Tod Bolsinger

Is That a Lion or Not: Another Lesson for Good Disappointing Leadership

Continuing a re-post of the series from 2010.  Many of us in leadership know about the need to attend to our anxiety, we just don't always know why...

In the harsh mid-summer African heat, a herd of impala find an increasingly rare water hole.  They rush to drink, crowding in, fearful of not getting enough water to sustain them.  Suddenly, one impala raises his head in high alert.  Immediately every other Impala stops drinking, and stands at attention.  No impala moves, none utter a sound. But the tension is palpable, there seems to be a crackle of electricity in the air.  Every impala at that moment has a life or death decision to make:  “Is that a lion or not?”

If there is a lion lurking near that whole and they don’t run,  they become lion lunch. If there is NOT a lion lurking near the whole and they DO run, they lose their place at the watering hole and could die of thirst. If there is a lion and they do run, or if there is NOT a lion and they do not run, they live another day.  But all that matters is: “Is that a lion or not?”

And everything in their impala-beings is focused on making that crucial life and death decision.  Just like they do every day. Numerous times a day.

Part of what helps the impala make that decision is the “herd energy”, the “animal anxiety” that permeates the group and that causes them to share listening, hearing, deciding together.  And depending upon how the “system” responds to anxiety is one of the key factors for the health and ability to weather threats and face changes in climate or challenges in terrain for a herd, a family, a church or organization.

In this series, we have been looking at what it takes to be a “good disappointing leader”, that is what it takes to “disappoint your own people at a rate they can absorb” so that they will take on the challenges, make the changes and continue to move toward the goals (or watering holes) that will insure their vitality, longevity and “mission” of the family, church, organization or company.  Over the last few posts we have been examining the leadership mantra:  "Start with a conviction, stay connected, stay calm and stay the course."  In my last post, I discussed the leader as “Crockpot thermostat” regulating the heat of a system so that it will continue toward transformation without scorching and ruining the system.

A significant part of “staying calm” and “regulating heat” specifically, is in understanding that the “heat” that most hinders organizational systems from moving toward their aspirations and goals is anxiety.  Anxiety isn’t a bad thing; it’s a ‘creaturely’ thing. It just is. We feel anxious when we are reacting to a threat that is either real or imagined.  Sometimes the anxiety is a gift that tells us that there is something bad that is threatening the clan (A fire alarm going off, the sixth sense that someone is lying to you, the motivation to lose weight when the doctor tells you that your cholesterol is so high you wont live to see grandchildren.) This is called “acute anxiety.”  It motivates us to do something to get ourselves or our loved ones out of danger (for example, when there is a lion at the watering hole.)

“In and of itself, anxiety is neither functional or dysfunctional.  It is a state of readiness to do something or other that may or may not be appropriate in response to a threat that may or may not be accurately perceived.”  (Jeffrey Miller, The Anxious Organization: Why smart companies do dumb things, p. 14)

But the key difference between animals and humans is that with humans real or “acute anxiety” often becomes “chronic anxiety”, lingering in a family or social system even after the threat is gone.  Acute anxiety is a pervasive stance of being that continues even after the threat is gone.  (Soldiers with post-traumatic stress who wake up on high alert even while safe at home in their beds, depression-era senior citizens who stock up on eggs or toilet paper years later, an adult who grew up in an abusive home who winces every time someone raises their voice even the smallest bit.)  Chronic anxiety is present when the threats of the past continue to hold power even though the system is no longer really in danger. 

There have been lots of studies about the affects of stress and anxiety in life today.  We are taught good stress reducing tricks like exercise or deep breathing or taking “mini-vacations” while at our desks, lowering our anxiousness by thinking of a ‘happy place.’  These things are all good for our personal well-being.  But in the midst of leading change, they miss the point.

For leaders, the point of “calming down” is not to feel better; it’s to make better decisions.  And when people are too “hot”, they don’t. The only issue is: Is there a lion or not? Is there really a threat or are we making this up?  Do we really need to run, or should we stay here and get water and then calmly continue our journey? Do we really need to be this angry, fearful, defensive or is there a better decision that we can make that will take us where we want to go? 

For leaders, this is the point to remember about anxiety: People who are overly or chronically anxious don’t make good decisions.  When anxiety spikes we revert to more “primitive” ways of being.  We fight, we flee, we freeze.  We turn on each other instead of working together.  We run from danger and leave others to face the lions alone.  Or we capitulate and allow the herd to be overrun.

Peter Steinke: “To lead means to have some command of our own anxiety and some capacity not to let other people’s anxiety contaminate us; that is, not to allow their anxiety to affect our thinking, actions, and decisions.”

