Churches can be sizable institutions with serious administrative responsibilities. To what extent should the Church look to the secular business community for assistance? These are questions that are explored in a commentary by Tom Horwood in the Guardian.
Noting that the Catholic Church in England turned to an outside commission (the Cumberlege Commission) to advise it about how to prevent future child abuse by clergy in the future, Horwood notes that churches have much to learn about leadership and management:
At the same time, like the rest of the voluntary sector, churches are having to become more professional – from child protection to health and safety, financial accountability to data protection. This draws faith leaders out of their comfort zone because they have tended to rely on traditional models of hierarchy to govern their flocks. They were normally recruited on the basis on orthodoxy and conservatism, and received little training when they were promoted.
There is a resistance to this change, as the Cumberlege report notes. Some religious leaders would prefer to devote all their energies to spiritual and pastoral matters, despite being responsible for multimillion-pound charities and large workforces. There is a temptation to leave practical problems to others. Yet Cumberlege criticises this attitude because it fails to make vital issues such as child protection part of the mainstream life of the organisation. Faith leaders need to be, and be seen to be, in the driving seat if the necessary culture change is to happen.
To effect this change, other organisations can teach churches a thing or two. Secular management theory has been grappling with change management for the last decade, as companies and the public sector have increasingly valued the importance of persuading people to modify how they behave to improve the organisation, whether the motivation is profit or public service. This way of thinking is now commonplace and mainstream, but it has yet to make a significant impact in most faith communities.
Elements of what works in the secular working world can be consistent with the ethos of religion. Strategic management does not conflict with theology or doctrine. I and other writers, managers and pastors across the denominations have been suggesting ways of integrating good management practice with faith.
Those who argue that the two are irreconcilable could consider these words of the management author Charles Handy, written for a secular audience in language that could be as at home in the presbytery as the boardroom: “The leader’s first job is to be missionary, to remind people what is special about them and their institutions; second it is to set up the infrastructure” to make things happen.
If faith leaders took to heart the lessons of other sectors, they would be better able to set strategies for what their communities would look like in the future. They would inspire people to bring about a shared vision, rather than responding defensively to crises. They could bring about the attitude changes the Cumberlege Commission believes are so necessary. They could find new ways of turning their faith communities into the beacons of hope and inspiration they aspire to be.
Read it all here.
When is it appropriate for the church to learn from the business community? Is there a danger that this can lead us to buy into the more materialistic aspects of our culture?