In a couple of articles I wrote not too long ago, I took up the five levels of leadership posited by Maxwell in order to discuss them in our own situation. Having done that, I should point out that no definition of leadership was given. There are numerous such definitions, but perhaps the simplest is the equation, “Leadership is influence.” However, this raises the question of whether such leadership (influence) can be had illegitimately. Maxwell’s five levels don’t address it.

On the one hand, there is a common presumption that authentic leadership is legitimate. That is, Christian leadership influence is commonly assumed to be the result of the leader’s demonstrated success with motives that align with the Church/parish/jurisdiction and with methods that meet the Christian moral standard. That presumption works most of the time, but what about the possibility of the leader’s having private motives that do not align with the Church’s, or a willingness to use immoral methods to attain success? Private motives allow for the possibility of acts contrary to the common goal, and immoral methods taint even good results under the principle that the ends don’t justify the means.

If you doubt the possibility of contrary goals or immoral methods, just look at the OCA scandals of the past decade. There is no doubt that Kondratick was a leader. He gave the impression of genuine interest in the people he dealt with, freely handing out his mobile number, and even answering when it was used. Have an urgent need? He could see that it was met. Are things going to pieces? He could pick them up. Yet, according to the best evidence (see the SIC and SC reports), one can see Kondratick’s most significant motive, self-aggrandizement, coupled with a willingness to manipulate and compromise others as needed to pursue private aims. It was leadership in service to self. In an odd perversion of level 4 leadership (“People Development”), how many clergymen owed their own standing to him? In promoting their causes or covering up their scandals, he established himself as a leader on a foundation of uneasy loyalty and the keeping of secrets.

Illegitimate leadership in the Church inevitably leads to spiritual harm. When the illegitimacy and its means become known, they create disillusionment and cynicism among the faithful of God. This might not happen immediately, but such things are very difficult to hide forever. This element of secrecy is key.

Legitimate leaders have faults that are known, and they lead in spite of them. They do so through personal effort, spiritual development and, more importantly, by augmenting their own strengths and weaknesses with complementary ones from those around them. (Brilliant but disorganized pastors are often saved by attentive secretaries.)

In contrast, the illegitimate leader must be seen as having no, or relatively insignificant, weaknesses. Why? If they were known, they would be exploitable by others like him. Of necessity, a certain hagiographic depiction of the illegitimate leader develops, as a means of concealing the sins and weaknesses. A veil of secrecy is established, either through an inner circle of individuals who maintain the facade (and diverting the curious) or through taking ownership of critical tasks personally, with minimal information disclosed to others. Both methods are seen regularly in the individuals mentioned in the SC and SIC reports: the cash transactions (which prevented tracking of funds), stonewalling (“the Metropolitan blessed it,” the hiding of accounts, the refusal to provide essential information), convoluted financial controls, and self-interest that prevented would-be whistle-blowers from saying anything.

What is perhaps worse is that the illegitimacy that masquerades as competence or piety at the top washes downward. The illegitimate leader gains the (unwarranted) trust of others, and that trust extends to his lieutenants. “If the leader trusts him, I should trust him, too.” Trusted lieutenants extend their perception of trustworthiness to others in the same way, establishing a web of compromise and privilege. It can work in reverse, too, with illegitimate leaders in the lower ranks transferring their ill-gotten trust to leaders in positions of greater authority, supporting them and, too often, manipulating them for their own ends. Illegitimate leadership is thus corrosive to the whole, and such rot is quite difficult to eradicate.

I think we’re still battling this in various forms within the Orthodox Church in America, even with the scandals described in the SIC and SC reports fading from memory, and in at least a couple of other jurisdictions in North America. The real questions for us are:

1. How do we spot illegitimate leadership? From a spiritual standpoint, how do we remain vigilant without becoming cynical or excessively suspicious?
2. How do we stamp out illegitimate leadership when it occurs and halt its corrosive spread?
3. How do we end, or prevent, a system a privilege that fosters illegitimacy?

What do you think?

Blessings to all on the feast of our Lord’s Ascension.

Returning to leadership matters, I posted last time about Maxwell’s five levels of leadership. I had some questions at the end, but I’m going to ignore those myself for a bit, in order to develop some more thoughts on this topic. At this point, my thinking may diverge from Maxwell’s. Make of that what you will.

Careful reflection reveals that a leader at a particular level always has the option to lead according to a lower level. As a hypothetical example, a leader at level 4 (who owes his stature to the respect garnered by developing other persons’ abilities) can choose to lead as though he were at level 1, for example, in a fit of pique, ordering rather than requesting a subordinate or teammate or church member to do something, “because I say so,” or “because I am the priest.”While this can be done from time to time, it requires those being led to overlook it in a spirit of forbearance. Why? It violates a principle of magnanimity. We naturally expect leaders to be magnanimous, and great leaders to be even more so. We possess an innate desire that our leaders be willing to overlook small insults for the greater good, avoiding any vengeful or resentful spirit. Put another way, great men don’t need to be worried about hecklers. Stepping down to a lower level of leadership means setting aside a higher, godly way of thinking in favor of a lower one built on self-interest to a greater degree.