Perhaps the most important task of leadership is to cultivate the ability to make good decisions.  Good, wise, discerning, decisions for the sake of both the health and mission of the herd.  And that will take both “regulating the heat” and thinking well while doing so. 

Both of which are necessary to face the absolutely unexpected threat that is coming to knock you "off course" as you lead your people.  Which is where we will pick this up next...

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Becoming a Good Disappointing Leader

Continuing to repost the series from 2010 that seems to spur the most conversations with pastors I coach.  The key concept here comes from Peter Steinke and his work with Healthy Congregations. 

In my last post, I suggested that the core competency for leading any “community”--from a family to a church to a country--is the ability to “disappoint your own people at a rate they can absorb.” (Heifetz and Linsky) 

In this post I want to begin to lay out some necessary skills for becoming a good disappointing leader.  And the word “good” here means both a sense of competence as well as character.  In other words, if I am going to be a good leader, I need to be committed to “skillfully” disappointing people as well as doing so for genuinely good reasons.

Here is a summary of what I want to say and then over the next few posts, I’ll take it apart and we can look at each piece. (With thanks to Ed Friedman, Peter Steinke and Murray Bowen for the "organizational systems" research that is behind all of this.)  If you want to lead effective change, in the face of resistance and even while disappointing people around you:

Start by acting on conviction, stay connected, stay calm, stay the course.

So, let's begin with the first clause: To be a good disappointing leader, you have to start by acting on a conviction. 

Now the word “start” here is actually misleading. Before you can “start” by acting on a conviction, you actually have to HAVE a conviction.  And this takes time.  Think of the forming of a clear conviction as the "prerequisite for leadership".  Clear good leadership that can withstand the disappointment of people is a product of maturity and differentiation (a term we’ll spend a great deal of time on in future posts). It is the result of study, conversation, humility and discernment. 

Having a well-thought-out, values-based conviction—an “As for me and my house” conviction (Joshua 24:15)—is not easy.  Most of us simply inherit convictions from those around us.  We take up the concerns or passions of others, we even take on the mantle of leadership to please others, or as a default.  How many of us have said, “Well, if no one else is going to do this, I guess I will (but don’t blame me if it doesn’t work out the way you’d like).” 

I think many people become pastors or take on leadership positions for ego needs.  We see the glint of admiration in the eyes of others, we hear the way they introduce us (“You know that my son is studying to be a PASTOR.  Isn’t that great?”), we like the sense that we are somebody special and we take on a role that we may not even have that much conviction about.  We imagine ourselves with our new titles.  Spiritual writer Parker Palmer was invited to apply for a college presidency.  When a “clearness committee” helped him think through his motives for pursuing the job, he finally admitted, “I think I am interested because it would be nice to get my picture in the paper.”

And soon, we are like the dog that catches the car.  We are dragged along by the sheer force and energy of others’ opinions and affirmation afraid to let go. And because we are not acting out of conviction, we fold under the disappointment of others.

But a clear, thought out conviction that comes from within one's values and is consistent with one's beliefs, is like a healthy spine and strong “core muscles” for the body.  They enable us to stand without wavering, to keep our balance, to stay grounded without having to be overly defensive or attacking.  We are like a well rooted Sequoia tree that can withstand the fires and the storms.  Others may get blown away or consumed, but convictions help us stand in the midst of the disappointment of others. 

But having a conviction is not enough.  Leaders act on their convictions.  And perhaps the clearest indicator of the clarity of a leader is his or her willingness to do so whether others follow or not. 

One of my favorite Jesus stories is when Jesus hears that his friend Lazarus is dying and he tells his disciples that he is going to Judea (John 11). The disciples are not excited.  Bethany has been a dangerous place for them.  They try to talk Jesus out of going. (“Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?”) He just simply restates that he has something to do and is going.  You have a sense that the disciples had to figure out if they would go to.  I imagine in my minds eye, the disciples spending the night tossing and turning, wringing their hands, arguing with each other, while Jesus likely slept like a baby.  Finally, Thomas says the other disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

Now, I don’t imagine that the disciples were excited.  And this wouldn’t be the last time that they would be confused and even disappointed in Jesus, (for example ALL of the events of “Holy Week”) but his clear conviction led him to ACT as a leader.

As a leader, to act on conviction is actually quite simple (though often not easy): I will only worry about myself.  I will do what my convictions call me to do and will not worry about anyone else following.  I will  change only myself. I will not try to control anyone else. I will not try to convince anyone else of my conviction. I will just, with as much clarity and awareness as possible, start acting out of the conviction that I am committed to doing.  I will, in the words of Gandhi, “be the change I want to see in the world.” 

