In today’s issue of What the Church Can Learn From… we’re going to be talking about one of the places in which I work, the credit union. Now, keep in mind that the names in the following story have been changed to protect the innocent. Because I’ve only been at the credit union for a few months, I have to get any check over $500 cleared by a manager. As you can imagine, this isn’t a very fun process for the customer, as they have to wait for me to find said manager. Oftentimes, the manager is busy and doesn’t have time to stop every few minutes to sign a check for me. To muddle things up even further, my boss told me that I didn’t have to get managerial approval if the person was depositing a majority of the check. Unfortunately for me, I still get in trouble if something goes wrong with the transaction. So, I’m almost darned if I do and darned if I don’t.

My company has a rule that not only is inconvenient to me, but also our customers. It creates a bottleneck at the manager, through whom all new employees are trying to get their checks cleared. Now, I don’ have a simple solution to this problem, but I do know that it frustrates the heck out of me. Because my manager usually gets visibly flustered by my 40th request for approval, I really dread getting any check over the prescribed amount. The bottleneck not only effects my performance but causes my manager to become a micro manager. All in all, the rule exists, but it’s very uncomfortable and confusing to carry out.

In church staffing, we can have the same problems. Either we create rules that are designed to make things better (you really shouldn’t trust large check amounts to new employees) but actually make things worse (by say, creating bottlenecks), or we drive our lead pastors crazy by not taking any responsibility off of their shoulders. Let’s say that everything needs to be cleared with the lead pastor before it is implemented. Before long, the lead pastor would spend all their time approving or disapproving ideas. Sermons? No time. Counseling? No time. Mentoring? No time. Leading? No time. You see, that is why we as leaders need to learn to truly give up decision making authority to someone else. I know that as our executive pastor I’m trying to find ways to take things off of James‘ plate, although he may not see it that way. :P If you are a member of a church staff or are close to someone who is, ask yourself how you can take some more responsibility off of those above you, they’ll be happy you did.