Where Have All the Leaders Gone?
I will never forget the day the world shut down. The closing on our 65-year-old church building was just a week away and we were 80% of the way moved out with just a few more things to donate and sell. The storage units were filled. We had already started meeting at a movie theatre to ready our church for a new mobile launch. It was on that day as we stood in the middle of an almost empty church building that we got the call that the sale of our building was frozen indefinitely, and we were to simply go home and isolate ourselves. The world was coming to a halt.
Everyone’s story was different, and yet it was all the same. A pandemic. An unseen future. Fear was engulfing the globe like a wet blanket.
The next years unfolded, trying us all as leaders. As pastors, we scrambled to engage the church differently. We navigated loss, heard varying opinions, shifted platforms, remained hope-filled, rallied the community, and stayed on our knees. And yet, who could have known that the pandemic was only the beginning of greater systemic issues. As Annabel Beerel notes: “Serious neo-political tensions, climate change, the implications of Brexit, the cooling of the global economy, growing income equality, digital disruption, massive mental health problems, racial tensions, and tension between generations provides a challenging leadership agenda.”[1]
Beerel asks the questions that others have asked several times, “Where have all the leaders gone?” It is a question that rallies the reader to ask “What do you mean, where have all the leaders gone? We are here, still leading, but in a world we no longer recognize.” Every pastor I know in the last few years has said in one way or another, “I am not sure how to lead anymore.” Many have thrown in the towel. Others cling to a calling knowing that God is constant. However, new strategies are necessary… I believe Beerel has me where she wants me. It is here, that Beerel begins laying a very thorough foundation of why a new look at leadership is needed and what that might need to change.
Having read a multitude of leadership books, this one resonates on a different level. Perhaps it is the attention Beerel gives to a systemic overview of leadership to help the reader make connections with what has been, what is, and what might be needed moving forward. With all our recent study of leadership, it felt like familiar territory as she drew from much of our reading…David Rock, Friedman, Kahneman, Northouse, etc., and then moved into newer territory.
One of the qualities, Beerel stresses is that of learning. “Leaders need to be learners. True learning results in transformation. Continuously transforming themselves is the hallmark of effective leadership.”[2] They will also need a calm non-anxious presence bringing clarity as life
swiftly changes and turns around us at breakneck speeds…also, “theories and practices that include profound, soul-searching, personal self-development will be exceedingly helpful to leaders going forward.” [3]
With much exposition, Beerel concludes that leadership will “need to operate from a higher consciousness and have both courage and compassion. Leadership development will need to be more sophisticated and rigorous, with emphasis on ego development and vertical learning.”[4]
What does this “more sophisticated and rigorous leadership development look like? Ego development? Vertical learning? I’m not sure, but I am willing to grow and learn in tandem with how God leads as well. This brings to mind Tom Comacho’s book “Mining for Gold: Developing Kingdom Leaders through Coaching:” where he speaks of the scarcity of leaders that exemplify love, fruitfulness, and the development of others. It is the refining power of fire that is necessary to purify gold.[5] The Holy Spirit will purify the inner motives, the unseen shadows, and the dark sides of who we are. It is also the Holy Spirit that will guide us in all truth (John 16:13).
“Where have all the leaders gone?” We are here. Regrouping. Learning. Praying. Changing. Listening. Dreaming again… Perhaps with a greater tenacious urgency of what really matters.
[1] Annabel Beerel, Rethinking Leadership: A Critique of Contemporary Theories, 1st ed. (Milton: Taylor & Francis Group, 2021), https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003044444. 16-17
[2] Beerel. 107.
[3] Beerel. 26.
[4] Beerel. 387.
[5] Tom Comacho, Mining for Gold: Developing Kingdom Leaders through Coaching (La Vergne: IVP, 2019).
