5 Minute Read…
I’ve been in ministry for quite a while. Church people can be amazingly supportive and encouraging. They can also be frustrating. Over my 15 years of ministry leadership, I’ve experienced my fair share of disgruntled church people, but the pandemic brought “disgruntledness” to a new level.
As a leader, we’ve been through a rough 18 months ourselves. Consistently dealing with the frustrations and disappointments of others is icing on the frustration cake.
What are you tempted to do when people are frustrated?
My temptation is to gruntle the disgruntled (is that a word?). But there are times we, as leaders, need to step back and evaluate how to best lead the disgruntled among us.
It seems most frustration stems from leadership decisions. Every decision bumps against someone’s completing agenda or vision for “their” church. As a leader, you are forced to make decisions, and if your church or company is bigger than you, these decisions will inevitably upset someone. Decisions have a way of disrupting the status quo. Of course, in many cases, the lack of success or progress with the status quo is why progress-related decisions are necessary.
Not to oversimplify it, but when decisions are made, two important people categories (of many) emerge:
1. The vocal disgruntled
2. The quiet supporters
The vocal disgruntled: The first category causes us to question our decision. Their loud response seems disproportionately in one direction. And this disproportionate response can be unnerving. It makes us question ourselves, our decisions, and at times our ability to lead.
The quiet supporters: The second category really does bring balance to the conversation, but their quiet support doesn’t ring as loudly as the disgruntled. Therefore, the balance isn’t felt.
Facing this seemingly unbalanced response, leaders begin to either question their decisions, or worse, seek to make decisions that are more “vocally” supported. As a leader, never negotiate with a terrorist. The decision goal is not vocal support, but missional progress. The minute we begin to make decisions to gain vocal support, the end is near.
Remember, in most cases, vocal support is an organizational oxymoron.
You’ve never called your local pizza delivery chain to thank them for your delivery, but you might have called to complain when your pie is late. People never call our church to tell us we’re doing a great job, but they have no problem letting us know when something doesn’t happen as they expect. Or when they don’t agree with a decision.
So what should we do when the vocal disgruntled feels like the vast majority?
1. Evaluate if the disgruntled are the real majority.
I know they’re loud, but is the volume representative of their size?
Most likely not.
When I make a decision that produces some vocal frustration, the first thing I do is individually evaluate the source of the dissatisfaction. Seriously, I look them up in our database. The majority of the time — and I mean the vast majority of the time — the vocal disgruntled could be better labeled the disengaged disgruntled. They are not in a small group. They are not serving. They aren’t really generous to our mission. Not always, but quite frequently.
I don’t mean for that to sound harsh, because we certainly desire to serve every person in our church and community, but there is an inevitable inverse correlation between complaining and engaging.
2. Encourage the quiet supports to become vocal vision-casters.
The quiet supports typically have higher levels of trust. Why? Because they are engaged in our mission, and through their engagement, they’ve learned more about our mission, our vision, our strategy, and our decision quality. These are the exact people we should ask to vocalize their support in the face of the vocal disgruntled.
One easy way to do this is by simply revealing new decisions to the engaged before the disengaged. Get them on board privately before you announce a decision publicly. This takes more time, but our goal as leaders is not efficiency, but to lead effectively.
3. Work to engage the disengaged.
The best way to help the vocal disgruntled is to engage them in the mission. Fighting the opinions of the disengaged is a lose-lose endeavor. It’s not always worth the effort, especially considering this same group will most likely be vocally frustrated with your next decision, too. So rather than convinced them to get on board, engage them and allow their involvement to solve the problem.
Again, a simple solution is to respond to a complaint with an opportunity to engage. Seriously! I do this all the time. It’s like Jesus answering a question with another question.
4. “Free up the future” for the perpetually disengaged.
AKA: Just let them leave. Or politely invite them to leave. You didn’t get into ministry to keep people against their will, anyway. If the vocal disgruntled never plan to engage the mission, they will perpetually be a noncontributing nuisance. We somewhat regularly invite people to leave our church — especially those who are Christians but never plan to contribute to our mission. Christian freeloaders should be an oxymoron.
But seriously, every believer needs to find a church where they can fully engage their head, heart, and hands. If that’s not your church, don’t fight to keep them. Support their search for a place they can call and make their home.
As a leader, you’re never going to have 100% consensus on big decisions, but if the vocal disgruntled begins to rule your leadership, odds are you’ll find yourself attempting to satisfy a minority group who have no intentions of partnering back with you.
How can I help?
Helping ministry and marketplace leaders through change, transition, and transformation is why I created Transformation Solutions. Go right now to mytransformationsolutions.com and sign up for a free, 30-minute conversation to decide if working together works for you.
