I’ve just emerged from our annual Willow Creek Association International Council meetings in Frankfurt, Germany, where we poured enormous energy into looking at how to extend the impact of our annual leadership conference, The Leadership Summit.
These three days have left me with an even greater sense of resolve as to my core beliefs about The Summit:
- I believe this is the best leadership conference available for church leaders. Period.
- I believe that churches that bring teams of leaders to this annual event are poised to make significant Kingdom advances.
- I believe that unless The Leadership Summit is embedded in a broader leadership development strategy, its full potential impact will not be achieved in the life of the leader, nor the life of the church he or she leads.
Year after year I see church vans and buses pull up to the doors of our Summit sites across Canada, with teams of 5, 10, 20 or more pouring out, ready to have their leadership tanks filled yet again. And as they drive away a couple of days later I think to myself, “I hope you have next steps mapped out for your leadership development.”
And that brings me to the next leg of my journey. I’m in Toronto’s Pearson International Airport now, having just flown in from Frankfurt, and I’m ready to board my connecting flight to Atlanta, Georgia. There I’ll be meeting with leaders from ministries committed to ongoing leadership training. My goal is to partner with as many as 4 or 5 leadership development organizations; to help us lay down “training tracks” for leaders to run on after the Summit.
Imagine if the impact of The Summit could be maximized by leading directly into a leadership development training program for you and your church! That’s the dream. And I trust that this coming week we’ll be closer to making that dream a reality.
Time to board my flight. Please pray for God’s leading and wisdom!
How intentional are you about mapping out your leadership development strategy? What development opportunities have been most helpful for you?
Share your thoughts by adding a comment!
Thanks Scott for putting it in print. I like you, believe there are ways to increase the band width of one the best two day leadership events in the world.
I think it’s a much needed idea to keep the ideas and discussion happening long after the ‘event’ of the Summit. So many, almost too many, great ideas are presented and caught during Summit, that it can be overwhelming to keep carrying them any longer than weeks after.
I hope this brings much fruit for us.
Thanks.