July 17, 2009
The Steward’s Way
So many gifts! So little time!
BY C. JUSTIN CLEMENTS
Ken Blanchard first popped up on the national bestseller radar screen in 1982 with his wildly popular book “The One Minute Manager.” Since that time Blanchard has written or co-authored more than 30 instructional and inspirational books relating to successful leadership and effective management. In recent years his professional and literary interests have taken a decided turn from promoting good leadership and management exclusively within the business community toward a push for good leadership and management practices within churches and other not-for-profit organizations.
Early evidence of Blanchard’s shift of focus might be seen in his 2003 book “Servant Leadership” in which he extols the powerful visionary insights of Robert Greenleaf. In the second half of the 20th Century, it was Greenleaf who elevated the concept of “servant leadership” to the highest levels of discourse among business and religious leaders and worked tirelessly to spread its decidedly Christian message until his death in 1990. In his landmark 1970 essay “The Servant as Leader,” Greenleaf described servant leadership in this almost Sacred Scriptural fashion:
“The best test (of servant leadership) is: Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society; will they benefit, or, at least, not be further deprived?”
Blanchard’s 2008 book “Lead Like Jesus” solidified his transformation into a crusader for servant leadership both within the business and the “church” worlds when he called Jesus “the greatest leadership role model of all time.”
A few years ago I attended a workshop conducted by Ken Blanchard sponsored by the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership in Indianapolis. A substantial number of the several hundred people in attendance were representatives of religious organizations (congregations, parishes, dioceses, etc.). One of Blanchard’s main points during that presentation was that leaders sometimes become infected with a malady he referred to as “EGO Addiction.” According to Blanchard, an EGO Addict is someone who suffers from overwhelming feelings of self-importance. In this context, “EGO” is Blanchard’s acronym for “Edging God Out.”
During his many years as an organizational consultant, Blanchard had noticed that when the leader of an organization develops a case of EGO Addiction, that organization quickly experiences a steep decline in passionate, committed members and eventually withers and dies. EGO addicted leaders are the antitheses of servant leaders. For them it’s “all about me:” my needs, my fears, my style, my insecurities, what’s in it for me, what’s best for me. It’s not about what I as a leader can do to help my community, my organization, my company, my staff, my parish, my diocese thrive.
From 2003 to 2005 I was honored to serve as one of four lay advisors for the U.S. Bishops Committee on the Laity. One of the seven bishops on that committee was Bishop Gerald Kicanas of the Diocese of Tucson, the same Bishop Kicanas who presently serves as the Vice President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and will become its president in 2010. During one of our committee’s discussions regarding the role of the laity in the Church, Bishop Kicanas made this comment (my apologies to him for paraphrasing his remarks): “One problem we bishops have is that we tend to talk among ourselves too much. Somehow we need to be more open and willing to solicit ideas and suggestions from the many skilled, creative, talented people in the much larger world outside of our closed episcopal circle.”
There is indeed a wealth of creativity and knowledge within our Church. But personal gifts and professional talents also abound beyond the boundaries of our Catholic faith community. A great idea is a great idea; a creative thought is a creative thought. If there’s a practice or a strategy that can help a parish or a diocese improve and thrive, why should the source matter? EGO addicted leaders tend to discount or even reject ideas that come from others no matter how great the ideas are. True servant leaders, on the other hand, are neither threatened nor do they feel personally diminished by great ideas and suggestions from others. In fact they actively celebrate and strive to employ the many gifts and talents that are available to them within their organizations and beyond.
In his recently published Vision Statement for the Diocese of Evansville, our own Bishop Gettelfinger emphasized the critical importance of engaging the gifts of the laity so that the Catholic Church in southwestern Indiana can continue to progress and flourish as an instrument for building Christ’s kingdom on earth. Here are excerpts from his Vision Statement:
“. . . Lest we bishops and priests lose sight of our call to celebrate Eucharist, we must not allow ourselves to be enmeshed in the exercise of ecclesial control; we must decrease ecclesial control so as to allow Jesus’ baptismal call to laity to flourish; we must not suppress that urgency. We clergy must collaborate with laity so that the church may grow. We must empower others to do that which they are capable. Bishops and priests must keep focus on those things that only they are able to do . . . .
“. . . Empowerment of the laity does not mean abdication on the part of the clergy be they the bishop, priests or deacons. Empowerment of the laity requires new skill-sets for clergy. It demands re-training. Clergy must learn the skill of delegation without abdicating the responsibility intrinsic to their pastoral role . . . .
“. . . Collaboration with laity must increase. That requires the empowerment of non-clerics to assist in fulfilling Jesus’ Mission to proclaim the Gospel . . .”
So, brothers and sisters, rejoice and be glad, for the gifts and talents necessary for our diocese to grow and prosper are among us. They reside in the People of God in southwestern Indiana and beyond. All we have to do is reject the harmful menace of EGO Addiction, commit to Christ’s example of Servant Leadership, and be on a constant lookout for great ideas, programs and services from all possible sources — perhaps from a neighboring parish or diocese, perhaps from the “business world,” perhaps even from other religious denominations — whatever we can appropriate to help take our diocese from good to great. With faith in the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we can only succeed.