Marc Estes

I am often asked, “With all that is on your plate, how do you manage your time?” That my friend is the million dollar question for all leaders. Time is critical part of our success. You can buy it, you don’t earn it, you get back what you have lost. We all have the same amount of it. Time is something we all will be held accountable for.  What we do with what we have been given will determine our success.

 Forbes magazine researched the subject of success and failure and found that the number one factor for success or failure was time management. What is true in the business community can also be true among Christians and their spiritual maturity. Christian stewardship requires the effective management of one’s time. It is only when we truly understand that we have a limited time on earth that we’ll live each day to the fullest. 

Life is complex. Ministry can be more complex. There are consistent demands on our lives that come from every angle. We must learn to be strategic, proactive and efficient with our time management.  Ever feel like Joshua? Ask God to stop the sun to get a little extra done?  If that is you, here are some practical thoughts that will either  encourage you or challenge you. These are some tips I have learned along the way:

        A.    Establish an Annual plan

                1.    Choose an annual time for goal setting and reflection

                2.    Review previous year’s goals.

                3.    Establish new goals for personal areas and ministry areas

                4.    Transfer all items into your prayer list and project list

        B.    Prioritize Annual Priorities

                1.    Set important family dates, events and vacation

                 2.  Set all Church even dates and meetings

                3.    Set meetings with departments and leaders

                4.    Set preparation time for all meetings

                5.    Enter all meetings and events into calendar for the entire year.

                6.    Contact all leaders with dates.

        C.    Develop a Weekly Plan

                1.    Set time every week for planning out week

                2.    Review existing meetings and insure enough time for planning

                3.    Review task list and move any priorities into time slots.

                4.    Review project list and move any projects into schedule.

        D.    Develop Daily Habits

                1.    Start every day with reviewing and planning your day.

                2.    Consolidate emails and phone calls into am and pm slot.

                3.    Avoid time robbers.

                4.    Use task list and leader list to catalogue thoughts.

                5.    Transfer any projects not done into future time slots.

                6.    Don’t revert back to old habits.

I heard a great story regarding the value the Word of God can play in our lives. It is worth the read!

A young man from a wealthy family was about to graduate from high school. The custom of this affluent neighborhood was the bestowal of a car once the student graduated from high school. The boy fully expected the norm would hold true for him as well. He had spent months talking about cars and looking at them with his father. Just a week before graduation this father and son found what appeared to be the perfect car. The young man was certain he would see the car in his driveway. Yet, when he opened his father’s graduation present it was a Bible. He was so mad that he threw down the Bible and stormed out of the house. He never reconciled with his father and remained estranged until the father died.

As the son went through his father’s belongings, he came across the Bible his father had given him years ago. He brushed off the dust and opened it. To his surprise and horror he found a cashier’s check between the pages of Scripture. It was dated the day of his graduation for the exact amount of the car he and his dad had chosen together. God’s greatest gifts are still found in the pages of Scripture, but we sometimes allow greed to destroy relationships and divert our attention elsewhere.

It is unfortunate that most of us see ourselves as a composite of all our failures. When we look in the mirror we may only see a divorced person, or someone who lost his job, or an overweight loner. Even though many of us can’t see beyond the failures, this is not the way God views us. As a loving Father, he looks past our failures.

Can you imagine a loving father introducing his children by saying, “This is my daughter, Meagan, who stained the carpet with grape juice when she was two”? Or, “This is my son, Myles, who broke a valuable vase last week.” If loving fathers don’t have a need to memorize their children’s failures, you can rest assured our loving Heavenly Father has no use for such memories either. When we accept God’s forgiveness through Jesus Christ, he forgets our failures.

This generation is in pursuit of finding authenticity. They are crying out for the “real thing” yet, may have a challenge in defining what the “real thing” actually is.  Many today do not have an issue with religion itself, but those who claim to know the truth and live a lifestyle that is contrary to their beliefs.  Over 80% of unchurched people today say that Christians are hypocritical. Although there are many today that do model the life of a true Christ follower, there are still millions that don’t.  If we are going to really bring a generation to God, we show them what real truth is and what it looks like through the daliy life of one who follows God.

As a Christian, one of our highest priorities must be to live a spiritually authentic life.  Simply stated, live what you believe! Devoting yourself to reading the Word daily and praying passionately are noble goals, but useless if we don’t live those truths out in our daily lives.  Having the intention to help someone in need and actually following through are two extreme opposites.  Our behavior must match our beliefs.

John Burke, in his book, “No Perfect People Allowed” states, “Authenticity is hard work. It always works from the inside out. It begins with your inner life being authentic first with God.  It manifests itself in personal vulnerability before others as an intimate connection with God… This opens for others a view into an authentic spiritual life of a real human – not a religious sales person.”

Why not partner with me in starting an “Authenticity Revolution.” Let’s take the truth that we know, apply it to our lives and take it to the streets.

Many leaders live in maintenance mode, it is shown by their fruit. The main goal is keep from losing ground rather than trying to make progress. That is the lowest level of leadership when it comes to the development of people and fulfillment of vision. Here are the five stages that exist from maintenance and multiplication:

1.    Stage 1: The Scramble Stage

About 20 percent of all leaders live on the lowest level of the development process. They are not doing anything to develop people in their organization, and as a result, their attrition rate is off the charts. They can’t seem to keep anyone they recruit. That’s why we say they’re in the scramble stage – they spend most of their time scrambling to find people to replace the ones they lose.

