A good quarterback usually hands the football to someone else who is responsible to gain yardage. He will either hand off to a running back or pass to a receiver.
As a leader, always be looking for things you can hand off to someone else—and not just the awful jobs you don’t want to do. Like a good quarterback, hand off the tasks which will develop the talent in your “receivers.”
You are developing the gifts of God in them; let them take credit for the “winning touchdown.”
I hear people say, “Well, it’s a shame, but as the organization grows, you reach the limit of people’s capabilities. You have to fire them and get others in order to progress any further.”
No. That is inconsistent with the Word of God. Growing ministries or businesses do not have to reach the limit of the staff’s capabilities.
Blend your willingness to make every educational opportunity available to the people who work for you. Encourage them to develop their natural gifts and talents, and then entrust them with additional responsibilities as the Lord gives you direction.
You will see them grow into newer and larger arenas of responsibility than ever before. And as they grow, your organization will grow from within.
Excerpt permission granted by Harrison House Publishers
Mac Hammond is the senior pastor of Living Word, a large and growing church in Brooklyn Park (a suburb of Minneapolis), Minnesota. He is the host of the Winner's Minute, which is seen locally in the Minneapolis area on KMSP Channel 9 at 6:44 a.m. and 11:11 a.m. He is also the host of the Winner's Way broadcast and author of several internationally distributed books. Mac is broadly acclaimed for his ability to apply the principles of the Bible to practical situations and the challenges of daily living.
Between 1970 and 1980, Mac was involved in varying capacities in the general aviation industry, including ownership of a successful air cargo business serving the Midwestern United States. A business acquisition brought the Hammonds to Minneapolis, where they ultimately founded Living Word in 1980 with 12 people in attendance. Today, after 40 years, that group of twelve people has grown into a church body of more than 10,000 members.