Leading Major Change in Your Ministry

by Jeff Iorg

The first section of the book outlines foundational concepts to leading major change. The second section explains a six-fold model for leading major change. Throughout the book, the examples and illustrations are from real-life ministry challenges in both local churches and large organizations—not armchair quarterbacking. While theories about leading major change are interesting, practical insight about how to actually do it is more helpful.

Dictionary writers have struggled to define leadership, deflecting the issue by simply connecting it to lead and leaving it there. Contemporary sources are not much more helpful. Dictionary.com calls leadership “the position or function of a leader,”2 and other online dictionaries mimic this tepid attempt. Defining leadership is apparently tougher than it seems.

While that tongue-in-check summation tried to cover every aspect of anything anyone had ever connected to leadership, Rost’s team ultimately reached a more helpful conclusion. After completing their comprehensive analysis over a century of the uses of the word leadership, they offered this potent and cogent definition: “Leadership is an influence relationship among leaders and followers who intend real changes that reflect their mutual purposes.”6

Servant-leadership is more an attitude than an action, but it is an attitude demonstrated by actions. You cannot have one without the other. If you want to have the kind of influence required to lead major change in your ministry setting, your followers must be convinced you are passionately driven to serve them. They will be convinced by your actions, not your words. Servant-leadership is demonstrated by both professional competence and personal engagement.

A clearly articulated mission—both the overarching mission of God and the specific mission of a church or organization—is the key to unity between leaders and followers who intend real change.

Good leaders do not enjoy hurting others, but are responsible to make difficult decisions (in the short run) for the long-term benefit of advancing God’s mission and the particular mission of the organization they lead.

The key diagnostic questions are: Is the change essential to the mission? Is there shared urgency about the change? Is relational trust high enough to sustain the change? Is the timing right for the change? Am I willing to see the change to completion?

There are at least three problems clouding the issue when answering this question. First, leaders can initiate major change to meet their ego needs (all the while using “mission language” or “God talk” to validate their decision).

A second issue about the priority of mission in major change is initiating it to make people (leaders and/or followers) more comfortable. Most legitimate major change does the opposite. Still, it is tempting to increase compensation, streamline organizational practices, or even add staff members to care for constituents rather than fulfill the ministry’s mission. These decisions are often popular and earn kudos from followers, making them more appealing than decisions that produce major change aligned with God’s mission.

Finally, another problem related to prioritizing mission when deciding about major change is making changes that actually serve the organization’s mission—but without improvement commensurate with the expense and effort it takes to accomplish the changes.

Major change must be made for one reason—advancing your ministry’s mission as it aligns with God’s mission.

The second diagnostic question—“Is there shared urgency about the change?”—strikes at what some feel is the key issue related to making major change successfully. In his best-selling book, Leading Change, John Kotter laid out an eight-fold model for organizational change.8 The first step in his model is “establishing a sense of urgency.”

A second strategy also includes using data effectively, but this time focusing on information about the mission field or ministry possibilities. When real needs and potential ministry markets are seen with fresh eyes, people are more easily motivated to make the changes necessary to meet those needs or penetrate those markets.

A third strategy for creating urgency is a fresh consideration of God’s mission in light of the organization’s mission. This can be done through teaching and preaching on these issues, as well as using other media to inform and educate followers. Over time, mission drift occurs in almost every organization. Followers and leaders alike can lose focus of their ministry’s true purpose and allow their efforts to become more about meeting their needs than fulfilling the organization’s core mission.

Finally, a fourth strategy is using crises to produce a sense of urgency. Be careful, though, to use legitimate crises—not something manufactured that produces short-term response followed by diminished trust over time. When followers feel manipulated—like by leaders who repeatedly claim financial exigency and demand increased giving—they lose confidence in their leaders and their response rate to those kinds of appeals will lag. They may become so jaded they will not be motivated when a real crisis happens.

Leaders earn trust by serving people.

Leaders build trust in and among their followers by investing them with responsibility and authority for decision-making, giving them incremental responsibility for ministry programs, and celebrating their successes. Wise leaders build trust in and among their followers over time, knowing when major change becomes necessary, followers must already be trust-infused so they can confidently take on a big challenge.

