Welcome! If you clicked on this link, you may be a team leader on The Race, want to be one, never want to be one, not even on the Race, leading in a work environment, a team member with a gift of leadership, whatever the situation is, put on your listening pants because I plan on delving into tips on leading that I hope everyone finds helpful.
FYI for Racers, my own journey on the Race, I started the Race as a team member and began team leading in month four of the Race and am still leading in month seven.
Here is a countdown of 10 helpful tips on how to lead:
10. Learn how to follow: I did not start The Race out as a team leader, so my first few months were all about learning how to follow well. I fear sometimes we view “follow” as a passive word, but I daresay someone following well is anything but passive. After all, Jesus had 12 hardcore followers (aka disciples) who were integral in turning the world upside down for the Gospel. In 1 Peter 2:13, Paul writes, “Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution,” and in 1 Peter 2:18 “Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect.” There is something in God’s heart about learning to be a good follower. As a leader, you are going to have to ask people to do stuff they don’t want to, and when you follow in the same ways, it gives you a heart of mercy and understanding. I prefer to do ministry during the day and have the evening free, but last night someone suggested we do park outreach from 7PM-9PM, did I love that, no, but I realized as a Team Leader I need to follow initiative well in order to encourage it, so I swallowed my preferences and ran with it.
9. Choose what you stand for: so that you may still stand when the going gets tough. In Galatians 1:10, Paul writes, “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” This statement presupposes you know what is pleasing to God. When put in a leadership position or frankly for any team member, spend time asking God what His heart is for the team, what is important to Him, and what He would like to see. Then stand on those things even when everyone else may be pulling in different directions. If you think it is important that 30 minutes a day are spent in team prayer, for example, and believe that is from God for the team for the month, stick with it even if it may be pulling teeth. You never know what glory you may be leading folks towards even if it may be reluctantly. For example, I went to my Community Group at home for two hours every week for four years and sometimes I wondered “what on earth is the point,” but somewhere along the way, my life changed drastically for The Lord through that time each week. You stand on what is important even if others do not always agree or instantly catch the vision.
8. Constantly seek to not be offend-able: “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another.” (Proverbs 27:17). If we think of the physics of iron sharpening iron, it means two things rub against each other, chipping parts off until the iron is sharp and ready to be used for a purpose. This very important task is not painless. Same with being in community and leading, there will be times you sharpen each other and it hurts. People will tell you how you could do a better job, people will make suggestions, people will tell you what they don’t like, people will be frustrated with some of your decisions. Sometimes you will make a decision you think is right and not everyone will agree. You can lash out and defend yourself, or you can view the iron sharpening process, search for God’s heart in the situation, and set a culture where feedback and constructive criticism is welcome. Choose unity over constantly arguing your side, team members growth is more important than being proven right. We all want grace, so we must be willing to hand it out too.
7. Be each teammates biggest cheerleader: The World Race is hard y’all! People are going to need cheerleaders and the knowledge that their team is in their corner. Life may bring them to share their vulnerable testimony to a room full of prisoners or get up to sing for the first time in a long time or go talk to a stranger about Jesus. Take time to figure out what each team member is good at, would be good at, and when to champion them getting lead out of those gifts! The best team leader isn’t the one who can do it all or have their hands in everything, they are the one who can empower others to run with things. So you may feel bad asking people to do the dishes, but instead of treating it as a burden, find someone whom it blesses and who is good at finishing the job to completion, and empower them.
6. Your goal is not to create six mini you’s: I think I am great, that’s why I am the way I am. However, the world does not need seven billion Juliana’s, it needs more of God’s glory. We read in scripture about how we are the body of Christ, some may be an eye, some an ear, and some a nose. I will call myself the mouth, and I don’t need to create six more mouths in the body of Christ, I need to help people find their spot. In the Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25, Jesus shows how important it is that we steward and use our gifts well, so you’re job as a leader is to create an environment for people to use theirs best. It’s okay if people do things totally different than you would, but still hit a goal. It’s okay if people have different goals as long as all of them work together to glorify God. Embrace the diversity in His body and don’t waste energy changing it just because it’s different.
