blind following the blind, who is more foolish the fool or the fool who follows him] etc;
• i'm arrogant/prideful - i want to be a leader, i want people following me, i want to set the agenda;
• i don't trust/fearful - i will be hurt, used, exploited, disappointed; misled;
• i can't be bothered - to busy, to self centred, to many other things I want to do/be;
• i'm stubborn/not easily teachable and refuse to be led; and
• i'm not inspired - it doesn't catch me, hold me, i get tired and bored

I will not lead...

Here's some reasons why this is true of me at times...

• i get hurt - people are unkind, ungrateful and blame me;
• i get tired - it's exhausting looking out for other people;
• i get wrongly interpreted/blamed - people want me to fit into their box or meet their need and so hear what they want;
• i get treated like a servant - which makes servant leadership a lot less glamorous than it sounds;
• i get no credit - when something goes well i get a buzz but that quickly fades in the face of the next project/person/problem;
• i get frustrated - it's like herding cats, people do their own thing anyway; and
• i get disillusioned - a lot of the time its seeing the worst in people

Character not systems

I think so many of these points above are related to my character, often to do with my self interest/fulfilment and my desire to live a life which avoids as many hassles as possible - leading or following seems to be a path that takes me into contact with messed up people like myself and exposes a myriad of character flaws that i'd rather keep hidden.

I used to think that it was because i hadn't found the perfect system, hit that formula, read that book, implement the next big leadership buzz phrase and ta dah! all leadership or even following would be easy.  I'm not saying that learning leadership skills/techniques is not useful, i think its essential but to advocate one model over another will make no difference if me as a leader or as a follower is all smucked up!

The bible seems to paint a story of God in a relationship with a whole lot of leaders who lead in a whole lot of different ways - was it the model they practised that was God ordained or was it the way they led, how the depended on God, how they struggles with their own insecurities and issues that God really cared about? Or both?

Take the CEO model as a recent example - either the one where the E stands for 'executive' as in some one who is ultimately in charge or 'entertainment' where the leader is there to please all the people and keep them happy [or everyone is leader and makes decisions, can vote for the leader etc].  When i hear critiques of either of these models its usually along the lines of character, e.g.:

• people are selfish and vote for their colour carpet choice rather than the practical hard wearing one - result no carpet;
• the CEO pastor is a power hungry control freak who insists on doing everything his way...

Ok maybe I exaggerate slightly but what if there is no perfect model?  What if whatever structures we use there are gonna be issues arising because of my dichotomy of not leading/following - after all even leaders are followers of other leaders -whether its thought leaders, or their physical boss?

What if i start saying to myself ok the problem is me not the system and the solution is found in working with God on the ragged edges of my character failings that are exposed by leading/following where I am with the people around me in this community?

What do you think?

Here are some Qs that are buzzing in my head that i'd love to hear your thoughts/feelings about [all or just the ones that grab you]...

• how far do you find yourself struggling with the follow/leading thang [any on my list match yours or are different]?
• do you find one easier than the other, if so which and why?
• what do you think about my thoughts on character vs systems - what does that mean for you personally?
• do you think that systems can change to actually help this character process - got some personal experience you can share?
• what am i missing/forgetting/is a glaringly obvious blindspot????
• anything else you think/feel...

Comments

[seekingsomething]

Hello again Paul.

My tuppence worth:

how far do you find yourself struggling with the follow/leading thang [any on my list match yours or are different]?

At the moment I class myself as neither a follower nor a leader, but a seeker. Not because I am trying to change or add to your paradigm, simply because, as I said before, having fallen away from my church and my faith these last 10 years or so, I'm outside the place where you are. This blog has rekindled my spark of interest that I left behind all those years ago.

do you find one easier than the other, if so which and why?

Back then I found following hard to do. Leading wasn't an option - as a young woman in a Brethren fellowship.

what do you think about my thoughts on character vs systems - what does that mean for you personally?

I'm not sure I understand you on this - again, due to my being 'out of it all' I guess, rather than that you were not being coherent! Don't know if this is relevant, but at the time that I was still 'holding on' to my faith, I used to wonder what it would be like if everyone went to their 'local' church, ie the most geographically local, and if we all HAD to just get on with it. My hypothesis was that 'denomination' maybe came about partly because human beings 'needed' to get together with those of similar personality types and political leanings.... (I voiced this bravely and was advised that psychology and politics were not a good thing for a young Christian woman to study....)

[Ken Allen]

Paul, i've thought about this a lot too, and there is no perfect system, I agree. I go back to the Bible, all but our triune God is in some degree part leader and part follower. My wife and i help shepherd an adult sunday school class. The model our church uses a lot is that of shepherds and sheep, that we see over and over again in the Bible. Yes, we've seen some behavior and attitudes, I wished I hadn't, in those cases, i think how does Jesus respond to me, and i do my best to do that. Recently, i failed at it, and I even felt the Spirit leading me to confess certain sin to a follower in my class who was probably not going to respond with grace and understanding, but i like this other post too, as long as we know we are all seekers, saved by His blood, we have something powerfully in commmon that no one else has.
ken

[Paul]

welcome back something and all donations gratefully received, so thank you for your tuppence :)

I like the paradigm of a seeker that you mention is very helpful - i think that is a helpful way for me to explore these concepts - i am seeking and i'd rather not seek alone.