A most common, every day example: Very often one spouse in a marriage will come to me and say, “I want our marriage to be better and I want us to get marriage counseling, but my spouse won’t go.  What should I do?”  My answer every time: YOU go to counseling.  You start working on yourself.  Invite your spouse to join you, but whether they do or not, YOU take responsibility for yourself, only.  (And as we will learn, systems-theory teaches us that this action of personal conviction stimulates change to the system.)

My friend and co-worker, Charlie Campbell is both a pastor and marriage and family therapist.  Charlie has said, that “a leader is someone who would be doing what they are doing anyway.”  It doesn’t matter if anyone follows, I’ll do it anyway, they say. It doesn’t matter if anyone likes this, I am going to do this anyway.  It doesn’t matter if anyone else cares for the environment, works for better schools, is committed to their marriage, makes their church more welcoming to the stranger, tries to bring peace where there is conflict, speaks the truth to power, loves those who don’t love, or forgives those who are filled with enmity… It doesn’t matter if anyone notices, anyone affirms it, anyone even cares about it…this is my conviction and I’ll be doing it anyway.

In one respect, the clearest sign of a leader, is that leaders don’t begin on the basis of whether anyone is following or not.  In one sense, followership is irrelevant.  Leaders start being leaders by acting on conviction. 

But what makes a leader really a leader is what we do when the followers start having opinions about our convictions.  When we hear the grumblings, the criticisms, the second-guesses.  When we see the glance of rolled eyes or hear the clearing of throats.  When those around us start getting anxious about our convictions and we find ourselves naturally looking over our shoulders wondering whether we are heading off alone.  The difference between Leaders and Lone Rangers is what they do next. And that is where we will pick this up…

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Friendly Fire: The Prize for "Good Disappointing Leadership"

Reposting another segment from my 2010 series on "Good Disappointing Leadership". This is perhaps the most brutal reality of all. But if you expect it, you can endure it--and in the end it may just be the key to any real lasting change.

“If you are a leader, expect sabotage.”  Edwin Friedman

For the last few posts, we have been parsing a quote from Ronald Heifetz and Martin Linsky that is worth committing to memory:  “Leadership is disappointing your own people at a rate they can absorb.”  The perceptive and caring leader will invariably wince at the three words in the center of the quote: “your own people.” 

Yikes.  That’s the rub, isn’t it?  It’s one thing to disappoint and anger the “other side”, but another to endure "friendly fire."  We in leadership comfort ourselves in believing that our leadership style will continually “energize our base”; that we will Braveheart-style be able to “rally the troops” to charge.  We just assume that our followers will “have our backs”.

But that is all a comforting fantasy if you are truly trying to bring change to an organizational system.  Whether it is a family, a church, a business, a not-for-profit, or a government, all the best literature makes it clear: To lead, you must be able to disappoint your own people.  But, even doing so well (“at a rate they can absorb”), does NOT preclude them turning on you.  In fact, when you disappoint your own people, they WILL turn on you.  If the change process is “Start with conviction, stay connected, stay calm and stay the course.”  Then when you are focused on “staying the course,” expect that it is “your own people” who are going to try to knock you off-course. 

Sabotage is natural. It’s normal.  “It’s part and parcel of the systemic process of leadership.” Many who sabotage you will even claim that they are doing you a favor by doing so. (Friedman calls these people “peace-mongers” or “highly anxious risk-avoiders” who are “more concerned with good feelings than progress” and consistently prefer the “peaceful” status-quo over the turbulence of change—even if change is necessary.)  Indeed, one of the prevailing theories of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus was that he was simply trying to “force Jesus’ hand” to fulfill the expectations of a first-century messiah.  When Jesus challenged the status quo with his notions of what the Kingdom would be and what a Messiah should do, one of “his own people” (Judas) turned on him. 

“Sabotage is not merely something to be avoided or wished away; instead, it comes with the territory of leading, whether that ‘territory’ is a family or an organization. And a leader’s capacity to recognize sabotage for what it is—that is, a systemic phenomenon connected to the shifting balances in the emotional processes of a relationship system and not to the institution’s specific issues, makeup, or goals—is the key to the kingdom.”  Friedman, p. 11

So, what do we do with sabotage and how do we respond to it so that we can “stay the course” or our convictions for change? 