5. Seek to have and model good boundaries: When I entered leadership, I thought anything short of having weekly hour long one-on-one’s with each person on the team, going 110% at ministry, spending hours praying for the team, and still growing myself would be a failure. If you add all that up, though, I would be running at 600% which isn’t really possible. Be kind to yourself. Embrace scripture where it says “Be still and know that I am God.” God will steward His children’s growth with Him much better than you can, that is not a burden for you to bear. Being a leader does not mean your job is to be all things for all people and do everything you can to make their lives easy and awesome. If you try that, your team will not like you because you will be frazzled and end up being negative help. Learn what you need to do to fill yourself back up. Learn how to say no so that your yes can be at it’s best. Learn how to create the best environment to cultivate growth in the team and ministry, then let them run with it. Being called to be a leader is not being called to be someone’s god (and no one is asking you to, it would be a bad substitute).
4. Be okay with tension, but face conflict head-on: The World Race loves the Myers Briggs. If you must know, I am an ESFJ. I lead a lot of people who are P’s. I like to schedule things and plan weeks in my head. That stresses others out. We have a tension when it comes to scheduling ahead of time. That isn’t necessarily bad, and we don’t need to change each other, we just need to recognize the tension and figure out how to best work with it. Some tension is good tension as it causes us to look at other viewpoints and work towards unity. Conflict, though, is when there is a disagreement or irritation that is pulling the team apart. It is something like in the Sermon on the Mount, where we know that our brother has something against us and we must first leave our gift at the altar and then go and be reconciled. (Do you think that’s a super smart tip? Sadly I can’t take credit, I heard it in the Andy Stanley leadership podcast that you should for sure check out).
3. Be team-driven: Someone in a foreign country asks you to plan a VBS, so you start thinking about it in your head and see pyrotechnics, ocean animal themed snacks, and plays that would win an Oscar. It will take about 70 hours of work over the next week, but watch out world, these countries won’t know what hit them with this VBS. Now if your team would just get on board with your vision… And there is the rub, as a team leader, you may love grand ideas and pushing harder and harder, but is that always best for the team? You may see opportunities for your work in a ministry, but is there a one-on-one you have been neglecting that would pour better into a teammate’s soul? Were you just asked by the host to work on the off-day your team desperately needs? As a leader there will be times you need to choose team over other things, but be okay choosing that as team is a legitimate ministry. Be okay handing things over to teammates and allowing it to flounder if it must because that is better for their own growth.
2. Have an eternal mindset: As my friend Allison would say, “Do you want this to be the best month of the Race or do you want to set this person up for the best 50 years after the Race?” (wise woman) View your team as legitimate ministry and see that the areas you lean into, the tearful conversations you have, tough moments are all helping shape you and others into mighty people for The Lord in the future. Don’t run from those things just because it isn’t what is directly asked or it may be messier than building a mud hut. You could have eternal consequences strengthening the Kingdom of God in this way.
1. Always, always, always be led by the Spirit: Pray about decisions. Pray about people. Pray about the team. Listen to God’s input, listen to God’s prompting. Don’t ever be rushed into something, the devil works based on rushing you, take five minutes to step back and pray about it. One month I was given a cool opportunity to pick someone on the team to do. I immediately had a name in my head of who to have do it, but one of my goal’s for the month was to be Spirit led, so I stepped back to pray. Lo and behold The Lord gave me a totally different name that i had not thought of, so I asked that person. It ended up being a huge moment for them that month and seeing more of what it looks like to work in the Kingdom. I’m glad I partnered with the Spirit in that and you won’t ever regret asking God for His opinion in things.
I write long blogs. This looonnnggg blog broke every rule of blogging, but maybe the hardcore are still reading. Team Leader, know that you matter a lot. Know also that you are just 1/7 of the rest of the team and each of them matter a lot too. Watch other people take parts of your job and think “hey that’s a team leader job” then do a little dance that other people are buying in and then look for more of your job to give away. This is not the greatest job title you will ever have, this may be one of the hardest you have had thus far, but know it is an awesome opportunity to grow in leadership in ways that you otherwise may not have the opportunity. Also do a little dance that we know a man named Jesus who led a group of 12 men to change the world and then glean from him everything you can. Also know you can talk to him and he will talk back, so that’s awesome you have the best leadership coach in the world on a never ending speed dial. Know if you don’t hear back right away, He may just be trusting you to make a decision and following you along the way or He may be asking for your patience. Know that things may blow up and you may feel like a failure, but if you are learning and growing and turning your heart back to Him always, I would never chalk it up as a loss.
I could keep going, but I won’t. Listen to Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast. Read books like Descending into Greatness by Bill Hybels.
