Knowing Better

Two excuses for that ministry leaders give for not learning

Photo by Rita Morais on Unsplash

In my role, I work with hundreds of non-profit organizations. I see a wide range of corporate cultures and how they impact an organization’s willingness to learn, adapt, and innovate. Here are two things I hear from leaders as excuses for not learning from others. Paradoxically, these are opposites that result in the same outcome: a lack of willingness to learn from others. We think we know better.

Excuse #1: We are unique.

Many organizations see themselves as doing something so different from others they assume that they could not possibly learn from them.

I once spoke to a rather large ministry that focused on short-term mission trips with teenagers. I suggested they consider joining Missio Nexus so that they could be a part of our shared-learning push. “No,” said the leader, “what we do is different than what your members do. There would not be much for us in those gatherings.” Of course, we have many member organizations with a focus on short-term as a part of our learning events. Even if we did not, topics like leadership, management, innovation, finances, and a host of other items are not going to be substantially different. The issues faced by ministry leaders are not that different from each other. This leader is limiting his willingness to learn with a false assumption of uniqueness.

Our team does an annual data collection of organizations regarding size, staffing, growth or decline, finances, and so on. Each year, a handful of ministries protest something on the form because it does not fit how they see themselves. Many of those reasons for differentiation are the same. In other words, even when making the case that they are unique they are confirming that they are “unique in the same way as others.”

I am reminded of the quip, “You are unique, just like everybody else.” That captures well the irony of this excuse to not learn from others. It is true, each ministry is unique. Yet, each one also has much in common with others. There are, in fact, great areas of shared challenge that make learning from others beneficial.

I once made a list of about 50 missionary agency mission statements. As I read through the compiled list, I was astonished by the similarities between them. There were hints of corporate culture seeping through the word choices and emphases. Overall, though, they were mostly the same. I have mentioned this to CEOs and presidents and they bristle at this idea. Yes, you are unique. But not so unique that you cannot learn from others.

Excuse #2: We can only learn from within our domain.

On the other end of the spectrum are those who prioritize learning from others doing the same thing as they are doing while discounting the opportunities to learn outside of their domain. They think, “the only good advice comes from leaders of similar ministries.”

I once asked a staff member of a megachurch about their pastor attending a leadership event we were hosting, “Our pastor does like learning from others, but he only attends learning events when the other leaders are also large church pastors.” I have found this to be true almost universally with large church pastors. They listen to each other but are not eager to expand their learning circle much past that group.

“Insider/Outsider” dynamics play a big role in the professional ministry space. There is a strong sense that we can only learn from those who have “been there and done that.” I see it when I talk with field missionaries. When they learn that I served cross-culturally, there is a rapport that was not there before they knew this. Similarly, CEOs often probe me to see if I ever held the “main seat” of leadership before dropping their guard. Pastors, CEOs, and missionaries listen best to their peers. I suppose that is only nature, but it can feel like a wall for those who are not in the club.

Do not take my word for it. Ask any ministry that is trying to do business as mission or another creative ministry model. They will assure you that global missions is an insider/outsider game because they feel the edges of our world in ways we do not.

Yes, this is an understandable reality. Shared experience builds empathy. It becomes a problem, however, when we discount learning from outside this shared base of experience.

A friend visited an innovation lab in the medical industry. In the course of their conversation, the innovation lab staff said something like, “We don’t believe that the best ideas for the medical community will come from within the medical community. We reach out to other industries to understand what is innovative there and if we can apply here.”

If you want to learn you will need to leave the confines of what you know well. The greater your confidence is in your own organization’s ability to figure out how to best solve problems and advance the mission, the less likely you will look outside of the organization for answers.

A little bit of humility goes a long way in keeping leaders hungry for innovative solutions. Remember that the Innovators Dilemma hits successful organizations the hardest. When legacy ministries struggle to innovate they tend to work the same model harder, in hopes that what once worked will work again. This is when a leader needs to look outside of their domain to find innovative solutions.