In a previous post I highlighted some content from Coachbook: A Guide to Organizational Coaching Strategies and Practices, namely the difference between four types of issues leaders face: puzzles, problems, dilemmas and mysteries. These four are listed in order of least complexity to greatest and the distinction between them offers an insight into one of the toughest issues faced by pastors.

Pastors face all kinds of leadership challenges, and a distinct dilemma for them is that most parishioners consider any given challenge to be a lower-order challenge than it really is. Let me share an example. Several years ago I consulted with a prestigious downtown church that was gradually shrinking in terms of worship attendance, membership, and involvement in missions and ministry. No one debated the reality of the situation, but key leaders in the church shared very different ideas about how to address the situation. When confiding with me in private, each of the five key leaders told me how simple the issue really was and that if only the pastor would do X, then the church would recover. Mind you, these were very involved lay leaders who were familiar with the church at an intimate level. But they were not as close to the challenges as was the pastor, and so the challenges seemed simpler, less complex, to them. As I talked with other church members who were less familiar with challenges, I heard even more simplistic remedies suggested and even greater concern for why the pastor didn’t just do the “obvious” thing.

Of course there was no “obvious” thing – a point underscored by the fact that lay leaders and members all had different opinions about what the obvious solution was. Church members who were less aware of the ins and outs of the church’s life saw the church’s decline as a puzzle with an answer. And the “one obvious answer” ranged from investing in a new pipe organ to starting an Awana program to paving the parking lot to shorter sermons to longer sermons.

Meanwhile, the key leaders tended to see the church’s situation in more complex terms. They approached lower attendance as a problem or set of problems with multiple criteria to consider, but which could be addressed with one or more solutions. The key leaders looked not to simple answers, but to more complex solutions involving budget, staffing, and programming. Of course, they disagreed with one another about what was “the real problem,” so one leader’s solution ran crisscross to another’s. The pastor faced an even more complex set of problems and even dilemmas than the key leaders imagined. In fact, the leaders’ conflict over what was the real problem and what solutions should be enacted only added to the complexity faced by the pastor by adding another  facet, another dimension to the problems they all saw. The pastor in the example is not alone. I’ve coached, consulted, and sometimes consoled many, many more pastors who live with this reality.

So what is a pastor to do when those around him or her see things as lower-order challenges, thus adding to the complexity? The pastors whom I’ve seen handle this best each have their own style,  but I have noticed some similarities in their approach. Here are a few things I’ve gleaned from pastors who handle complexity well:

1. The pastor defines reality. As Max Depree famously said, this is a leader’s first responsibility. When a pastor defines reality well, he prevents competing realities from adding to the complexity of the situation. Rather than trying to lead by committee, the pastor listens, absorbs, and then communicates clearly what is going on. Less effective pastors bemoan the fact that people see things differently while more effective pastors help them see things similarly.
2. The pastor nurtures leadership trust. Relationships really do matter in the church. For a pastor to be trusted is a matter of both personal connectedness (how well people know and like you) as well as perceived competence (how confident people are that you know what you are doing). When a pastor establishes both connectedness and competence, a layer of complexity is eliminated  from the problem/dilemma.
3. The pastor understands complexity, but communicates with simplicity. There is a big difference between being simple-minded and simple-mouthed. Pastors who comprehend the complexity of a problem and can describe it clearly are at a significant advantage.
4. The pastor never offers “silver bullets.” For the most part it’s foolish for a pastor to offer sweeping solutions or big answers to the complex challenges faced by any congregation. Wise pastors  offer strategies and plans, but don’t pitch them as silver bullet solutions.
5. The pastor finds plenty of room between being over-confident and overwhelmed. When asked, “How’s it going?” these pastors respond that there is work to do, there are things to figure out, and there is progress being made. They do not respond with “Oh, I’ve got this under control.” Nor do they act as is the complexity of church leadership is a surprise to them or more than they should have to bear.
6. The pastor is able to live in and deal with reasonable chaos. Those who strive to get the church to some nirvana status where everything is finally organized, under control, and predictable tend to create a ton of stress, both for the pastor as well as for those around him. Meanwhile, the pastor who is okay with a perpetual mess is equally out of touch with reality and likely will not be  tolerated by the congregation for very long. Pastors who bear fruit in complex situations are like gardeners who take an organic approach to leading the congregation.