Cultivating Leadership Recruitment and Development
Belgium is the new super-power in world sports such as football (soccer), hockey and surprisingly, basketball. One of the keys to their success is that they have developed a nursery of talent identification, coaching and player development that has a well fine-tuned pathway.
Through education and statistical research, they have started with the kids and turned many of their government schools into sporting academies that have nurtured students into elite sports people. In 2021, after 15-20 years of this system, the cream of the crop is in their national teams, and they are number 1 in the world rankings.
In our churches, leader recruitment and development takes serious hard work; hours of thought, planning, conversations and being willing to take risks, make mistakes and fine-tune a pathway. You need to be willing to see some ideas fail and even take a bit of criticism or difference of opinion from people who want results quickly. It’s understandable, we all want to see ministries grow and leaders raised up. But there needs to be patience from church leadership, a serious investment of resources and time poured into the pot to make sure the recipe is right before the combination is ready to eat and mass produce for others.
Here are 5 things to think about and do for leadership recruitment and development for your ministry team
1. Always be on the lookout for leaders! There is no “recruitment season” if you are serious about cultivating healthy leadership recruitment. As leaders ourselves, we must be always looking for potential ministry gifts and servant hearts in everyone we minister to and with, no matter how young. Look for character, service, humility, an ability to care for others, good communication skills, positive energy, willingness, and commitment, even in just small ways.
2. Making the pathway for discipleship and leadership development clear helps everyone look forward. You want everyone to buy into the vision of ministry training. My sons are 9, 7 and 4. They are energetic and impressionable, and I want them looking up to the youth in our church. I can tell you, when they come on camps or are led by youth at Kids Church, they watch every single move those high schoolers make and hear every single thing they say and don’t say! They want to be like those youth and as a Christian father, I want my boys to follow them as they follow Jesus.
3. Identity young people for ministry and invest in them. Disciple them in the word, teach them how to read the Bible for themselves, show them how to live for Jesus and to stand up for him when life is tough. Help them to speak about him when given the opportunity and to lead others in their Christian life as they follow Jesus. Involve them in your life wherever you can, have them in your home, get them involved in the wider Church family, give them responsibility and opportunities to try new skills. I sometimes take senior high youth to the oldies service, along to the men’s events or basecamp so they can be with other men and be intergenerationally discipled.
4. Have the conversation with every potential team member before recruiting them to serving in ministry and leadership. Good identification and recruitment requires seeing how the player goes on the sporting field before putting them in the team. Carve out the time to meet with people 1-1, go for a walk, have a coffee or meal, and talk about everything. Hear their testimony of how they came to know Jesus, get to know if they love youth and kids, what their passion is, the place of scripture in their own life and the lives of the kids and youth that they might disciple. Make sure you outline the expectations, role descriptions and time commitment, share the vision for the ministry and then after praying together and answering any questions about the ministry, sign them up!
5. A healthy discipleship pathway leads to a good leadership recruitment culture. It is important that everyone from the head leaders to the junior leaders knows that the culture is about seeking to grow in Christ and help each other develop as Christian leaders. This means that we reflect Christ and seek to model to others what it means to lead as a servant like he was. We set a high bar to show the value of leadership which reflects the responsibility that leaders have in raising up young disciples. All this needs to be ‘taught and caught’ as part of cultivating the culture that we are looking for which breeds leaders now and in the future.
There’s much more to say about finding, training and unleashing leaders in youth and children’s ministry. There’s even more to read by way of books and resources on the topic. The key is to keep at it and value the people as precious members of the body of Christ. What a privilege it is to be a part of recruiting people to serve the best team on the planet, the family of God!