The wrong decision at the wrong time = Disaster The wrong decision at the right time = Mistake The right decision at the wrong time = Rejection The right decision at the right time = Success10

The final question to answer when diagnosing the need for major change—“Am I willing to see the change to completion?”—is a gut-check for every leader. Major change takes time—often years—to plan, execute, and fully implement. The onerous part of major change is not the dreaming or launch phases; it is the completion phase.

Foundational to helping people through major change is this seminal idea: change is different than transition. Change is the new circumstances introduced into organizational life, i.e., a new staffing plan going into effect on a specific date. Transition, on the other hand, is the emotional, psychological, and spiritual adjustments people go through when change is implemented.

Leading through transition requires understanding both how change happens (see chapter 3) and how people process change (the transition process). There are three key aspects of managing transition that inform a sound plan for leading followers to embrace major change, implement it successfully, and personally manage it well.

When people feel a profound loss, they go through stages or phases of grief. These have been defined and described in different ways by psychologists, ranging from five to eight different aspects of the process.13 Most pastors learn about managing grief in the context of helping people cope with serious illnesses and death. Wise leaders learn this breakthrough insight: going through a major organizational change and accompanying sense of personal loss produces a very similar grief process. When people go through ministry changes, they feel a sense of loss, and express it through a grieving process similar to the death of a loved one.

These stages or phases of grief are shock, anger, denial, bargaining, exploration, and adjustment.

Wise leaders remember processing a major change decision usually takes them several months. When they announce it publicly for the first time, followers are at the beginning of a similar consideration process. They need time to assimilate what they have heard, consider its implications, and check with other people (like their spouse or trusted peer) before settling on their response. If a major change is timely, reasonably presented, and essential to fulfilling the ministry’s mission, it will eventually be embraced by most followers. Leaders must trust decision-making processes and allow followers time to work through the information and reach suitable conclusions. If the decision is the right one, most people will agree with the change in a relatively short period of time.

The six axioms for leading major change are: Major change begins with direction from God. Major change requires initiative from a leader. Major change is accomplished by followers. Major change depends on God’s intervention. Major change is messy and difficult. Major change brings glory to God.

The primary way God speaks to leaders is through the Bible. God uses His Word to guide leaders in corporate decision-making in two primary ways. God instructs devotionally to “rebuke, correct, and encourage” leaders (2 Tim. 4:2).

God also guides directionally, meaning he uses the Bible to clarify how any potential ministry decision relates to his overall mission of creating a community for his eternal companionship (Eph. 3:8–11).

We eventually achieved clarity by continually focusing on God’s mission and evaluating our options in light of his eternal purpose.

This book would be a lot better if instead of just stating something like this and moving onto another example he sat here and expanded on this idea. I would like to hear specifics on how they achieved clarity. He’s gone on about how they could have remained in the original campus or they could move. It seems to me that both could be options used by God. So when you have choice where God can use either option how do you decide? That’s what I’m trying to learn.

Collegial decision-making contributes to good decisions about major change in several ways. First, a leadership group creates more ideas and options about a major change than any one person can produce. Second, a group can also edit out bad ideas, eliminating them before they do any damage by public disclosure. Third, good ideas can be turned into great ideas as the leadership group sharpens them. Fourth, objections from group members to a major change are usually the same as will be faced when the issue becomes public. Solving these problems in private may eliminate the issue as a concern, give leaders time to think through appropriate responses prior to going public, and allow leaders to practice dialoging about troublesome issues. Finally, a group decision—particularly when one or more people are reluctant to go forward—can be the means God uses to keep a major change on his timetable.

Real change requires a point person who will pay the price to make it happen.

Throughout the Bible, when God was ready to do something new, he started by choosing a leader—Abraham inaugurated a nation; Moses led the Israelites out of slavery; Nehemiah rebuilt the wall around Jerusalem; Peter led the disciples who guided the early church; and Paul expanded the gospel among the Gentiles. God assigns leaders, then uses them to accomplish his purposes. When an organization needs major change, God usually begins the process by placing the right person at the helm.