2.    Stage 2: The Survival Stage

The next stage in the development ladder is survival mode. In it, leaders do nothing to develop their people, but they do manage to keep the people they have. About 50 percent of all leaders function this way. Their organization is average, the leaders are dissatisfied, and no one is developing personal potential. No one really benefits from this approach to leadership. Everyone merely survives from day to day without much promise or hope for the future.

3.    Stage 3: The Siphon Stage

About 10 percent of all leaders work at developing their people into better leaders, but they neglect to build their relationship with their people. As a result, their potential leaders leave the organization to pursue other opportunities. In other words, they are siphoned off from the organization. That often leads to frustration on the part of the leader because other people benefit from their effort, and they must devote a lot of time to looking for replacements.

4.    Stage 4: The Synergy Stage

When leaders build strong relationships, develop people to become good leaders, empower them to reach their potential and are able to keep them in the organization, something wonderful happens. It is often called synergy, meaning that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts because the parts interact well together and create energy, progress, and momentum. A church on the synergy level has great morale and high leadership satisfaction. Everyone benefits. Only about 19 percent of all leaders reach this level, but those who do are often considered the very best there are.

5.    Stage 5: The Significance Stage

Many people who reach the synergy level never try to go any farther because they don’t realize they can take one more step in the development process and that is to the significance level. Leaders on that level develop and reproduce leaders who stay in the organization, work to reach their potential, and in turn reproduce themselves in other leaders. And this is where influence really multiplies. Only about 1 percent of all leaders make it to this level, but the ones who do are able to tap into almost limitless growth and influences potential. A handful of leaders continually functioning on the significance level can make an impact on the world for generations to come!

One of the greatest challenges I face as a leader is getting people to step outside their comfort zone to grow. Most all of them have the desire to grow, but are just unwilling to move beyond the boundaries of familiarity and comfort. However, if any of us are ever going to grow to new levels of leadership and influence, we will need to identify areas of weakness and develop a strategy to stretch beyond them.

Let’s just recognize that leadership is getting people to do what they don’t want to do so they can become what they are supposed to become.

We must ask ourselves, “is it God’s will that they stay that way?” If the answer is, “no,” then we have to ask ourselves, “what role do I play in challenging them to get out of their comfort zone?”

People are like sharks, they grow into the environment in which they’re placed. You take a baby shark and put it into a small aquarium and it will stay small. You put it into the endless ocean and it will grow huge. People who are not stretched beyond their comfort will remain small in the potential.

What size tank (your ministry area) do you create for your leaders?  It is perfectly alright to stretch people. God actually did this frequently. From Genesis to Revelation, God’s people were stretched.

 Don’t apologize for asking them to build the church… Jesus never did, neither should we!

 

Whether you are a pastor, small group leader, worship leader or busineww owner, you understand that vision plays a key role in accomplishing God’s purposes. Moving those you lead to completely embrace vision can be a challenge if we don’t understand the process of receptivity.

There are various stages of vision receptivity. A person’s receptivity can be affected by a variety of factors; personality, maturity, gifting, communication, level of position, and how it affects them personally.  If you have been leading any length of time, you understand that casting the vision is the easiest part of vision development. Moving people from where they currently are to where you desire them to be is where the fun begins.

We must learn to identify where leaders are at in the process and be willing to take the time to coach them through the process until they own the vision. Remember people are your most precious commodity.  If no one is following, you are not leading, just on a walk.

Therefore, we must understand the different stages of receptivity and acknowledge the importance of each phase. Learning to lead people through each stage and giving them the grace they need to digest change is a critical part of fulifilling the vision God has placed on your heart.

Levels of receptivity:

1. Communication – Vision is communicated.

2. Interpretation – People interpret, then develop their perception.

3. Assessment – People analyze vision and its affect.

4. Response – Their response can be negative, positive or neutral.

5. Revelation – The turning point! They get it. They get on or off board.

6. Embrace – Those that stay get excited.

7. Ownership- Once it is owned, you are successful, and can move forward.

Have you ever sat at a table in a restaurant where the legs were uneven? Did you find it a little irritating? Have you ever been around a leader that had great potential, yet they were unbalanced in a certain area of their life and they bothered you as well? Balance is a key component to all aspects of life. Balance is a key component to developing leaders.

As you look at developing leaders around you, there should be three foundational components that deserve equal attention:

1. HEAD development – Leaders with wisdom and knowledge.

2. HEART development – Leaders with character and integrity.

3. HAND development – Leaders with skill and experience.

 

HEAD Development

We need leaders today that understand and embrace sound doctrine and leadership principles. Our leadership development must include some strategy inwhich we direct those around us to grow in their knowledge of God and doctrine. You might consider a cool new equipping opportunity at PBC website.

HEART Development

Leadership is influence. Who we are ultimately shapes what those following us, ultimately become. In a time where there is an onslaught of fallen leaders and a society that exalts gifting over character, we must reverse the trend to develop leaders who lead by character.  Settle for nothing less than developing leaders with impeccable character.

HAND Development

Leaders must have knowledge and heart, but must also  have application. As you work to develop leaders around you, there must be environments in which they are allowed to apply that which they have learned. Experience is the best form of development as it gives you the opportunity to observe and evaluate the leader’s life in action. Allow them to try and allow them to fail. Encourage them, critique them and inspire them to succeed.

As you move forward in developing leaders around you, make it your aim to create leaders that are balanced in these three important areas.