First, as we said, expect it.  Anticipation is a great defense.  To be aware that sabotage is coming will at least keep us from being surprised when it comes.  Even if everybody is excited in the beginning stages of a new organizational shift, change, initiative, or restructuring, be aware that a time will come when they will certainly not be.  Expecting sabotage enables us to “stay the calm” when it comes.

Second, embrace it as a normal part of an organizational life.  Even the saboteurs aren’t really to blame.  Systems like stability.  You, by bringing change, have upset the emotional equilibrium of the system.  The Israelites wanted to go back to slavery in Egypt once things got rough in the desert.  Systems always look for and find comfort in the familiar. (Do you hear the root word of “family” in familiar?  Every organization has its own “family system” at work.)

Third, don’t take it personally.  The people following you may be shooting you in the back, but it’s really not YOU that they are sabotaging, it’s your role as leader.  They would do this to ANY leader.  By not taking it personally, we then can keep monitoring ourselves (AH! we are back there again, aren’t we?) and keep from reacting in a way that will make the situation worse.  By depersonalizing the attack, you are much more likely to stay both calm and connected even to the saboteurs, enabling you to make much better decisions as you stay the course of change.

Fourth, focus your attention on the emotionally strong, not the saboteurs.  We are so focused on quieting our critics, appeasing our accusers and shielding ourselves from the friendly fire that it often knocks us off-course.  While we need to “stay connected” to the “saboteurs” (“Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer”), what actually keeps the change process going is investing even more time in those who are committed to growing, adapting and changing for good.  Keep building healthy alliances with those who are emotionally mature, share your convictions, and they will join you in the needed change.  Find other calm, courageous people and strengthen and support them.  As you see them begin to grow and change, it will inspire you to stay on course, also. 

Lastly, keep “staying calm and connected” so you can, stay on course. (again!)  Endure.  Stick with it.  Leading change is a PROCESS that is not accomplished quickly and the moments of sabotage are actually the most crucial times in the change process.  At this moment everyone in the system sees the leader’s true colors.  Sabotage is not only a test of the leader’s resolve, but also a test of the systems’ resilience.  If you as a leader can help them work through their own sabotaging instincts, then the system will change and the saboteurs will become change-leaders themselves. 

A final word on sabotage:  This is a good place to talk about courage.  All the best leadership literature emphasizes the need for courage.  Stuck systems, bad government, corrupt organizations, dysfunctional families and hypocritical churches, all have at least one thing in common:  There is, as Ed Friedman, describes it, a colossal “failure of nerve” in leadership.  It takes courage to stay true to convictions.  It takes courage to stay calm and connected in the face of friendly fire. And it takes enduring, repeated acts of courage to stay the course and keep others on course when they are disappointed in you as a leader. 

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How Culture Changes...Really.

How Culture Changes...Really.

Another post on "Good Disappointing Leadership" will follow, but wanted to offer a word of practical hope...

"How does culture change? A powerful person at the top, or a large enough group from anywhere in the organization, decides the old ways are not working, figures out a change vision, starts acting differently, and enlists others to act differently. If the new actions produce better results, if the results are communicated and celebrated, and if they are not killed off by the old culture fighting its rear-guard action, new norms will form and new shared values will grow.

What does NOT work in changing a culture? Some group decides what the new culture should be. It turns a list of values over to the communications or HR departments with the order that they tell people what the new culture is. They cascade the message down the hierarchy, and little to nothing changes." 

Kotter's observations led me to the work I now do with "Transformation Teams".

Disappointing Leadership: The Core Competency

I am reposting this series on the conversation that I have the most with the pastors I coach.  This is part 1. 

“Leadership is disappointing your own people at a rate they can absorb.”  Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linsky

Most of us who take on leadership roles do so from a place of technical competence.  The best player on the team often becomes the captain.  The best teacher in the department is asked to become head of the department.  The best sales associate is given a promotion to manager.  And as I wrote in my last post, the best “lay leader” in a church is encouraged to become a pastor.  This, of course, can be the root of the dreaded “Peter Principle”: "In a Hierarchy Every Employee Tends to Rise to His Level of Incompetence."  Not every one who is competent at sales is good at managing (see Scott, Michael)  not everyone who is a good teacher is a good administrator.  But there is one core competency for leadership that is almost never recognized until it is too late: Disappointing people well or, as Linsky and Heifetz say, “at a rate they can absorb.”  And this is the skill that requires such incredible competence: Disappoint people too much and they give up on you, stop following you and may even turn on you.  Don’t disappoint them enough and you’ll never lead them anywhere.