In fact, this is directly related to what we refer to as the great virtue of humility. We only progress in our spiritual lives to the extent that our pride, our ego, and other personal vanities are set aside or destroyed in favor of seeing ourselves as we really are before Christ. We must recognize ourselves as the greatest of sinners, and, in doing so, we find it so much easier to overlook the sins of others. Humility leads to magnanimity. The greatest Christian leaders are notable for their magnanimity, for their resistance to pettiness and hostility.

Resorting continually to lower levels of leadership, for the sake of passions (like irritation and anger) or impatience or frustration, is to discard humility in favor of pride. It inevitably leads to a leader’s loss of status. That is, the higher level of leadership is traded away for the lower level. In fact, others come to see the original higher level as a fluke, as the exception rather than the norm. The higher levels can be regained, but only with effort and time, and usually only after other damage has been done. Only humility, and the desire to heal the wound, make it possible.

Next time, I’ll be discussing illegitimate acquisition of leadership levels (is that possible? If so, how?) along with a vitally important level that can precede these other 5.

In the meantime, I ask each of you to consider what I’ve said above, and to assess its value. (As the blog title suggests, these are reflections. Like an intimate discussion, we all get sharper as we discuss, even if it means tossing aside something we believed strongly before.) Do you have any examples to share? If so, please use the comments.

(Sorry for the delay since the last post. When you see me again, ask me how the post-exposure rabies shots for the whole family went. I think that sums up the last week pretty well.)

Some personal reflection on recent events as well as parish and mission development have led me to revisit the five levels of leadership (or see here) as posited by John Maxwell, a well-known leadership speaker and motivator. (Individuals love or hate John Maxwell, but the five levels in his scheme are well-supported in my own experience. Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while?) I’d like to discuss how these levels play out in an Orthodox situation. The list below summarizes them.

The Five Levels of Leadership:

1. Position – People follow because they have to. That is, they recognize the “rank” of the leader, but with little other basis.
2. Permission – People follow because they want to. This is the “teamwork” level, where others follow the cues of the leader much as those who play team sports follow the team captain.  Those members who aspire to more will soon look elsewhere, though.
3. Production – People follow because of the leader’s contribution to the organization. The leader has made the organization successful. He is liked, and generates momentum to accomplish more.
4. People Development – People follow this leader because he develops them in line with their potential. The individual team member perceives the leader’s contributions personally (i.e., the leader’s contributions affect the individual personally, not just organizationally).
5. Pinnacle – The team follows the leader out of respect for what the leader represents. This level is achieved rarely, and only after long years of service. This is the kind of leader for which people will undertake extreme risk.

In an Orthodox setting, we struggle mightily with these levels. The Church is hierarchical, but that doesn’t always mean those in the hierarchy are “natural” leaders. Likewise, some of the faithful become leaders only in the crucible of extraordinary difficulty. (Look at the heroes from the scandals of Metropolitans Theodosius and Herman.) Such “weak” men and women become leaders only by the grace of the Holy Spirit and their constant cooperation with it through the seeking of God’s will and the kenotic act of risking reputation and wealth for the sake of righteousness. Our treasure is in earthen vessels, and that also applies to our leading clergy and laity, many of whom come from unlikely places. The difficulty lies in bringing the gifts of God to the surface, in order to manifest the treasure.

We are familiar with leaders, particularly priests, who struggle to get beyond level 1 in Maxwell’s hierarchy. The faithful accord such priests the basic respect of the office, politely hear their sermons (no matter how bad), go to them for confession and absolution, and partake of the Body and Blood administered by their hands. Indeed, these are the vital things of the Christian life, but the priest must not be reduced to little more than a vending machine for Sacraments. The relationship shouldn’t end there, with pious laity quietly tut-tutting about Father’s lack of [insert skill here]. Under these circumstances, the priest can find himself tossed aside, his spiritual authority confined to, rather than based upon, the Holy Table. Out of frustration, the priest asserts his priestly authority (qua priest), and bad things ensue, much as Metropolitan Jonah describes:

If you sit there and you lord it over your parishioners that ‘I am the priest and I can do whatever I want and I can spend the money however I want without accountability and without…’ you are not going to go very far. In fact you are likely to get thrown out because you will get into all sorts of problems.

The source of such a loss of real leadership authority can have multiple causes at the same time, but the core of the problem is the leader’s failure to advance beyond level 1, regardless of mitigating factors. In the realm of the Church, there are legitimate ways to do this (and see the questions below, where I ask you to think about them), as well as illegitimate ways, such as the “purchase” of loyalty through favors, cover-ups, and cold hard cash and the imposition of loyalty through punishment and abuse. We should all know about these illegitimate ways by now.

With these things in mind, I ask readers here some questions for reflection:

1. Where do you see Orthodox leaders reaching levels 4 and 5 in contemporary Orthodoxy, particularly in North America? Think of this as a moment for praising the good.
2. Where do you see Orthodox leaders stuck at level 1? Cite examples, but be constructive.
3. What is the way forward for us to see more of our leaders, clergy and lay, making it to levels 3 and 4? That is, what can these leaders do (or stop doing) to escape level 1?
4. What role does trust play in advancing through the levels? What about goodwill?

Sharing of your answers is encouraged. I hope to present some other thoughts on these questions, in the context of current events, very soon.

[UPDATE 5/28: I still prefer real names here, but, considering that this might make some would-be participants nervous with regard to this particular subject matter, pseudonyms are OK here. Please use a real email address (not shown to the public) and keep it constructive, please.]