Five Keys to Disagreeing with Your Senior Leader

Every Associate Leader will eventually disagree with the Senior Pastor.  At some point it might even become a passionate disagreement.  This is only natural when someone is a leader in his own right but is serving under the leadership and vision of someone else.

Whenever this happens it is important for the Associate Leader (and the Senior Leader) to remember that no matter how passionately they disagree, they are on the same team.  If conversations on a church staff become adversarial, Satan is already gaining the upper hand.  

As an Associate Leader, what can you do to keep this from happening?  How can you disagree with the Senior Leader but still protect the unity of the church and the unity of the church staff?  Here are five keys that will help:

1. Express Yourself with Confident Humility

A Senior Leader hopefully has a God-given vision.  That means that his mind is filled with vivid pictures and plans about how things might happen.  Often, those ideas may be far clearer in his head than he is able to communicate.

If you want the Senior Leader to listen to you, then you need to make a proposal that is as clear and well thought out as the plans and visions that are already in his head.  Make sure you clearly communicate the following:

• The need or purpose that you are trying to meet.
• The financial cost – don’t just say “about $350.”  Prepare an itemized list of what you need and each item’s cost.
• The required other resources – does this require staff time?  Volunteers?  Service time?
• The steps you are going to take to put your plan into action.

2.  Don’t Take the Disagreement Personally

Be prepared to defend your ideas to the Senior Leader.  He might question your thinking or your plans.  He will likely disagree with some things you are going to say.  If you want to succeed, remember: don’t take it personally.  He isn’t attacking you.  It is his job to hold the staff to a level of excellence.  Your job is to let him challenge you to refine and improve your ideas.

3.  Keep the Disagreement Private

Conversations like this often happen in parts, and it might be days or even weeks between parts of that conversation.  During that time, it is never appropriate to air the disagreement publicly in the church.  Every Associate Leader is called by God to preserve the unity of the church.  That is always a higher value than anyone’s ideas or anyone’s ego.

4.  Find an Appropriate Outlet for Your Feelings

You might be frustrated.  You might be offended.  You might be incredibly confident that things would be better if the Senior Leader would just do things your way.  Deal with your feelings, but don’t deal with them by gossiping to other people in your church.  Spend time in prayer until you are right with God and right with the leadership that He has placed over you.  Sort out your thoughts and feelings in a journal.  Processing your thoughts is important, but it is equally important to do so privately.

5.  Let the Senior Leader Lead

Eventually the conversation will end.  Hopefully, the Senior Leader will take your idea.  Sometimes, however, he won’t.  When that happens, it is important to remember that he is the Senior Leader and you aren’t.  That means that he has the right to direct the church in whatever direction he feels that God is leading.  Your job is to follow.  Don’t follow begrudgingly.  Don’t follow cynically.  Follow patiently and joyfully.

What other keys would you add to this list?  How else can you protect the unity of the church and the staff while still being able to share your thoughts and ideas?