It’s annual performance review time with me and my staff. Recently InterVarsity has developed this set of leadership competencies staff can aim for in our multi-faceted jobs. This particular set of skills isn’t the sum-total of everything our job requires – these are the direct ministry actions that help us build InterVarsity. We also need to find funding, communicate with our ministry partners, structure our time and cultivate our own life with God. But these are our nine most important leadership roles. Staff use these tools to grow effective, missional fellowships. Supervisors use them to grow effective staff teams. What do these 9 things look like in action? Glad you asked.
A quick tour:
Assess Reality– My role as an evangelism champion for our region has led me to launch an exploration into why most of our known conversions in GFM ministry are among International Grad students (with far fewer conversions among American Grad students – and almost no conversions among faculty). Why is that?
Build Teams– although I have a current team of 13 staff members at 9 schools we have a serious need to recruit new staff. At the moment we are in very short supply of young staff, new staff and full-time paid staff who raise their budgets. How can we get better at finding prospective staff candidates?
Catalyze Diversity– Of the thirteen staff in our Area, there are three women and two Asian American volunteer staff. As we seek new staff for our team, we’re looking for prospects that will keep us younger, more ethnically diverse, and we are eagerly looking for women as well as men staff candidates.
Collaborate with others– Our undergrad InterVarsity colleagues are our most important ministry strategists. My Area is a complete overlap with the UFM Central Region – Kathy Haug and her team of Area Directors are developing undergraduate ministries on all the campus GFM inhabits. We share strategic resources and strongly benefit from collaborating particularly in planting new work and working with christian faculty members.
Communicate Vision– when we find a new ministry strategy we’d like to flesh-out in campus ministry we need to tirelessly paint a future for it. A few years back I started thinking about Spiritual Friendship as a core spiritual formation tool for Graduate students. My hope is to grow the idea into a workable model with a set of tools and stories – click here to see my rudimentary Spiritual Friendship community I’m calling Syntrek.
Develop Staff– each spring supervisors and field staff do an extensive review of our ministry goals for the year. We’re encouraged to think about our own staff development not only in terms of immediate ministry growth, but also in terms of personal growth. What kind of skills would we like to bring to our leadership? Are there educational or training experiences we can write into our job plans for the coming year. One that I am contemplating is a writer’s workshop this summer (more on that in a coming post). Other developmental experiences I and my staff have done over the years – ongoing education like seminary, ministry in an overseas setting, courses from our Learning and Talent division nationally, preparing for a ministry job change/promotion, etc.
Exhibit Emotional Intelligence– two areas come to mind immediately: a- leading teams of student and faculty leaders in growing on campus outreach (shared leadership with our national movement’s target audience requires building trust and discerning levels of risk and sacrifice others are prepared for). b- fundraising! Understanding how to talk with people about resources and invite their commitment is one of the most tricky things to navigate sometimes.
Make Decisions and Plans– SOMETHING on this list needs to be self-evident. This one is it! Budget decisions involving significant dollars, setting pay-levels with staff and deciding when they need to set aside ministry to find funding, helping a staff member retire, hiring a new staff member, knowing when to get your supervisor’s help with something one of your staff is struggling with.
Manage Change– “InterVarsity will be changing from staff communication via email to using Microsoft Teams.” For a team of largely senior staff, traveling at the speed of technology can be a very bumpy ride.
I’d love your prayers for me and my team in the month of April. We’re wrapping up a number of administrative tasks like inventories, performance reviews and our fiscal calendar year end. May is also a month of transitions for graduating students. Seven of my students in our local GCF will be graduating. Pray for me to be able to connect with them when they migrate back to Omaha for their capstone and graduation ceremonies.
This was a couple of Friday’s ago over in Iowa City. I was teaching Matt 13 to the Univ of Iowa, Grad Christian Fellowship. If you’re curious about my teaching notes, track down that QR code in the 4th picture. That’s Kevin and Maria Kummer and myself at the Encounter Cafe on Univ of Iowa’s campus. Kevin has been on staff with InterVarsity for 45+ years! It was great fun spending time with them and their students.
Thanks so much for your prayers!
PBR 