For this conversation, we were joined by Ted Egly from the Center for Creative Leadership to talk about what leaders can do to get the best out of the teams and organizations they lead.
The research says that a high-performing team has three things: they celebrate wins early, they slow down in order to power up, and they are willing to change…
In my experience, the celebrations that are most powerful are the ones that affirm or encourage those who are actually moving the mission forward…
This really means that pastors have to be mindful of what is happening in their ministries… sometimes when the church gets to a certain size, ministry leaders lose a sense of what is going on…
We need to give ourselves white space [in our schedules] to slow down in order to be more intentional about what we’re doing…
Routines and rituals are all about being intentional about the script that you’re writing for your week, month, and year… you need to set them up so that you’re not just pulled by the emergency of the day…
I tell pastors all the time that if they’re preaching every Sunday, it’s a mistake… it’s hard to be creative that often… I use my weeks off to do exactly what we’re talking about: planning, leadership development, etc.…
We’re married to the mission, but we date the model… the model is going to change… sometimes we get stuck in a model that used to work…
The pain of staying the same has to be greater [for you] than the pain of changing… pastors need to make assess whether the pain that comes from change is worth it… a lot of times for pastors, the perceived pain is greater than the actual pain of the change… usually, it brings relief to the organization…
We can prepare people for the changes that are coming by having the conversation early with a core group of influencers and letting them speak into the process…
QUESTIONS FOR YOU AND YOUR TEAM
- Assess yourself: which of Ted’s three elements of a high-performing team do you think you and your team are best at? Why did you give that answer?
- Which of the three do you need the most improvement at? Why do you think that?
- What is one thing you can begin to do this week or month that will help your team perform at a higher level?