I love the quote from Ken Blanchard and others.

Things not worth doing are not worth doing well.

Have you ever come to the end of the day and wondered what you have accomplished? I have. Oh, sure, I filled my day with “stuff.” But what did that stuff all amount to? Sometimes we obsess on getting something done well that didn’t need to be done at all. Or, could have been done by someone else (probably better).

Blanchard says, “Today people are often busy doing what seems to be extremely urgent but really isn’t. They spend a great deal of time moving paper rather than listening to their people….” (Ken Blanchard, The Heart of a Leader)

Those last four words are key. Listening to their people. So often we are so focused on accomplishing a goal and building a successful ministry that we use our people instead of loving them and letting them feel good about accomplishing the goal. We dictate jobs and set timetables.

So how does a leader actually lead? One important ministry truth is that people need to like the leader they serve. Then they will follow, not out of duty or compliance or a paycheck, but out of a sense of mission set by a someone they admire. John Maxwell talks about the charisma that a leader needs:

“THE GREATEST LEADERS HAVE IT—that special quality that causes people to be drawn to their magnetic personalities…. We all have the potential to develop this quality that makes the difference between personality and personality plus.”

– Be a People Person: Effective Leadership Through Effective Relationships

This doesn’t mean that you have to become something you aren’t. It means you may need to develop some of the areas of your personality that help draw people to you and causes them to want to follow you. Nothing fake here…genuine care and concern for others.

Maxwell goes on to offer this acrostic for the word “charisma:”

  • Concern
  • Help
  • Action
  • Results
  • Influence
  • Sensitivity
  • Motivation
  • Affirmation

Without going into great detail, these are areas that can be developed in you that will ultimately help your ministry and your people who serve with you. You might examine your personality and style of leadership, then take two or three areas where you could improve. Maybe areas like concern, or sensitivity, or affirmation. What would it mean to your staff if you took time to learn what things outside of work concerned them most? A brief time of prayer with this person about these things would be a great step toward building a better and more productive relationship.

A word of caution. Don’t do this with a sense of manipulation. There has to be real concern for the person and not just what they can do for the ministry. Jesus modeled this in the love and concern He showed for friends like Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. He wept real tears and experienced fellowship and joy with them, too. Then there is John, often referred to as the apostle that Jesus loved. So much so that from the cross Jesus gave the assignment to John to care for His mother Mary, which John faithfully did.

Paul gave his Roman friends this advice: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us (Romans 12:3 NLT).

Eugene Peterson expands on that and the surrounding verse with this:

I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him (Romans 12:3 MSG).

If you are at the start of your day as you read this, think of the most important thing you can do today that will show your care and concern for those the Lord has entrusted to you as co-laborers in His work. You may need to go over that To Do list and mark out things you probably shouldn’t be spending your valuable time on anyway.

If it is the close of a busy day, ask yourself, “Did I do the most important things today…or did I just check off the urgent items?”

Then vow moving forward to think of others first and foremost. Remember, there is no virtue in doing well something you shouldn’t be doing at all.

God’s best…