God’s method is leader first, strategy second. Ministries must first identify the character qualities, skill sets, life and professional experiences, and training essential for a person to be successful in their context. Once God has led an organization to put the right leader is in place, he will work through them to develop a strategy for major change. The right leader must be in place before the right strategy can be developed.

Two other aspects of leadership selection processes in the Bible are encouraging—particularly in light of the inadequacies found in every leader. First, God chooses flawed people as leaders. The weaknesses (and even heinous sins) of biblical leaders are painfully evident. God chose people and used them in spite of their shortcomings.

Second, God patiently trains people for the leadership roles he assigns, and then uses their unique qualities (including their shortcomings) to accomplish his purposes.

A third key principle is evident in God’s selection of leaders: experience shapes usefulness. When God chooses a leader, it is in the context of that person’s past life and professional experiences.

Leaders lead. They take initiative. They stand up at the appropriate time, give definitive direction, and supervise the job to completion.

Leaders count the true cost—including the full duration of time required to implement a major change—and then commit to seeing it through to the end.

Good leaders plan their communication about a proposed change as thoroughly as they have strategized the change.

Keep this principle in mind, however, when deciding how much and what kind of information to share: the greater the investment you expect from followers, the more information they need about the proposed change.

As previously noted (see chapter 6), a major change takes longer to fully implement than many people realize. Leaders know, however, they must sustain an intentional communication strategy to the true end of the project—not just when the major public aspects are finished. Followers crave information and wise leaders communicate thoroughly to make sure this need is met for the duration of the major change.

Since followers are primarily responsible for implementing major change, leaders must provide the resources necessary to get the job done. Those resources can be described in three categories: time, tracks, and tools.

Determining an adequate time line for implementing a major change is important for several reasons. First, it relieves undue pressure followers feel to get the job done quickly. Second, it assures followers their needs are being considered as part of the implementation process. Third, it creates a sense of pace—rather than panic—about the change. Steady progress on a reasonable time line is better than frantic effort. Fourth, a good timetable recognizes the natural energy swoon associated with any major project.

Finally, a good timetable recognizes “life happens” while implementing change and followers will need time to absorb these challenges while still implementing the changes being made in their church or ministry organization.

Leaders must do more than cast vision about change or passionately advocate for it. They must lay the track their followers will use to travel to the destination. Leaders do this in several ways.

Since followers actually get the job done, wise leaders supply the resources necessary to accomplish major change. As a leader, make your followers more effective and maintain their morale by creating a realistic time line, laying out a reasonable plan, and supplying them with the tools needed to complete a major change.

While God’s approval is our ultimate goal, good leaders know the powerful, positive results from recognizing people for their sacrifices and accomplishments. The Bible encourages us to “outdo one another in showing honor” (Rom. 12:10). When leaders do this well, surprising things happen. Here are three categories of recognition leaders can provide followers who are implementing a major change.

This same faculty member later posted a sign outside his office door that said, “The person who says something is impossible should not interrupt the person who is doing it.”

Change is hard and major change doubly so. Managing the conflicts associated with major change is a significant problem for leaders who are also going through the change, dealing with personal emotional and spiritual issues while trying to lead the organization, as well as helping their followers process the transition.

Relational conflict can occur in at least three interpersonal dimensions: struggles with God, debates among decision-makers, and tensions among followers as they process the change they are attempting to make. While these can be negative, each can also be a source of healthy conflict contributing to making major change.

Conflict among leaders trying to decide about a major change can be a healthy part of the process when it engenders honest debate. As long as the debate remains focused on core issues, it will lead to greater insight and unity about the final decision. But when any debate becomes personal—more focused on winners and losers than advancing the organization’s mission—it becomes detrimental. The spiritual maturity and missional focus of ministry leaders should keep the debate appropriately centered. When it drifts, team members have to take corrective action to get it back on track. Otherwise, what could be a force for good can poison the decision-making process.