{"id":24511,"date":"2019-10-21T06:24:50","date_gmt":"2019-10-21T13:24:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=24511"},"modified":"2019-10-21T06:24:50","modified_gmt":"2019-10-21T13:24:50","slug":"no-size-fits-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/no-size-fits-all\/","title":{"rendered":"No Size Fits All"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leadership is a tricky topic to discuss.\u00a0 As the Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice<\/em> shows, there are not just many definitions of what leadership is, but many different ways in which it manifests itself.\u00a0 Although we may try to systematize leadership in a clear cut way, the reality is much more complex.\u00a0 There is no one size-fits all style of leadership.<\/em>\u00a0 <\/strong>There are unifying principles that can be utilized in helping to discern the role<\/em> of leaders, but a big part of leadership is how one leans into their God-given abilities.<\/p>\n

Whether we realize it or not, we carry various notions of what leaders should be.\u00a0 When I was in university, the most common type of leader I saw on my campus was a dominant leader who got things done at all costs.\u00a0 For these various leaders, the tasks they were trying to accomplish came before the relationships they had with people.\u00a0 Because this was what I was primarily exposed to (or at least consciously reflecting on at the time), that was what I thought leadership was: You need to get things done and you\u2019re the ultimate authority.<\/p>\n

While that style of leadership is valid and does <\/em>carry a purpose and role within society, that\u2019s not me.\u00a0 I remember very clearly the first real leadership role I had in university was the co-director of a drama ministry.\u00a0 I had been part of the ministry for only one semester after becoming good friends with the previous director.\u00a0 He told me that he thought I would be a good fit to take over for him because we had similar personalities, so the transition wouldn\u2019t be too jarring.\u00a0 I was hesitant to even consider the role, but at the first meeting of the new school year, I was voted in as the new co-director.<\/p>\n

There are many factors to what happened next.\u00a0 First, I had just returned from Hong Kong for the first time and I was experiencing a type of reverse culture shock upon reentry.\u00a0 I just wanted to be back in Hong Kong and couldn\u2019t appreciate what was happening in front of me at the time (I say during that time I came back with a fire in me, but instead of providing light I simply burned everyone around me).\u00a0 Second, some of the older members \u2013 who were more dominant in their personalities \u2013 pushed me to make decisions that they thought was best for the group.\u00a0 Because of my difficulty in reentry (and really not wanting to be in that leadership position to begin with), whatever suggestion they gave I pushed ahead with it even if it hurt people along the way.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, this experience ended with the ministry all but completely crumbling, a lot of broken relationships, and a growing resentment for myself as I realized I had failed.<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 When I finally realized what was happening, it was too late.\u00a0 It appeared that things were on the upswing, but I was voted out of leadership and the position was given to the previous director.<\/p>\n

Still reeling from my failure with the drama group, my next major leadership role was as a team leader in Hong Kong for a group of teachers.\u00a0 I had participated in this program the previous two years as a teacher, so it was my first time leading anyone overseas.\u00a0 Again, the leaders I had were very driven individuals who I respected very much, so I tried to emulate their leadership style.\u00a0 …and failed.<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 After two weeks of frustrations and miscommunications, I finally realized that because I was trying to be someone else, I wasn\u2019t giving this team what they needed.\u00a0 I had been giving them a false self.<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 We had a heart to heart where I explained where I was coming from and my team was very gracious with me.\u00a0 From that moment, I started leading not as my previous leaders, but rather as who God made me.\u00a0 And my team embraced not just me, but each other as we formed our team identity.<\/p>\n

The story that we tell and the story that we write shapes those around us in ways we don\u2019t realize (a concept hit upon in Chapter 19).\u00a0 If the narrative of leadership that we have written is one that ultimately disempowers people from leading through their strengths and instead tries to pigeonhole people into a uniform style of leadership, we\u2019re doing not just a disservice to the world, but to the Kingdom of God.<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0 A mentor of mine in Hong Kong is the one who finally showed me the importance of this.\u00a0 The organization he runs is called Empower Asia and they do a lot of work with coaching, mentoring, and training.\u00a0 When I was in the midst of conflict with several leaders in my life at the time, he sat me down and walked me through a DISC assessment and showed me where my tensions were based on my type versus theirs.\u00a0 But he also showed me the value that these other types of leaders have.\u00a0 Because I had been burned by different dominant leaders, I had a bad taste in my mouth for that style.\u00a0 But he showed me that there are times when it\u2019s needed (something he also struggles with at times, as we share similar personalities and experiences).<\/p>\n

Part of leadership is knowing the people you\u2019re leading and what they need in different situations.\u00a0 It may be that your group needs someone more dominant who can give clear vision.\u00a0 It may be that they need a leader who is more focused on intimate relationships.<\/p>\n

But whatever the style of leadership, people need to be empowered.\u00a0 <\/em><\/strong>For me, when I was leading a small group at my previous church, the measure of success I found wasn\u2019t in how big the group was, but rather the answer to the question, \u201cIf I step away from this, can the group function without me?\u201d\u00a0 In the many instances that I had to step away, I found that people stepped up because they had been previously empowered to do so while I was<\/em> there.<\/p>\n

Some may disagree that a leader\u2019s success shouldn\u2019t be based on what happens if they aren\u2019t there (I would be interested to hear some thoughts on that).\u00a0 I know I\u2019m not a dominant leader \u2013 and I\u2019ve learned that\u2019s okay.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m going to lean into and lead through the strengths that God has given me.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leadership is a tricky topic to discuss.\u00a0 As the Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice shows, there are not just many definitions of what leadership is, but many different ways in which it manifests itself.\u00a0 Although we may try to systematize leadership in a clear cut way, the reality is much more complex.\u00a0 There is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":129,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[414,35,225],"class_list":["post-24511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-khurana","tag-leadership","tag-nohira","cohort-lgp10"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/129"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24511"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24511\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24512,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24511\/revisions\/24512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}