dimly lit...

General Tso's Showdown...

Yesterday I was eating at a Chinese restaurant when a man came in to pick up his order.  He was quickly irritated when the Chinese woman who was cleaning tables did not immediately help him.  She spoke little English and was thus limited to mostly waitressing.  After taking care of a few others duties she went behind the counter to attempt to get the man's order.  Classic American, the man was irritated by the language barrier (dude, she's Chinese and you are in her Chinese restaurant).  Eventually the young lady who speaks English and runs the counter comes out and goes to ring up his order.  She, the English speaking lady, then realizes that she forgot to have the non-MSG sauce put on something.  She apologizes, receives a glare from the guy, and goes back to fix it.  He continues to act a bit jerky and the non-English fluent lady also apologizes, she gets a nasty glare too.  He throws his sauce packs back in the dispensing dish (they probably had MSG in them anyway).  I watched the young woman behind him and she is obviously feeling crushed.  The man blurts out, "This place ain't gonna make it."  So, having just officiated a three hour (7 inning) baseball game I'm still in umpire mode and I say from my seat, "Sir" to get his attention and give him the 'calm down' gesture.  He goes to explain his plight and I reassuringly say, "I understand."  It all works out, he calms down, I chat with him briefly at the counter as I go to the buffet and he was a decent hungry guy who just didn't want his misfortune to go unnoticed.  Had this guy actually been mean this could have been a regular Chinese buffet bar-brawl, real pastoral, eh? 

Anyway... all of that got me thinking about accountability and our understanding or misunderstanding of it.  I tried doing a Google image search on the subject and I got everything from police officers beating a man in the streets, magnifying glasses looking at text and the classic "man climbing beautifully sunlit mountain" picture with the word 'Accountability' at the bottom.

Accountability is vitally important to the church and the Christian community.  A classic explanation of the roles of the church says the church is to be preaching the Gospel, delivering the sacraments and be a community rightly ordered.  The first two tenets are not difficult, but the third is wading in murky dangerous waters.  

So, rather than give my fuzzy accountability philosophy, I'm interested to hear from others...

• When is accountability appropriate/inappropriate?
• What is distinct about accountability in the church?
• Was I out of line to address this man at the restaurant?

MLK

p.s. Have you seen the show "What Would You Do?" on ABC?

Trust and Indifference...

Communicating indifference is not the same as communicating trust.

I have a bad habit of saying "I don't care" when people ask me my preferences.  Sometimes I am really trying to say "I know you'll do a good job."  But saying "I know you'll do a good job" empowers and encourages people and shows them that when they do succeed you will appreciate it.  Saying "I don't care communicates that regardless of the outcome you don't appreciate what the person put into it. 

I need to say "I don't care" a lot less.  I do care.  And I think we all care a lot more than we like to admit.  or we wouldn't complain so darn much.

MLK

Follow to Lead...

I've been toying with this idea of whether a good leader must also be a good follower.

Good leaders who do not share much with their followers can easily be found.  Leaders can even be found leading in areas they've never had previous experience in.  These cases debunk the myth that one must be able to have shared experiences with their followers to lead them (i.e. a successful plant manager who has never worked with machinery).  This is not to say there is no value in having shared experiences with teammates.  There is a wealth of understanding and connections that accompanies sharing a background with another person.  Typically a similar background with someone will automatically gain some influence.

I think good leaders have a very difficult time following, unless they are following another successful leader.  There are occasions where he/she may be under a weaker leader but they have learned to lead from the middle.  Successfully leading from the middle brings a win to the entire team - including the positional leader.  This is a very difficult task that requires much patience and humility.  I've failed to learn the art of leading from the middle on occasions in the past and it hurt. 

I've met other tremendous leaders who had to move on from their roles because they were so impact hungry and the positional leader (authority) knowingly or unknowingly prevented their leadership.  So much rides on leadership, including the success of surrounding leaders, that it is impossible to say a good leader could unconditionally be a good follower.  A good leader knows and has embraced the cause so deeply that he/she will quit following and use their influence to make an impact elsewhere.  Refusing to throw pearls before swine as Christ put it. 

I've asked others "do leaders need to be good followers?"  The responses were insightful.  I think it is understood that as Christians we have characters that allow us to be led - especially by Christ.  But we do not automatically follow poor or unrighteous leadership.  But we do have Christian attitudes when we come to a decision of no longer following a leader.  That said, I think there are people who leadership is so natural to them that despite their position they will be leading in some way. 

The purest element of leadership is influence.  There is a small amount of influence that accompanies titles or positions, the rest of it is earned - good leaders understand that.

Marc