{"id":3995,"date":"2014-07-21T19:31:33","date_gmt":"2014-07-22T00:31:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/?p=3995"},"modified":"2014-07-21T19:31:33","modified_gmt":"2014-07-22T00:31:33","slug":"why-leaders-must-stop-feeding-the-dragons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/2014\/07\/21\/why-leaders-must-stop-feeding-the-dragons\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Leaders Must Stop Feeding the Dragons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Originally posted June 17, 2013<br \/>\n<\/em><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>How much time, energy and money do you spend feeding your organization&#8217;s dragons?<\/p>\n<p>Whatever you lead, you could well be feeding dragons you&#8217;re not even aware of.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Dragon.jpg\" class=\"btn-image--openpopup figure aligncenter\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" title=\"Dragon\" src=\"http:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/Dragon.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"393\" height=\"432\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m talking about one of the biggest reasons your church or organization might be struggling to gain traction.<\/p>\n<p>I define a dragon as \u201cAn institutionalized drain on resources\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, believe it or not, there may be elements right under your nose which could be devouring resources\u2026and which have been intentionally created by you, your team, or leadership predecessors.<\/p>\n<p>These elements not only fail to move things forward, they drain so many resources that they can actually prevent you from moving ahead.<\/p>\n<p>Examples of these dragons include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>The mortgage on a building that no longer suits your needs,<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>The program which continues to exist despite no longer aligning with your vision,<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>The staff person whose development has not kept pace with the growing demands of the ministry,<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>The old way of doing things that is out of touch with your present reality.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>You get the idea.<\/p>\n<p>These are all dragons that must be fed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>You can either keep feeding them, or you can pay attention to these 5 reasons you need to slay your dragons.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>If you don\u2019t slay them:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><strong>It could be hard to recruit top leaders<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Leaders can tell when a place is \u201ctop-heavy\u201d with this kind of baggage<\/p>\n<p><strong>2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Donor fatigue could set in<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Donors want to see forward motion<\/p>\n<p><strong>3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Staff could be de-motivated<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Who wants to devote their time and talent to something increasingly outdated?<\/p>\n<p><strong>4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><strong>Lethargy could settle into your constituents<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A \u201chere we go again\u201d culture can quickly develop<\/p>\n<p><strong>5.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><strong>You could find yourself at risk of burnout<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Burnout doesn\u2019t come from working hard. It comes from working hard and not producing results<\/p>\n<p>None of this is to say that buildings are bad or that traditions should be avoided.<\/p>\n<p>But you need to ruthlessly examine the flow of resources for which you are accountable, and identify those which are moving things forward, and those which are merely dragon-feeders.<\/p>\n<p>Consider placing this at the top of your agenda for your next lead team or board retreat. Ask your key leaders, \u201cWhat are our dragons\u2026and why are we feeding them?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Because if you want to move forward, you might need to slay a few of these.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What are the dragons you might be feeding?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Originally posted June 17, 2013 How much time, energy and money do you spend feeding your organization&#8217;s dragons? Whatever you lead, you could well be feeding dragons you&#8217;re not even aware of. I\u2019m talking about one of the biggest reasons your church or organization might be struggling to gain traction. I define a dragon as&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,22,738,478,577,7,579,705],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-action","category-church","category-effectiveness-2","category-featured","category-focus","category-leadership","category-ministry-2","category-strategy-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3995"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3995\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3998,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3995\/revisions\/3998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}