In my last two posts I have written about the complexities of pastoral leadership and the confusion of the role of leadership that plagues most of us right from the beginning.  I promised to take up some of the “adaptations” that are necessary for making the transition from “star player” to “coach” or leader.  And with this post I want to begin some specific reflections on the necessary competencies of a leader.

First, leadership isn’t so much taking people where they WANT to go (that is more what management is all about.)  Leadership is taking people where, in that great phrase of Lincoln’s, “the better angels of their nature” know that they need to go and yet resist going.  Deftly handling resistance and the disappointment that comes along with it so that a community of people can accomplish a goal for the greater good is the core competency of leadership.

What does it take to disappoint people well?  I’ll discuss those particular skills in my next post.  But there is one internal adaptation of expectation that is necessary in order to leading through disappointment.  By definition, the move to leader from a position of technical competence is difficult.  And not just technically difficult (e.g. learning how to run a good department meeting, managing direct reports, setting vision and protecting values).  The real challenge of leadership is that it is emotionally difficult for the leader.  The first great challenge for the person who wants to go from player to “coach”, from star to leader is to determine whether you have the stomach for disappointing people.

Technical competence pleases people.  When we hit our sales numbers, or teach a really good Bible Study, sing a great solo, run a really great program, or hit a home run and people cheer.  Most of us who have been asked to consider leadership have big cheering sections.  We are used to applause, affirmation and a feeling of success.  But the minute you accept the call to leadership, you have to expect that most of the cheering will stop. 

When you stand before people and tell them that in order to accomplish a mission, they have to change, adapt, give up something for the greater good, work with those whom they don’t like or compromise on something that they care about they get mad.  They get really mad.  And mostly, they get mad at you.

For those of us who are pastors, this is even harder.  Note that the quote above from Linsky and Heifetz  defined leadership as, “disappointing your own people.”  (This is a huge part of the complexity that I wrote about previously.)  Leaders want to bring change.  We want to accomplish big goals.  We gave up our cozy platforms of people-pleasing technical competence to take some big hill.  But the real challenge of leadership is not anywhere “out there,” it’s among our own people.  People whom we love.  People who love us.  People whom we consider “brothers and sisters.”  People who are the “family” of God for us.  People with whom we have found a place of belonging, camaraderie of beliefs, a sense of shared purpose and meaning in life.  The call of leadership is learning how to disappoint THESE particular people well and that is not what most of us ever considered when a most pleased people asked for us to lead them.  

Next Post: the skills for disappointing well.

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November 2012. I am reposting this series from 2010. It is probably the most requested topic by the pastors I coach.

"Disappoint people too much and they give up on you, stop following you and may even turn on you.  Don’t disappoint them enough and you’ll never lead them anywhere." 

The whole blog series begins here and is in its entirety here.

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Three Leadership Truths: Essential, Functional, Developmental

Three Leadership Truths: Essential, Functional, Developmental

Leadership is distinct from management because leadership is about transformation—personal and organizational transformation.  While management, like stewardship, cares for what is, leadership is about what can be or what must become for an organization to fulfill its reason for being.  To that end, let me offer three leadership truths that shape my work in leadership development (mostly in church and non-profit circles.)

1. Leadership is essential. By leadership I don’t mean titles or authority necessarily. (Both are helpful, but not essential to leadership.)  Leadership is not measured by corner offices or heavy furniture, higher salaries or august job descriptions. Leadership is a way of being in an organization, family, team, company, church, business, nation (or any other ‘system’) that, in the words of Ronald Heifetz, “enables a group to grow so they can face their toughest challenges.” Since leadership is about transformation and because we are hard-wired to resist change, every living system requires someone in it to live into and lead into the new future we are resisting.  If someone is not functioning as a leader, the system will always default to the status quo. 
   
   Which hints at the second truth:
2. Leadership is expressed in functioning.  Leaders act. Leaders function.  While speaking is a form of functioning, and many leaders are known for their words in times of crisis, leadership is expressed mostly primarily in the actions that “enable a group to grow and face their toughest challenges.”  Leaders lead by example, words, decisions and even silence.  Sometimes a transformative act is to stand in the middle of an anxious storm and say nothing. Just stand and stand there.  Ed Friedman said, “The leader in the system is the one who is not blaming anyone.” Note: Everyone one of those words was chosen deliberately.  The Leader is the one “in the system”.  That is they have stayed in the family, church, organization, company, country, etc.  You can’t lead from outside the system. (You can be a prophet or critic or consultant or supporter, but not a leader).  The leader is “not blaming anyone” or for that matter any circumstance, but solely focusing on personal responsibility, looking to what she can do—how she can function--differently. And that ‘doing’ is not just impulsive acting, but thoughtful, reflective responding. Perhaps the single most transformative moment of all is when a leader says “I don’t know what to do” and then gets about the hard work of leading learning.
   
