Friday, May 6, 2011
Stubborn as a Buffalo?
“Most leaders act like head buffalos, giving orders and making decisions. Everyone else is a member of the herd, following instructions. Hard-driving head buffalos and their well-intentioned herd followers suffer the same fate as the buffalo on the plains: consistently outmaneuvered by more nimble, quick-thinking competitors.” While this resource may not be geared toward church growth, it can be a very helpful resource in creating a dynamic leader. The book shifts the focus on the leader as opposed to figuring out how to manipulate the followers. Part one focus’ on the challenge of leadership and how quite often it is the leader that needs growth and development as opposed to the follower. Chapter three deliberately states that the shock to most leaders, is that they are often the problem. From there the book explains how and why it is so important to transfer ownership onto those who are following. The focus for the leader should be to do what they do best and allow others to do everything else. This falls right in line with what we have been reading and learning about, empowering others. One lone goose can only go a hundred miles, but when there is a flock that is working together, they can increase their travel distance ten-fold. In order to accomplish this, the geese rotate the lead, often giving the leader a break. This relates to ministry, because as leaders we can’t do it all. We have to be able to rely on others.
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Rotating leadership is an important idea that should be explored more frequently in the church especially. When we discuss leadership, we tend to think about one leader at the top with a group of followers. However, a much more effective model is that of the flock of geese where leadership is constantly being shifted to those who are strongest, most capable, and best equipped to lead in that moment. In even the smallest settings, there are bound to be more than one person with leadership qualitites that can be utilized for the advancement of the goals of the organization. In the church, in particular, the Great Commission is not only a call to do the work that Jesus left us, but to also make disciples ourselves. In other words, we are called and developed as leaders in order to develop others to be leaders who will also develop leaders. This is an ever expanding chain until the Gospel has been spread and taken root throughout all the nations. We must not only identify potential leaders to take our places once we are done, we must also identify the leadership potential among our flock to take the mantle of leadership as a matter of course in our faith communities.
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