Church Leader’s Top 5 Weaknesses

Somewhat to their surprise, Thom Rainer and his research team found effective church leaders not only recognize and admit their mistakes, but they were happy to share those weaknesses. The top five weaknesses revealed are:

Pastoral Ministry - 3 out of 4 admit their number one leadership weakness is providing personal pastoral ministry. Pastoral ministry is defined as counseling, doing hospital visitation and performing weddings and funerals, to name a few of the responsibilities.
Lack of Patience - Another top weakness among effective church leaders is that they are task driven. More than 7 out of 10 indicate they are impatient to see objectives accomplished. Contributing to this dilemma is the fact that most American churches are notoriously resistant to change.
Dealing with Staff - 7 out of 10 considered their staff leadership skills to be weak.
Dealing with Criticism - Nearly 7 out of 10 effective church leaders struggle with handling or avoiding criticism.
Always Task-Driven - The dominant leadership style noted was "task-oriented." Task-driven or oriented is defined as "high interest in production and getting things "done." When a leader is always task-driven, sometimes to the exclusion of relational issues, there is a tendency to fail to take people's feelings into consideration. It's good to be task-driven, but it's not good to be so driven that you forget about people.

Adapted from "Lessons on Integrity: A Tribute to James Draper" by Tom Rainer, Christian Post 13 August 2007