Training and Lay Leadership Education

“Exercising leadership is an expression of your aliveness.” – Ron Heifetz

Intrinsic to my ministry is helping to develop the lay leadership and learning capacity of the congregation. The role of teacher is one that I greatly enjoy. In all the congregations I have served I developed modules on topics of spiritual development, personal awareness and leadership skills. 

In my various roles at the UUA I took this experience, as well as what I learned in my doctoral studies, and offered workshops for lay and professional leaders in a multitude of congregations. 

My goal in training is not to simply regurgitate my own learning, but to create a space into which people can bring their own knowledge and experience to bear on the subject. 

Below you’ll find a few descriptions and examples of training topics I developed.  

Conflict Transformation

As much as people wish it were not the case, conflict is endemic in congregations. Rather than consider it something which should be “managed” or “resolved,” I have been trained in an understanding of conflict which asserts that it exists because we have something to learn. Conflict, when engaged with in a healthy manner, offers an opportunity for everyone to learn and change together.

I was trained in Conflict Transformation processes in my doctoral studies, and have applied it in working with many congregations in distress. 

Adaptive Leadership

I subscribe to the Adaptive theory of leadership which asserts that leadership is not something only certain powerful people can do, but that leadership is what people do together. In this sense leadership is a verb, rather than a noun. Everyone has the capacity for leadership depending on the kind of challenge that is before an organization.