Postkiwi

I’m currently finishing off a paper reflecting on the challenge of motivational communication - the task of building vision amongst congregational leaders. This is in the context of Jeremiah 29 - the call to deal with the past, live in the present, and prepare for the future.

I have been writing this paper for six years! I have worked in three different positions in those three years. I was National Youth Ministry Coordinator for the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand, Minister of Youth and Families for Robina Surfers Paradise Uniting Church and am Mission Consultant for the Uniting Church in Australia, Queensland Synod. Throughout this time I have struggled with what it means to be a visionary leader who inspires and equips others to become visionaries themselves.

I’ve discovered that a lot of writing by Christian leaders focuses on the need for the congregational pastor/senior leader to take a visionary lead, inspiring others to get in behind a common vision. In many cases Christian leaders are encouraged to take most of the responsibility for discerning purpose and direction.

Within the circles I’ve moved, this approach to leadership leaves many cold. It is perceived to be an approach rooted in a corporate church culture, espoused by men rather than women, and suitable for hierarchical structures. In many cases this approach in fact disempowers people, expecting lay people to be loyal and enthusiastic followers of charismatic or authoritative parent figures. [1] Peter Senge calls instead for the sharing of vision which involves the skills of unearthing shared pictures of the future that foster genuine commitment and enrolment rather than compliance. [2]

I believe there needs to be, at a congregational level, visionary people, rather than a compliant people lead by a visionary leader. In this paper I will explore a framework for guiding disillusioned congregational leaders [3] through a grief process in order to build the capacity for vision. I will discuss the practice of communicating that motivates people to thoughtfully move into the future with purpose and direction, with both an individual and a common vision.

As part of my preparation for this paper I have worked my way through three sets of reading.

My initial focus was on communication as an art. I was looking for clues on more effective communication of vision in my role as National Youth Ministry Coordinator. I looked at the importance of clarifying the message, knowing the audience, using symbols and stories that could be related to by a variety of stakeholders, while using feedback to develop the message. As I read through this material and talked it through with my colleagues and support group, it became clear that empowering a new generation of visionary leaders was more important than the mere communication of national strategies for youth ministry. This shaped my work significantly.

My second focus became the nature of visionary leadership. This follows on from my previous paper on servant mission leadership. I prepared a summary of writing and resources on leadership and have published this on my work website.

The focus of this current paper has been narrowed down to the process of motivating, inspiring and mobilizing visionary leaders in the Uniting Church in Australia, particularly in situations where levels of morale and innovation are low. As mission consultant I have a key role in the redevelopment of threshold congregations - congregations who are facing either continued decline and death or the reinvention of their models of membership, ministry and mission. The development of vision in these settings requires initial groundwork in grieving processes.

More tomorrow…

[1] Loren Mead, Transforming Congregations for the Future, pp. 97-100. Mead uses the concept of parent tapes to describe unhealthy levels of dependency in the church.
[2] Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, Random House, Sydney, 1990, pg. 9
[3] I am working with teams of congregational leaders rather than just the ordained leaders of churches.