Building Resilient Leadership

The atmosphere in the car resonated with Jazz, Big Band, Folk, Rhythm and Blues, and Rock and Roll as music from the 50s and 60s dominated my family’s car radio. My experience of classical orchestral or symphonic music was sparse. The Nutcracker one Christmas with Grandma, the Cleveland Pops Orchestra in the park while visiting other relatives during the summer, and the soundtrack to many Bugs Bunny cartoons. As an adult, I still love Jazz, but my car radio regularly blasts classical music. Music is part of my life, and as a result, my children have traveled a different journey, each playing multiple instruments across varied genres.

Recently, at my son's orchestra concert, my attention and thinking were sparked by a comment from his teacher/conductor. The conductor announced that he was a teacher first and a conductor second, and that although the next piece wasn’t ready, the teacher and students chose to include it in the concert. The conductor turned to face his students, and with a raise of his baton, music filled the room. The complexity of the contemporary piece was evident, and while it wasn’t polished, the Varsity Orchestra ended the piece to erupting applause.

Caught up in the music and the moment, my thoughts orbited around the similarities of church leadership and the risk a young teacher/conductor took in presenting an unpolished piece in the Varsity Orchestra’s final concert. The caliber of his orchestra’s performance would characterize his teaching and leadership. Yet, the teacher/conductor demonstrated resilient leadership as he facilitated the risk of performing the unpolished piece. Likewise, resilient church leaders are those willing to jeopardize personal regard while empowering team members with the authority to take risks and experience failure to increase collective success.

In the church, how you lead is often more important than what your leadership produces. While the number of leadership books continues to grow, two seminal theories speak to the "how" of leadership: servant leadership and transformational leadership. Robert Greenleaf pioneered the concept of servant leadership, which encourages positional leaders to serve their employees to improve job satisfaction and productivity. James MacGregor Burns is the pioneer of transformational leadership, which encourages positional leaders to empower and inspire employees as stakeholders, charging them with developing personally and benefitting the group. Either approach or a combination of servant and transformational leadership may not prescribe resilient leadership but can beneficially inform how one leads in the church.

My thoughts kept returning to the orchestra, resilient leadership risks personal regard. The teacher's competency is on the line at each concert. The competency of church leaders is on the line at each worship service, student meeting, wedding, funeral, care request, small group, service project, and more. The teacher/conductor instructs students, but their efforts rise and wane with student’s practice habits. As leaders in the church, we do our best to train or facilitate training for our staff and volunteers, but application and implementation are up to them. Is resilient leadership worth the risk?

As leaders, it is often easier to avoid empowering others when we know we can perform better. My son's teacher can competently play most, if not all, of the instruments in his orchestra. Some students may play a particular instrument better than their teacher, but not all. Suppose the conductor concludes a piece will sound better if he plays the cello in the concert. Stepping aside from his podium and replacing a student ensures the piece goes well, but who would lead? We might experience great music or a fantastic cello solo, however, In the absence of the conductor, the entire orchestra suffers. Yet, how often does the same scenario occur in our churches or organizations? The senior leader or a department lead steps away from their role to solo, ensuring the success of a program, meeting, worship service, ministry event, or lawn maintenance. Yes, when leaders go solo, everything looks good from the outside, yet we weaken the collective group, church, or organization. When we solo, we are not resilient leaders, and we disempower our people, and the whole church suffers.

What sparks a leader to solo? Is it forgetting that everyone’s leadership journey begins untrained and unrefined? Maybe soloing results from unclear vision casting- “If they could only see what I see?" Opportunity, excitement, or enthusiasm may drive some leaders to go solo. For others, going solo results from pride, insecurity, or even the fear of failure. Leaders solo when they are unwilling to risk letting others make them look bad.

In allowing a piece that was not ready, my son’s teacher risked letting others make him look bad and revealed a significant leadership principle. Resilient leadership avoids soloing and empowers others to lead, giving them the authority to succeed or fail. In the second chapter of 2 Timothy, Paul writes, “What you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, commit to faithful men who will be able to teach others also (2 Timothy 2:2, CSB). As leaders, we can train, entrust, and empower others to lead. But we take a risk. We risk someone else missing a cue,  a singer stumbling, a sermon flopping, a misspelled word, a shut-in accidentally overlooked, or an opportunity missed. Resilient leaders know that when they risk empowering others, failure will happen.

The failure of others can make a leader look bad. Resilient leaders risk allowing others to make them look bad. Leadership is risky, yet the literature encourages resilient leaders to learn and help others learn from their mistakes. Today’s failure is tomorrow’s learning or innovation. People, groups, organizations, and churches may learn from failure. Resilient leaders allow, expect, and prepare for failure by setting up systems to coach others, helping them learn from failure. Resilient leadership within the church embraces empowering others who, in turn, empower others, so everyone wins—regardless of how it may reflect the leader. As those we lead experience setbacks, they grow and learn, and like the Varsity Orchestra performing an unpolished piece, every achievement becomes a shared victory.

References

Ardjomand-Kermani, N. (2024, May 31). Fostering a culture of collective success. https://www.hypatiacollaborative.co/collaborative-not-competitive-fostering-a-culture-of-collective-success/

Bartolo, C. (2024, July 13). Redefining leadership: The power of collective success. Medium. https://chrisbartolo.medium.com/redefining-leadership-the-power-of-collective-success-b35e5516c160

Burns, J. M. (1978). Leadership (First Edition). HarperCollins.

Eskreis-Winkler, L., & Fishbach, A. (2022). You think failure is hard? So is learning from it. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 17(6), 1511–1524. https://doi.org/10.1177/17456916211059817

Greenleaf, R. K. (1970). The servant as leader (an essay). Greenleaf Organization.

Transformational leadership vs. servant leadership: 3 key differences. (n.d.). Retrieved April 2, 2025, from https://ideas.bkconnection.com/transformational-leadership-vs.-servant-leadership-3-key-differences

Vittori, D., Natalicchio, A., Panniello, U., Messeni Petruzzelli, A., Albino, V., & Cupertino, F. (2024). Failure is an option: How failure can lead to disruptive innovations. Technovation, 129, 102897. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.technovation.2023.102897

Waldner, S. (2023). Resilient leadership. Scandinavian Journal for, 10. https://doi.org/10.53311/sjlt.v10.78