Equipping Leadership Skills

Many people have the knowledge of what being an equipping leader is all about. They've read Ephesians 4:11-16 and they KNOW all about what is says they should be doing. The problem is that when the rubber meets the road, it's more difficult for them to embody equipping leadership and actualizing the skills necessary to be effective.

In response, there are four key skills with multiple sub-skills that when embodied, assist individuals in becoming equipping leaders. They are...

- Serving

The skill of serving[1] focuses on the care and support of another person. This includes…

1. Personal Posturing – Leaders must upend the pyramid[2], by becoming a servant first, and embodying the leadership of Jesus (Matthew 20:25-28).

2. Care – Leaders must authentically care for, be concerned with, and involve themselves in the lives of followers.

3. Support – Leaders both deflect credit to others and willingly receive the blame for failures[3], while removing all the obstacles for a follower to succeed.[4]

- Facilitation

The skill of facilitation acts as a catalyst for the journey of discovery and purpose for the individual and the team. This includes the skills of…

1. Meeting management – Leaders must create a learning environment that is dedicated to teaching[5] and effective time management for the team.[6]

2. Person development – Leaders must continually provide the space for each follower to become more self- and ministry aware.

- Team Development

The skill of developing teams seeks to collaborate with and empower passionate, gifted, and called people. This includes the skills of…

1. Collaboration – The leader must willingly share resources, knowledge and gifts[7] with their followers.

2. Empowerment – The leader must share authority, power and responsibility[8] with their followers.

3. Discovery – The leader must assist followers in personal discovery (for self-awareness sake) and team discovery (becoming a strength finder and connector[9]).

- Systems Development

The skill of developing systems focuses on creating intentional systems to effectively engage, equip, and esteem others. This includes the skills of…

1. Design – The leader must intentionally design naturally occurring systems (non-random forming[10]) for the team to flourish.

2. Implementation – The leader must create implementation processes for the team to interact with the systems and processes available.

FOOTNOTES:

[1]Ken Jennings and John Stahl-Wert, The Serving Leader (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.), 100-107.

[2] Ibid., 18.

[3] Jim Collins, Good to Great,

[4] The Serving Leader, 50-60.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Patrick Lencioni, Death By Meeting,

[7] George Cladis, Leading the Team Based Church ( ), 93.

[8] Ibid., 123.

[9] The Serving Leader, 72-84.

[10] Margaret J. Wheatley, Finding Our Way, (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2005), 102-103.