Leading Past Your Due Date

How does a leader discern when it's time to leave?

I publish a monthly CEO newsletter that goes out to about 350 mission agency CEOs (let me know if you are a CEO/President and I can add you to the list). This past month I wrote about leaders staying past their due date. A couple of the CEOs responded with a different view, some critique of my analogy, and a few “right ons!” I think it hit a nerve, so I am going to share it here along with some of the feedback. I promised them I would not “out” them.

The college football scene is currently in mass transition. Conference re-alignments, NIL (paying players for the Name/Image/Likeness), the transfer portal, and television contracts are rewiring everything about how the sport operates.

Dear CEO:

Nick Saban, the greatest college football coach of all time, recently retired. I have no doubt that one of his motivations for leaving was the massive change around him. His method was built around obtaining highly skilled high school recruits, growing their skill (and size) for a year or two, and then putting them on the field. That is not how the new era works. Players are not going to sit out for a year or two when they could be making NIL money now. I believe that Nick looked at the new environment and decided that now was the best time to get out. At 71, he was not interested in rewiring his coaching approach.

It is not simply an “age” thing, either.  High expectations on younger leaders means that the time to develop maturity is cut short. Jake Meador recently wrote that this is one reason why we have had an exodus of high profile GenX pastors. They did not have time to develop the maturity needed to withstand the temptations that leadership brings. The changing dynamics of power overtook their ability to lead spiritually.

Last year, on sabbatical, I asked myself if I had another round in me. The global Great Commission is in massive flux. Was I able to keep up? Did I have the spiritual fortitude, energy, desire, and vision to lead through whatever is coming next? Well, I am obviously back in the seat and I hope I am reading the signs correctly (I am glad to be here).

This is a question we as leaders need to be asking ourselves every couple of years. We have all met leaders who held on to their roles despite a falloff in effectiveness. Nobody wants to be that leader. It takes guts to objectively see reality when it is our own selves in question.

Leaving at the right time is one of the greatest gifts you can bring to your ministry. I wish Alabama the best, but as a Florida State fan, let just say, GO NOLES!

Ted

Well, the first CEO to write me called me on citing that Jake Meador article. The article claims that a problem for the leaders mentioned was that they were not given time to mature. Thus, they led too early, without being prepped for a season of leadership that should come in their future. Their immaturity led to their failures. “Interesting, Ted, how you are suggesting that leaders are staying on too long, yet the article suggests that the best leadership may be coming from older leaders. Let’s let these older leaders lead!”

Point taken!

Another suggested that I am placing too much emphasis on age. We all age differently, as our geriatric political class is currently showing us, and therefore we must be careful about how age plays into our leadership longevity. Again, excellent point.

When I pondered my own longevity in my current role, I surmised three attributes to consider: the person, the organizations, and the context.

1. Some people are builders (long window of contribution) and some are blazers (short window of discovery, innovation, etc.). All but a few of us have a lifetime arc, where we blaze as youth and build as we age. I do think there is a God given piece of this, in which maturity brings somewhat of a shift. I would suggest that this is Ralph Winter - stuck in "blazer mode" when his organization needed a builder. He did not take his personal tendencies into account enough (he was extreme).  So, the person is important.

2. Some organizations need institutionalization (long window) and some need transformation (short window). I know of a mission that had a visionary founder that was growing the org without much structure. They needed some institutionalization, and the founder's son came in and did that when the father realized he could not. Another organization had a classic builder well known for his teaching on leadership. When he left, the next leader sold the buildings, changed the branding and essentially tore it all down. The new leader had a different view of what the organization needed and pushed them back into blazing. This factor is about the status of the organization being led.

3. Leaders and organizations (or it could be a team) exist in a context. Sometimes, things are stable (benefitting long window leaders) like the years 1980-2020 offered the US. At other times, there is mass change and flux (favoring short windows) like the years 2020 to now have been. I have visited numerous Missio Nexus member missions in which the actual office building is out of date, reflecting the feeling inside the organization. Do they "live on" after this? Yes... for a long time. But they need leadership change. The organization is probably served best by a new leader who can more easily let go of the legacies.

I think a leader needs to look at all three (themselves, the org, and the context) in deciding how relevant their contribution might be. There are certainly some leaders who are like Olympians - incredibly talented and miraculously discovered such that they outperform all others. But most of us are mere mortals. I know I could blaze when I was 21 but now that I am 61 my tendency is to favor building. Am I in an organization that needs building or blazing?

Finally, one thoughtful leader suggested that longevity in leadership is necessary for ministries to thrive over the long haul. With a little editing, he asked, “’When is a leader quitting too soon?’ it seems that in our parent’s generation people stayed a long time in their roles, maybe too long, but these days transition is frequent. If innovation and flexibility can be combined with longevity on the part of at least a few key organizational players, it would seem to yield significant results. I’ve seen a lot of turn-over in my years, not much of which has seemed to be particularly beneficial to the churches and organizations experiencing it. Frequent transitions sometimes prevent organizations from achieving sustained momentum.”

Excellent points to consider. Particularly in an era when the eccliosystem is going through a massive change curve. Perhaps older, more stable leaders would help us through these transitions.

This same author included a set of reflective questions for leaders to ask about their term of service. I provide them to you here as they be a blessing to some who are in the process of evaluation:

1. Is the Lord making something clear?

2. Do I still have physical energy?

3. Do I still have vision and new territory I want to take?

4. Am I bored?

5. Do I see someone better equipped to do the job?

6. Does my spouse/family think I should keep going?

7. Are there family demands requiring a change?

8. Am I feeling pulled to something new?

9. Are there a growing number of voices suggesting that change would be welcome or needed?

10. Does the board want me to keep going?

I would add the following:

1. What does the ministry need right now, and I am able to deliver that?

2. Is the cultural context making me more. or less, relevant?

Happy evaluating!

I am prepping for a trip to North Africa, where I will be teaching on innovation to a roomful of leaders from across the continent. I look forward to it very much – it is always stimulating. However, next week I will not be posting an article.

[Image: Generated by midjourney with the prompt “a very old man, on oxygen, using a walking stick and very fragile, running a marathon”]