Abstract
Reviewing Leadership by Banks and Ledbetter looks to review and evaluate the concept of leadership in our culture today. Initially the book looks to the rise in the interest of leadership and the development of leadership within churches. The book also delves into trends and societal issues while it forecasts that the central theme of leadership is the concept of values.
On the other hand, the authors look to see how some people's faith affects their approach about leadership and use the example of the Apostle Paul. After the book addresses the interest in leadership today it looks to provide Biblical contemporary and historical aspects of leadership. The Biblical and contemporary aspects that Banks and Ledbetter include are Benedictine tradition, Lutheran, Presbyterian and Pentecostal; and contingency and transformational. Banks and Ledbetter state “[s]uch approaches have their basis in an institutional setting-primarily the church or a religious order-that was influenced explicitly or implicitly by a particular set of theological convictions” (2004, p. 28).
Next the Authors address the spiritual and religious dimensions that leadership offers. In this chapter the authors look at spiritual dimensions of leadership characterized by Vaclav Havel and accordingly two basic Christian approaches to leadership.
In the chapter following the spiritual and religious dimensions, Banks and Ledbetter look into the faith-based approaches to leadership. In this portion of the book the authors look at popular faith based leadership approaches such as: David Baron, Laura Beth Jones and Charles Manz, as well as Max Dee Pree. This chapter shows practices and approaches that can be learned from a range of theological traditions.
Before the authors offer some case studies about Christian leadership they tackle the concepts of integrity, faithfulness and service. The authors state [t]he aspects of faithfulness, integrity and service…are most perfectly embodied in Jesus… (Banks & Ledbetter, 2004, p. 112-113). Concluding Christian leadership is based off of integrity, faithfulness and service.
Concrete Response
One key idea that stuck out from the book was the idea of servant-leadership which the authors proclaim that “the servant leader is servant first. It begins with the conscious feeling that one wants to serve first- and that conscious choice brings one aspire to lead” (Banks & Ledbetter, 2004, p. 126-127). The experience that sticks out the most is back in college when I when I worked at a Books A Million bookstore. This is where I believed where I started off as a servant and contributed to me becoming a servant leader.
As a young worker in the bookstore I did not necessarily agree with all the decisions that management made especially around holidays. I believe the bookstore was only closed Two day out of the years which were Christmas and Thanksgiving Day. The manager and the assistant manager could never be found all the holidays and days leading up to Christmas and Thanksgiving. I remember working one Christmas Eve with a handful of new personnel who had only been at the books store for a few weeks and didn’t have too much experience at the time. This really got under my skin and gave me the aspiration to lead. At this time I felt that key management needed to care more about the employees than themselves.
I vowed that upon completion of my degree and upon commissioning into the United States Air Force that I would to serve those in a career field, aircraft maintenance, which has had a history of low morale. Since arriving to my duty station I have consciously tried to make an effort to boost morale by getting to know the maintainers and often try to get out of the office in order to help perform maintenance. It came as quite a shock to some folks that I was out on the floor performing maintenance with the troops.
On the other hand, it appears that many of the troops enjoyed when I got out on the floor and helped with maintenance and tried to learn more about their jobs. I tried to make it known that I was there for whatever the troops needed and that I would try my best to help them out with anything that they needed. I believe I needed to set the example and be the first supervisory person in at the beginning of the day and the last person out.
Reflection
Overall, I think Reviewing Leadership: a Christian evolution of current approaches was a fairly good book. I think the authors Banks and Ledbetter accomplished what they set out to do and showed the association between ones faith and ones understanding of leadership. I don’t believe this book is necessarily a Christian book but a book that addresses Christian values in conjunction to the evaluation of leadership.
On the other hand, I valued the different theological perspectives in which the authors drew from. Before reading this book I was familiar with Stephen Covey and his books The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and Principle Centered Leadership, but I had no idea that his books and leadership philosophy were based on his belief in Mormonism.
Additionally, I thoroughly enjoyed chapter 6 which was the chapter devoted to case studies. My favorite case study was the case study about Soren Kierkgaard. Through this unique person’s life we can see that “a person whose personality may not be seen as an ideal match for a position may bring a unique experience, perspective, and style to the task” (Banks & Ledbetter, 2004, p. 121). I think it was important for the authors to incorporate case studies into this book in order to look at the various questions that come about when talking about people and leadership.
If I could ask the authors anything, I would ask what they would add to the book if anything since the book was written in 2004? I feel that times have steadily been changing and there are other perspectives of leadership that have come into existence.
I wish we could have delved more into biblical aspects of leadership and spent a little more time in Jesus’ life and his characteristics and style of leadership. To be a Christian is to be Christ-like so therefore I think it is very important to take an in-depth look at the life of Jesus Christ. At the end of the day a want to be a Christ-Like leader.
Action
Two actions that I plan to implement into my life and at work as a result of reading this book include reading daily devotionals on leadership and keeping a leadership journal that I will reflect in during the weekdays. I felt I was called to leadership when I was in college and I felt my future career path taking a sudden turn. I worked in a book store for three years while I was in college so I was able to see the different types of leadership books. This is the time period when I began to purchase books and make a list of books that I wanted to read. I have a devotional by John C. Maxwell called Leadership Promises for Every Day: A Daily Devotional that I have not made the time to read and reflect upon. I think this 365 day devotional will be a great starter guide in order to delve into leadership and the aspects of leadership in the bible. I also plan to keep a daily journal in order to reflect and upon my readings and how I plan to put into action the daily devotional. It is important that I keep a daily journal in order to fully grasp and comprehend what I am reading. I feel that this will help me develop into a better leader and help me understand leadership from a Biblical aspect.
Upon finishing my leadership devotional and daily journaling this year I would like to continue my leadership endeavors for the next few years with two other devotionals by John C. Maxwell titled: The Maxwell Daily Reader: 365 Days of Insight to Develop the Leader Within You and Influence Those Around You and A Leader's Heart: 365-Day Devotional Journal. Leadership has become an important aspect in my life and I feel like it is a gift from God because I was not initially headed down this path.
As the final step to my action I plan to bump my daily devotional readings to my Maxwell Leadership Bible which has extra content that helps correlate biblical leadership to various leadership aspects that John C. Maxwell has written about and his assortment of leadership books. Reference
Banks, Robert J., and Bernice M. Ledbetter. Reviewing Leadership: A Christian Evaluation of Current Approaches (Engaging Culture). Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004