Falling away is an interesting term that you use, i wonder if you just outgrew your faith/church of 10 yrs ago and now maybe you are starting to explore/grow into something bigger? what do you think?

You say that you found following hard, why do you that was and probably still is?

I doubt i was very clear on my point about systems - what i was wondering was whether it is an issue of character and the system i find myself in brings out good/bad in me [but then would every system] - hence it becomes something of God teaching me love, patience, kindness through am imperfect medium. Or maybe there are systems that would genuinely help me more - the upswing of that is that maybe my faith would grow but i could of course end up being disparaging about where i currently find myself and focus on changing externals rather than internals.

I think you make a great point about choice - since there is an element of consumerism in our church choices and we have the freedom to go to any church within a reasonable distance maybe if we get fed up we move, rather than working on the causes of why we are fed up.

Altho it is pretty obvious why you might well have got fed up with responses like that!

[Paul]

Thanks Ken - i think models/systems/structures are helpful and i am not sure you can really have a church with no structure - i suspect even the ones that say they have no leaders still have leaders etc. Then again models can be unhelpful particularly as they are all people based and as you point out we have a high propensity for failing.

I always find it both encouraging and challenging that Jesus focused part of his message on kingdom life being about reconciliation even putting it above religious practice which seems to me to suggest that he was expecting us to need to practice this a lot. Actually cultivating that kind of honesty, self awareness, graciousness and humility when we've offended someone on - and being generous and forgiving when we've been offended is a highly necessary part/outcome of any church/character encounter...

[seekingsomething]

You ask some good and thought-provoking questions Paul!

Falling away is an interesting term that you use, i wonder if you just outgrew your faith/church of 10 yrs ago and now maybe you are starting to explore/grow into something bigger? what do you think?

Hmm, maybe you're right. I used 'falling away' because it was part of the language of the church I knew back then. You were saved or unsaved, and then if you were saved you were either ight with God or you were 'backslidden' or 'fallen away'. If you missed church one week, or even one service out of 3 or 4 possible ones on a sunday then you were 'backslidden' and in danger of falling away..... Don't get me wron, this wasn't a cult of monsters, it was a fellowship of lovely, caring people - but of people who were 'right' it seemed, whereas I felt mostly in the wrong.

I say 'fallen away' too, because I didn't just up and leave one day and say 'enough - I'm done with this'. I just slowly lost confidence, grew tired of feeling guilty and wrong for not fitting in, and over time as my friends and work situations moved on, I gradually found myself 'away' from the church that was at the same time a family, but also such an (unbeknowing)cause of hurt.

You say that you found following hard, why do you that was and probably still is?

I found following hard because I didn't feel that I fitted in. I felt like everyone else 'fitted' but me. I was a young woman who 'thought too much', who wanted a career, who wanted to lead, I suppose. I resented being asked to follow people who pitied me for not being meek and mild like the 'proper' women. I resented sitting through formulaic gospel sermons that presented the same story, week after week, to the same people, often using very similar words for the three alliterated headline points!

I lost confidence in the church and I lost confidence in me and I lost faith in that there could be a God whose son said "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples - that you love one another" I felt unloved and unloving and felt this proof that there could be no God.

Along the way, others did get up and move on and choose other churches that better suited their needs and personalities. I kind of admired them, but at the same time found this lacking authenticity and at odds with what I read about the early church.

Hmmm, so there you have it. I'm hoping you're right. I'm hoping that maybe I'm starting to re-engage with something bigger....

[Paul]

Thank you seeking. I know where you are coming from in that i went to a church a lot like you describe, sometime i'll have to tell you about my meeting with the elders to check whether i hada demon or not after i had a dramatic encounter with the holy spirit...

i'm definately one of the unauthentic ones as I bailed - i liked the people in my church, in fact i owe them a considerable amount -but there you go i found a girl friend who was the pastors daughter who then got sacked on the back of people encountering the holy spirit so maybe hanging around was not so good ;)

I am sorry that you fell away, I can't help that the church needs more people like you in it to help keep reminding us of what we really look like - if only we were able to get past ourselves and listen...

When i read your thoughts I wondered about the dynamic of I won't follow since you wouldn't follow me - not in a throw toys out of the pram but mainly in terms of my own arrgance - how often as i as a leader in the past equated that with being all knowing and not trying to learn from other people - i have felt challenged over the last couple of yrs about my need for greater humility and generousity...

It is hard when we no longer fit in - i'm not so sure that you wouldn't have seen people changing congregation in the NT - once the church began to get bigger and fan out i wonder how much of it became household related where it would be family/servants and friends? I don't know? But i might just do a post on it cos i'd like to know what you and other people think more...

thank you again :)