About the Author
Esther Edwards
Esther has served in ministry leadership for over 35 years. She is an ordained minister, an ICF and CCLC certified coach, and licensed coach trainer. Her and her husband have launched their own coaching practice, Enjoy the Journey Leadership Coaching and seek to train ministry leaders in the powerful skill of coaching. Esther loves hiking, reading, and experiencing new coffee shops with friends and family. She enjoys the journey with her husband, Keith, their four daughters, sons-in-law, and their five beautiful grandchildren.6 responses to “Where Have All the Leaders Gone?”
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Hi Esther,
I love your response to Beerel’s question of where have all the leaders gone?
“We are here, still leading, but in a world we no longer recognize. We are here. Regrouping. Learning. Praying. Changing. Listening. Dreaming again… Perhaps with a greater tenacious urgency of what really matters.”
I keep thinking about the dynamic between leaders and followers that Northouse discussed. Leaders had so much to adapt to during the pandemic. I wonder about the experiences of followers after such life-altering change.
What has regrouping as a leader looked like for you in your context? What are you noticing about how followers are regrouping?
Thank you for continuing to lead in challenging times.
Jenny,
I think it was Socrates that said “All I know, is that I know nothing.” However, realizing that we don’t know begins the creative process of being curious, listening, watching, and learning. I am determined to hear God’s voice at a deeper level and also very determined to learn about how culture is changing and why. As I watch those who follow in a ministry context, I sense a desire for confident yet authentic leadership and a need for a community with safe places to process fears and doubts so that regrouping to move forward can happen.
Great post Esther…thank you. Your answer is similar to my own–there’s still leaders out there….good leaders doing their best to use their gift of leadership to serve others and their organizations. That was one critique of Beerel’s book…the other critique I had which I didn’t blog about was related to her assertion that a ‘new type of leadership’ is required, and that her book was articulating what that was. I found the vast majority of her content to be very helpful but not really new (perhaps apart from the ego-conscious transpersonal chapter that made me wonder if I should be taking shrooms while I read that chapter!). Even that chapter could be included in a recognition of ‘spirituality and leadership’. So I would be curious what sort of new content/teaching regarding leadership stood out to you in her book?
Hi, Scott,
Thank you for commenting. Most of the book, for me, was more of an up-to-date synthesis of all the strands of leadership thought. However, the last chapter had some new awareness for me. She speaks of “action logic”, which “is a disciplined leadership practice that enables one to become more capable of self-transformation and better able to handle complex problems” (p. 381), and “vertical knowledge” which “is the transformation of how one thinks, feels, and makes sense of the world. It is the development of mental, psychological, and emotional complexity. It creates a new sense of identity and thus a change in ego structure. (p. 379) There really isn’t too much new under the sun, but she seems to hone in on the leader being more in tune psychologically with the complexity of the world and being able to self-adjust and change with that complexity. So maybe I should have just read the last chapter. Ha! Ha!
Esther, I know I talked about being with people dying and that’s deep and heavy and important, but I remember thinking during pandemic listening to the stuff my family members who are pastors had to endure, I was thankful to not be in church leadership! Whew! What a hard place to be on the day of closing!
When you said ““Where have all the leaders gone?” We are here. Regrouping. Learning. Praying. Changing. Listening. Dreaming again… Perhaps with a greater tenacious urgency of what really matters”, I want to know what are you dreaming of and how does tenacity play out for you in your leadership?
Jana,
With all of our church transition as well as the pandemic and societal change, I’d say that 2023 was the hardest in ministry, even greater for us than during the pandemic. As you mentioned in your response to me in your post, perhaps the aspect of compassion fatigue plays a part in the aftereffects that everyone has endured throughout the last 4 years. For our church, and maybe others, I would add “change fatigue”. Sometimes you just want stability and routine. For us dreaming again, is first of all, moving into a stable building and then envisioning opportunities for community ministries. Though it will bring much new, there is something to having a “home”. Also, for me personally, many of the extras that we think we need don’t seem as necessary anymore. We are regrouping and focusing on what is the most important. For us, it is about relationships, vertical and horizontal. Northern Va is simply very lonely though affluent with a large immigrant population. We are tenacious in holding to the value of relationships and family as we dream of new opportunities for our church.