I regularly have the opportunity to talk to others about leadership. Often this is in a discipleship context with a small group of emerging ministry leaders. During these kinds of conversations, inevitable questions arise, such as…<\/p>\n
\u201cAre leaders made or born?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cIs leadership something people grow into naturally, or is it an assigned task?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWhat kind of leadership is best in church?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWhat is the role of character in leadership?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cWhat is the difference between management and leadership?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n And so many more…<\/p>\n I could easily fill up this blog post with the types of questions I have been asked, and it wouldn\u2019t be too difficult to blow past 1,000 words with just those questions. Because it seems that for as much as has been written about leadership (and it\u2019s quite a lot), there is not<\/em> a universally accepted definition of what a leader is.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n This poses a challenge for my NPO, which, at this stage, states \u201cThe Church On The Way needs an intergenerational culture that engages rising generations in ministry leadership.\u201d<\/em> (Yes, it\u2019s a mouthful, and yes, I continue to refine it even at the end of our 3rd<\/sup> semester).<\/p>\n There are multiple words that need defining in the NPO, but the trickiest may be the final one: Leadership. As I have been navigating through workshops, one-on-ones, and other ancillary conversations, it\u2019s the question that has come up more than any other: \u201cWhat\u2019s your definition of ministry leadership?\u201d<\/p>\n This is where a book like the one Peter Northouse wrote starts to be useful. Leadership, Theory and Practice, Ninth Edition <\/em>is not a title I\u2019d be inspired to purchase in an airport bookshop, or at Powell\u2019s in Portland, or even on Amazon. As an apparently \u201cboring\u201d textbook with a decidedly unsexy title, it simply isn\u2019t designed to attract the eyeballs of those looking for the next big inspiring leadership concept (the kind of book I\u2019m usually a sucker for).<\/p>\n And that\u2019s part of why this book is so helpful. Where most pop books on leadership have a singular bent, Northouse is unpacking all kinds of well-researched ideas from across the spectrum regarding leadership, and letting the reader build a foundational understanding that will serve them better than if they only grasped leadership from a single perspective.<\/p>\n He accomplishes this by exposing the reader to a depth and breadth of leadership, without going so deep or so wide that the reader gets lost. I found that by presenting major leadership theories with an overview of the description, models, how they work, strengths, criticisms, applications, case studies, and summaries, Northouse was able to cover a lot of ground. I also appreciated the wealth of references to other important voices, both academic and popular, that any student of leadership should be aware of, and able to be conversant about at a basic level.<\/p>\n However, even with the significant number of voices represented in this book, Northouse does offer his own framework for a definition of leadership. In the same way that Bebbington\u2019s Evangelical quadrilateral[2]<\/a> was helpful for me to understand a movement I have identified with all my life, Northouse\u2019s own quadrilateral helped to clarify a role I have served since before I was an adult. He writes, \u201c1. Leadership is a process. 2. Leadership involves influence. 3. Leadership occurs in groups, and 4. Leadership involves common goals.\u201d[3]<\/a>Based on those elements he then goes on to share how he defines leadership for his book: \u201cLeadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal.\u201d[4]<\/a><\/p>\n While ministry leadership must involve elements such as intimacy with God, character, followership, servanthood, and more, this is as good a basic starting point for me as any, and I plan to use it in my next discussion on leadership.<\/p>\n _______________<\/p>\n Epilouge:<\/strong> There seems to be an unwritten rule that in our posts we shouldn\u2019t admit \u201cout loud\u201d that we didn\u2019t actually read<\/em> the book, but I\u2019m pretty sure it\u2019s already evident by the blog post that I did not.<\/p>\n Regardless, I AM actually glad<\/em> that I purchased the book. As I \u201cinspected\u201d Leadership<\/em> for this blog post, I realized three fundamental truths at the exact same time:<\/p>\n \n [1]<\/a> Peter G. Northouse, Leadership Theory and Practice, Ninth Edition<\/em> (Sage Publishing, Thousand Oaks, CA, 2022), 2.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> D. W. Bebbington,\u00a0Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: A history from the 1730s to the 1980s\u00a0<\/em>(London: Routledge,1989).<\/p>\n\n