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I love re-reading books. I often feel like I learn and apply more the second time around (kind of like the way “Princess Bride” seems to get better every time I watch it).
I’m re-reading The Five Temptations of a CEO: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni. One of Lencioni’s temptations that I think is relevant to youth ministry is Temptation #2: The failure to hold others on our team accountable. According to Lencioni, we often want to be liked more than we want to hold others accountable.
My best definition for accountability, the one I use with kids and adults alike, is inviting someone to speak into your life. How well are you doing holding the (paid and volunteer) leaders accountable in your ministry? How well are you doing at speaking into their life about their personal, spiritual, and ministry development?
It’s interesting to me how few churches have an established process to review their employees, let alone their volunteers. When I was a youth pastor, I always felt the most connected to our interns and leaders when I was meeting with them individually to help them assess their relationship with God and with students. It never was anything all that complicated; simply a time to ask a few pointed questions, questions they knew ahead of time so they could prepare and be the first to answer. Questions like:
- How would you describe your spiritual journey this month?
- What in your life would you want students to imitate?
- What in your life would you not want them to imitate?
- How are you doing in your relationships with students?
- What are you doing well?
- What do you wish you were doing do differently?
And perhaps the most important: How can I help you?
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