Raukura 2007: A Manifesto for Strategic Leadership
December 3, 2007
This is part of a series of posts using reflections produced by staff and participants at the Raukura: Intro to Strategic Leadership Module held at St Johns College, Auckland, in December 2007.
These reflections have been compiled as a Study Guide, and are available in printed form for below cost at $10.00 a copy including postage and handling (contact us for more details). Alternatively, you can download a PDF version here.
What is Strategic Leadership?
For our purposes, Strategic Leadership is applied here to the context of our ministry to the “under 40s” - youth, young adults, and young families – with several meanings and applications: It is a mix of inspired vision, communication, planning, management, and pastoral care. It is thinking, praying, teaching, preaching, guidance, and servanthood.
Strategic Leadership means having a plan. Strategic Leaders know where they are going, and how they are going to get there.
Strategic Leadership is more than being the front and centre of a group of people. It’s about being a builder, a provider, a networker, a planner, and a guide. Strategic Leadership, therefore, can take dreams and visions, and finds ways to make them reality. Strategic Leadership is able to do what is required – to prepare, to plant, to nurture, to wait, to do and re-do, to harvest at the right time, and to start the process again.
What makes a Strategic Leader?
A Strategic Leader has all the attributes of a leader in Christ: They offer grace, humility, compassion, courage, and servant-hood. A Strategic Leader is a role-model: listened to, watched, and followed.
A Strategic Leader has vision. They know the importance of the little things, and how they add up to the big picture.
A Strategic Leader understands people. They know how to serve them, motivate them, care for them, and put them first. They know how to bring them together to achieve goals safely and successfully.
A Strategic Leader is willing to risk failure, and risk disappointment.
Why do we need Strategic Leadership?
Strategic Leadership is leadership on the move. It gets people from where they are, to where they need to be.
Strategic Leadership engages our people. It understands scripture, faith, worship, language, culture, and context.
Strategic Leadership engages our reality. It is forced to deal with our actual problems, and not just ideas about those problems, to produce actual solutions.
Strategic Leadership stays small and agile. It avoids empire-building, gate-keeping, and a culture of compliance. It nurtures, facilitates, and frees.
Strategic Leadership understands iterations – trialling, measuring, growing, and improving.
Strategic Leadership delivers what our people need, and puts aside what they don’t need.
How do we become Strategic Leaders?
We become Strategic Leaders when we follow Christ. We strive to live and minister as Christ did.
We become Strategic Leaders when we accept our calling to make disciples. We are prepared to teach, share, and to journey.
We become Strategic Leaders when we choose to be deliberate about our calling, our ministry, and our lives. This means we think, we pray, and we act with purpose.
We become Strategic Leaders by growing ourselves, and growing others.
We become Strategic Leaders by supporting dreams, building vision, and contributing real solutions. When we take the lead in providing needed ministry and mission, we are offering Strategic Leadership.
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