Leadership isn’t about who goes first

I consider Andy Stanley to be a leader in every sense of the word. If you’re not familiar with Andy, he’s the senior pastor of North Point Community Church, speaker, author, podcaster and much more. If you ask someone that knows Andy if they consider him a leader, they’ll almost certainly say yes.

Andy’s churches see weekly attendance of more than 40,000 people during non-COVID times, so you think he’d want to be a “leader” and reopen as soon as possible. You’d be wrong. They announced months ago that they’d be staying closed until at least the end of 2020, perhaps longer. In their eyes, the safety of their congregation comes first, and unnecessarily putting them at risk isn’t leadership of any kind.

They’re certainly doing a ton to support their congregation through virtual events, and much could be learned from that, but they don’t think that leadership means going first.

I’m sure you’ve seen plenty of businesses and organizations in your area that are doing the opposite. They’re “leading the way” to reopen or to host their event, even if it might not be a smart move. It’s a tricky thing to navigate, particularly for businesses, so I’m not sure what the right answer is. However, I don’t think that opening quickly necessarily equates to leadership.

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