   Which leads to the third truth…
3. Leadership is developed. I believe that leadership is a skill that can be taught.  I am firmly in the leaders are ‘made, not born’ school.  Just as some have more aptitude for a skill than others, some have more natural abilities and talents that lend themselves to particular leadership in particular circumstances. But any person who is willing to take personal responsibility, convene a group to work on a tough problem and persist in the face of resistance is a leader.  At the same time, the common inference when people want to learn to be leaders is that it is mostly head-knowledge.  If we read books and can repeat phrases (like ‘adaptive challenges’) we think we have ‘learned leadership’ (which is pretty much like learning to fly a plane from watching a video).  But, and this is critical, leadership is learned in the doing and on the reflecting on the doing.  (John Dewey reportedly wrote: “We don’t learn from experience, we learn by reflecting on experience.”) At the same time even reflection is not enough.  Leadership requires developing what Friedman called, “self-regulation.”  Because our brains don’t process information and learn well when we are highly anxious. Leaders must develop in emotional maturity and the ability to persist in complex emotional systems without either distancing or taking resistance personally.  Or as the good folks at the Lombard Peace Center like to say, Leaders must be able to “stay calm, stay connected, and stay the course.”

If we read these truths backward we get a dose of harsh reality. Since we are not developing leaders, there is lack of leadership functioning. Without essential leadership functioning, most organizations are not “growing”, not “transforming” and certainly not “facing their toughest challenges.”  

These truths about leadership being essential, functional and developmental are critical for any organization facing tough challenges.  But I see it even more clearly in the churches with whom I work. The world is changing rapidly. Churches and church leaders are becoming increasingly irrelevant, even marginalized. Shared, corporate faith is viewed with cynicism at best, downright hostility at worst.  The cultural advantage we experience during the 18 centuries of Christendom has almost completely dissipated.  The church and our churches are in an ‘adapt or die’ moment.  And the leadership that has been developed with a Christendom mindset (leadership is a position, a mode of speaking, and is found only in those with natural born gifts) is inadequate to this immensely challenging—transformation-demanding--moment in history. 

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Doomed to Fail (...and that’s the good news)

You are tasked with the big problem. You work hard. You learn. You listen. You consult. You think. You scribble. You problem solve.  Then… The muse inspires.  The bolt of lightning strikes.  Clarity comes from the sky and you see the Big Idea. You frame it in a classic Jim Collins-worthy “Big Hairy Audacious Goal”.  You can see the future laid out before you.  You write it up. You create the PowerPoint. You shape the concept into a memorable phrase. You launch the initiative. You make the announcement.  It is met with wild affirmation, appreciation, applause; commendations all around.  You are a star.  The organization rolls out the new plan. The org chart is rearranged.  Teams, plans, goals are renamed.  Objectives are set and all is good. And then… 

Nothing.  Nothing changes. At least nothing really important. Oh, a few cosmetic shifts.  But mostly. Everything defaults back to where it was. Homeostasis rules.  The “persistence of form” as Ed Friedman called it, is really, really persistent.  Cynicism follows.  Resistance becomes more entrenched.  True transformation just got that much harder.

What does it take for the Great Idea to become embedded in the culture of the institution?  Why do so many innovations get sabotaged or stunted before they could even be tried as an experiment? 

This is the demoralizing frustration for so many leaders. We see ourselves as a vigorous President Kennedy laying out the challenge to put a man on the moon.  We believe people will rally to the vision and eagerly sacrifice their personal goals for the higher good. 

But Kennedy had far more than a good speech and a compelling vision.  He was coming off a failure (the Bay of Pigs fiasco) that convinced him that he needed to take a big risk on a big idea. The Russians were already ahead of him in the space race creating a compelling sense of urgency.  He also had at least some tepid support of the Congress.  (Reportedly, on the way back to the White House after the now famous speech, Kennedy turned to speechwriter Ted Sorenson and said, "That didn't go over well, did it?")

And most importantly, he had NASA.  He had a group of really smart, really committed, roll-up-the-sleeves-and get-it-done task masters who were ready to get to work.

As John Kotter and other gurus of deep organizational change will tells us, transformation does not just come from a big idea.  Deep change is more than genius, inspiration and marketing. Transformation requires risk-taking born of urgency, aleadership  ‘holding environment’ that will create enough stability and support in an organizational system to experiment with a big idea, and a “guiding coalition” or a “transformation team” ready to do the work of bringing the idea to reality.  

