Ministry leaders who developmentally invest in their future find roles that match their giftings and provide increased levels of influence.
The demands of the present often prevent leaders from taking the time to pursue people and experiences that produce developmental gains. However each moment invested in the present, however important, diminishes the ability to prepare for the future. These are not mutually exclusive but can functionally exist as such.
In his book Dealing With Darwin, How Great Companies Innovate at Every Phase of Their Evolution, Geoffrey Moore talks about companies who fail to invest in their workforce’s future:
“By not investing in their workforce’s next-generation skills, they render it increasingly incompetent to compete for the next generation of work…It is like selling off the company a piece at a time and declaring the proceeds as operating income.”
I have certainly sold off a piece of myself to maintain unrealistic goals in the present, only to find myself unprepared for various roles and responsibilities that came from overachieving.
Seminary, conferences, college and post grad courses are common opportunities to develop your future; most are expensive. Yet the cost of seeing a future that you want but is unattainable due to a lack of preparation is much greater.