When Leaders Transition Best

Be strong. Take courage. Don’t be intimidated. Don’t give them a second thought because God, your God, is striding ahead of you. He’s right there with you. He won’t let you down; he won’t leave you. (Deuteronomy 31:6, MSG)

Leaders come and go.

Like everything else involving work today, change is the only constant.

So in the midst of these shifting tides of workplace culture, how do you as a leader transition best?

Let’s take some leadership cues from one of the Old Testament’s foremost leaders—Moses.

God tells Moses that he is unable to lead the Hebrews into the much anticipated Promised Land. This leadership challenge is for Joshua.

Moses prepares for the transition by speaking to Team Hebrews on his 120th birthday about how to move forward into the Promised Land. What does Moses say and do that helps the start-up nation achieve their best?

Name the Reality

“I’m 120 years old today. I can’t get about as I used to. And God told me, ‘You’re not going to cross this Jordan River,’” Moses tells Team Hebrews. He names the reality. He acknowledges the necessity of changing leadership.

Leadership, like everything else, has its seasons. Particularly with start-ups like this one, one leader creates and another leads to the next phase of development. It’s rare for one leader to possess the varied skills or adapt well enough to see the organization through its life-cycle.

Leaders transition best when they name the reality, telling their team what time it is in the life of the group, stating clearly that it’s time for someone else to lead.

Name the Replacement

Moses summons Joshua to stand alongside him, naming him as the next leader. Joshua receives Moses’ blessing and instruction for the next phase of the nation’s life together.

The team has so many questions in the midst of leadership change:

          “What will he change?”

          “I wonder if she’ll eliminate my position?”

          “Who will I report to?”

The unfamiliarity prevalent in the transition creates anxiety and fear. When leaders bless their successor as Moses did Joshua, they lessen the anxiety and reduce the fear in the company. They bridge the familiar and unfamiliar.

Leaders transition best when they bless the next leader.

Name the Real Leader

As Moses transitions the leadership of start-up Israel to Joshua, he is careful to point beyond himself and Joshua to the real leader: God.

Moses charges Team Hebrews and commissions Joshua with the assurance that even in the midst of change, God is present and leading: God, your God, is striding ahead of you. He’s right there with you. He won’t let you down; he won’t leave you.

The eternal, enduring value of God’s leadership is paramount to the success of these former slaves growing into the chosen people of God.

Every organization has values that transcend the leader. A culture that’s defined and refined by each subsequent generation. In start-ups like this one, however, the leaders often embody those values best. In the transition phase, it’s powerful to name those values as enduring beyond leaders.

As a Christian business leader, your enduring value finds its rootedness in the same soil as did Moses: God is ahead of you in the future, present with you in the moment, just as He was in the past.

You transition best when you name the reality, name the replacement, and name the real leader—God.

As you do, you further grow a work culture in which faith increases, joy is greater, and team members love God and others more.

Dr. Joey Faucette

www.GetPositive.Today

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