• Without the Bay of Pigs, Kennedy wouldn’t have been willing to gamble on a risk.
• Without the Russians, there wouldn’t have been the urgency to act.
• Without even the tepid support of Congress there wouldn’t have been the resources to even try.
• But without NASA, nothing would ever have gotten off the ground.

Every architect needs both a bank to fund the project and a construction team to build it. Every visionary leader needs both a group to keep attending to the necessary work and a team to lead the transformation of the organizational culture. And while they may be one and the same in some circumstances, a great idea needs at least TWO groups of people to see it through:  The Maintaining Mission Group and The Transformation Team.

The Maintaining Mission Group has to be committed to giving safety, time, space, protection and resources to the project.  At first, they don’t need to actually do anything except NOT create obstacles and not sabotage the change process (a big task, in itself!).  At best, they actively voice support, they keep a steady hand at the wheel and they monitor the inevitable anxiety.  They provide ‘cover’ for the Transformation Team, while also caring for the organization. They make sure that the community feels ‘safe’ while a few are venturing forth. 

In the church setting that I mostly work in, this is the perfect job for the Session or Board. For a non-profit this is the Board of Directors.  They don’t so much have to make it happen, as ‘buy-in’ to giving the Transformation Team time to make it happen.  They have to understand and ‘own’ the changes, but not necessarily give their time and energy to them.  Or to shift the metaphor, they need to keep the wagon train moving even while the scouts ahead are looking for a new pass through the mountains.  Eventually, this group is the most important.  This is the group that will choose to institutionalize the change or not.  This team protects the culture of the organization and it is the team that can single-handedly thwart

The Transformation Team is akin to what John Kotter calls a “Guiding Coalition”.  This is the group of people who are going to add effort to the inspiration.  They are going to actually do the work of listening, learning, attempting, and yes, failing (Do you remember how many early attempts at building rockets flamed out on the launch pad?).  This team needs to be innovative and persistent, cohesive and communicative.  In many situations, this is the staff executive team, but often it is not.  Indeed, in church settings, I believe it is usually a mistake to assume that the church staff is going to be the Transformation Team. Transformation Teams need to be made up of both staff and lay leaders, both those who have defined roles and those with informal influence.  In short, the Transformation Team must be those with the most creativity, energy, credibility and personal maturity.  They must be both enthusiastic for the idea, determined to see it through, and willing to expend relational capital to bring genuine culture change.  And eventually, they have to give up their power and influence so that the organization itself will embrace and institutionalize the changes.

For most leaders I know, and especially for pastors, this certainly doesn’t sound like good news.  This means that most of the ways we have been taught to lead are indeed ‘doomed to fail.’  We want to believe that if we just give a good speech, then people will rise up and rally to the cause.  We love the idea that a compelling vision, an inspirational goal and maybe creative YouTube video going virally on our Facebook page will bring about a new day in the life of the organization. 

The skills that we have honed most (write sermons, hospital calls, counseling, teach classes) we do independently, even individualistically.  When we work with a committee it is usually as a ‘moderator’ not leader.  We mostly watch over processes that are more about making sure that the conversation is orderly, than courageous or creative.  So most very well-intentioned, even ambitious, attempts for a Session or a Pastor to bring transformation are doomed because of a lack of capacity more than anything else.  A pastor needs to speak like Kennedy, moderate the governance like a Speaker of the House and establish and lead NASA all at the same time.  

The good news in the midst of all this doom and failure, is that our own Christian tradition is filled with examples of “transformation teams” that succeeded in ways far beyond most imagining (Even Jesus had a “Transformation Team” of Twelve).  Our theology affirms that leadership is a shared task and the church is meant to be both a safe environment for protecting the community and a group that is willing to lay down their lives for the vision of God’s Kingdom come to earth.  

For inspired ideas to take root within the culture of an institution there must be series of intentional actions.  Pastors need to learn a new set of skills to go along with our abilities to preach, teach, counsel, and moderate meetings.  When leaders are willing to give up the myth of the inspiring idea and instead learn to build teams of inspired action then the church will begin to see more dreams become reality.

