Recently I sat down with a group of College Pastors to follow up on their results for the past few months of ministry. I worked with them a few months back to help provide some guidance for their 1 year goals of the ministry. I was trying to work with them to figure out how to tackle some of their tough problems. It was in this group of meetings that I began to identify the different types of killers who are involved in meetings. So as a quick reference here it is.
For lack of creativity in naming I made them very strait forward [edit: I now have names ]. In the future I'll find a catchy name for the groups. But I realized how important it is to identify these people because meetings are the place that teams and organizations come to either thrive or die. A bad or tense-filled meeting will typically mean a sort of death by personality. But here they are.
Killer 1: (Typically the main culprit) The NCO's aka Sergeants
This is great if they can bring people together and get ideas going which Sergeants typically do. The danger is when they are unable or incapable of pushing the organization in a positive way. Could be a result of pride or simply could be a result of lack of training. I'm idealistic and like to think most times it comes down to lack of experience and training in this area. They are hard workers but need outside instruction or leadership if they can't handle the responsibility of making decisions for everyone. It's very important to stifle their control in meetings unless they are truly equipped to make the bulk of your decisions.
Killer 2: The Assassin
This person may or may not have good ideas but we can never know without them opening up. A lot of the time they provide some of the best ideas considering their careful, well thought out analysis. It's up to the rest of the leadership/team to draw the opinions and beliefs of this type of person out to get their input in the decision making process. It's also important to stifle the assertive types so that they fee like they can contribute. The killer here is the lost ideas that never get put on the table. They may feel like a part of the team but functionally they are not performing at their best.
Killer 3: The "I dont know's" (Still no name here, Ideas anyone?)
This type of person doesn't feel like they are eye to eye with everyone else. Typically comes from being new or having a lack of confidence. Understanding their roll and directing them towards tasks will typically help keep them involved. This group is best dealt with be giving them confidence in their credibility. They will need to hear it frequently and will typically turn into one of the above once they get comfortable. The death here is that often what happens is they will begin to feel resentful or out of place. Over time they begin to question whether they are actually contributing to the team and never get the chance to open up and confidently contribute.
So where does the danger come? It comes when these people begin to interact with other members of the group who aren't leaders. When this happens the people they impact will pick up the same problems/habits as they do and can work as a slow poison to your growth.
Another way it hurts is that the organization never gets the benefit of having all ideas out on the table. It kills innovation and momentum and can create big problems without having them dealt with as soon as possible.
That's it for now. Be good kids ;)
Mikhail
Comments