Related articles

Discipleship in a Rapidly Changing World: What the Mid-Council Report is Really About #PCUSA

The Key to Changing Organizational Culture

Three Leadership Truths: Essential, Functional, Developmental

Connecting Conversations about leading learning communities:

http://www.faithandleadership.com/blog/10-03-2012/learning-the-job

gives some church leader specific implementation of http://www.forbes.com/sites/actiontrumpseverything/2012/09/22/how-the-best-entrepreneurs-succeed-a-case-study/

And helps me with the thoughts I have been developing here: http://bolsinger.blogs.com/weblog/learning-communities/

Butter Knives in the Final Frontier #PCUSA #leadership

My Dad can fix anything with a butter knife.  In Dad’s hands a simple kitchen instrument that just that morning had been instrumental in making PB & J sandwiches for school lunches, becomes, at once, a screwdriver, a paint scraper, a pry bar, a file, a lever and even a small hammer.  It is really a wonder to behold.  When I was growing up, if some small home repair was needed, more often than not he wouldn’t turn to the big tool chest in the garage, he would just summon me to go to the silverware drawer and bring him a butter knife. 

After two years of reflecting on what is needed to help the church face an uncertain future and changing world, I have come to think that what we need--even more than new structures, organizations, fellowships and denominations--are the kinds of people who can renovate it with butter knives.

Bob Johansen, Distinguished Fellow for the Institute of the Future, describes what he calls a VUCA world, that is a world that is ‘volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous.” As Johnson puts it in the title of his best known book, “Leaders make the future.”

It was this spirit of imagination, play and innovation that infused the now-reconfigured Mid Council Commission.  In one sense, our hope was to give the “makers of the future” a new set of tools, a new ‘shop’ to experiment in, and a new sense of permission.  Our 300 page report was an attempt to recast every presbytery to fullfill Thomas Friedman’s charge: "We need 100,000 people in 100,000 garages trying 100,000 things-in the hope that five of them break through." 

And it was turned down flat. Barely even read or considered, let alone debated or discussed. The central idea rejected; a portion sent back to a new commission to be made more palatable to the present realities.  The shiny new tool box, the experimental work place and the bold call for creativity and permission silenced by an avalanche of “no” votes.  You can almost see the lights in the garages click off, the new tools, still in their plastic wrap shelved, unopened, untried. 

But in all honesty, it was expected.  Or should have been.  Johansen uses language that could have been the headline summary for the Pittsburgh Assembly, “You cannot listen for the future if you are deafened by the present or stuck in the past.”

But in this changing world, the leaders of the future will not be overwhelmed by either present or past, but will excitedly, “imagine alternative structures and love to play around with them to see what new things they can create.” They will be ‘tinkerers’ according to Johansen or, as Steven Johnson in his study of innovation has written, those who can “cobble together” the parts and pieces in front of them with the tools at hand for a new discovery.  Like the Houston engineers in the film, Apollo 13 who had to make a new air filter with only some small parts or the orbiting astronauts would succumb to their own carbon dioxide, the leaders of the future will need to be creative, persistent, resilient and able to make the future out of the parts and pieces of what we’ve got.  

It became crystal clear to many of us at the General Assembly that another “study”, “conversation,” “task force,” or even commission will not bring change to the church.  The church will not change until we get a change in leadership. Either we need new leaders who are ready to make the future or the current leaders of every level of the church must find a courage and creativity that has so far eluded them.

The leadership we have today is indeed “perfectly designed for the results we are getting.” It is leadership that is well-schooled in managing divisive politics through zealously guarding the status quo and then wringing hands and blaming the system when nothing changes.  “This is what it means to be Presbyterian,” one high ranking leader rationalized.  In Apollo 13, the lead engineer, mindful that not only the mission but the lives of his colleagues are at stake, yells at an excuse-making subordinate, “I don't care about what anything was DESIGNED to do, I care about what it CAN do.”

Over the summer I have talked to several emerging leaders who are not letting the failure of nerve of the stakeholders of the status quo stop them.  They are not wringing their hands in futility.  They are not throwing up their hands in frustration.  They are not worrying so much about the initials on the door or whether another commission (or another denomination) can somehow save us from ourselves.  They have thumbed through the Form of Government, taken notes on the best practices of their peers and partners, started conversations across theological lines and started looking past the arguments in the presbytery meetings to the opportunities in their neighborhoods and the needs in their cities. 

They are not waiting around for another Assembly.  If good things come from the earnest people who are in the broader conversations, they are all for it.  But, there are people to reach and neighbors to love and good news to be proclaimed.  There are new worshipping communities to build and old congregations that need to be renovated.  They are going to keep thinking about what a congregation, a presbytery and a denomination CAN do, not what it was supposed to do.  Even if they don’t have the tools they might have had, they are not going to let that stop them.  They are too busy in the basement with their butter knives, making the future.

I’ll be tinkering with them.