If you lead an organization or team, here’s a truth worth holding tight: the success of any plan depends on the people executing it.
Other things matter, too – from good strategy to logistics. But nothing will prove more decisive than the people involved and their health in mind, body and spirit.
Jesus put it this way, “A good tree will produce good fruit.” In other words, if a person is deeply healthy, then what springs from their life over time will be deeply good.
Of course, caring well for our staff and colleagues is not just about productivity. It’s first for love, desiring their good before anything else. But if Jesus is correct, no leadership investment will prove more consequential in the long run than to care well for those we lead. Thriving people will produce good fruit.
Three essentials to cultivating health
So how can we as leaders cultivate that kind of deep-down health — whether in a nonprofit, business, church … or even a family or circle of friends?
Here are three things I’ve come to believe are essential in this kind of leadership:
1. Set your heart towards your team.
To care for someone well, you need to love them – really love them. We may not feel that kind of love at the start. But contrary to common assumptions, we can grow it. I’ve found no better way to deepen my affection for people than to pray for them. It’s remarkable how asking God to bless and bring good to a person affects how I feel about them. (Maybe that’s part of why Jesus told us to pray even for our enemies.)
When we pray for team members, our hearts are set toward them. We start seeing them more as God sees them, with compassion amidst our differences and longing for their good. We find ourselves strategizing about how best to care for and build them up. Over time, subtle shifts like these in our thoughts become drivers for loving action.
2. Consider the whole person.
It’s easy to view staff members through a utilitarian lens. We weigh the exchange of what they give and get. We consider only parts of them – perhaps their mind and skills, but little else. But caring well for our team means seeing the whole person, including their intellect, emotions, physical health, relationships and spiritual life.
Even the dimensions of a person that seem to have little direct connection to work are a vital part of them … and ultimately affect all the other parts. Certainly, a boss can’t force an employee to get more sleep or invest in their marriage. But we can help – both in shaping an overall culture of health and in specific policies that encourage healthy practices in every sphere of life.
CAFO operates with – alongside our typical strategic plan – an internal document we call our “Strategic Plan for Thriving Souls.” It sets out both our vision and specific policies for this whole-person care. It’s first an expression of love. But we believe it’s also key to long-term productivity as well.
3. Nurture their spiritual life, especially little habits.
Our “spirit” – that profound part of us that the Bible also refers to as the “heart” or the “will” – is much like a rudder. It’s far smaller than the ship, yet it is vital in setting direction. Dallas Willard describes the spirit as the “executive center” of our lives. So the formation of our spirit – what our heart and character are becoming over time – is the most important thing about us.
Good leaders pay attention to this. Alongside other ways of caring for their team in mind, body and relationships, they help them cultivate their spiritual life as well. For Christians, that spiritual life is grounded in Jesus – his death and resurrection and all that he modeled and calls us to be and do as his disciples. Good leaders help their teams to grow more like Jesus.
This happens especially in the small, daily habits that shape our character over time. Faithful disciples in every era have done this together, engaging these practices as a way to participate with God in His formation of us. We can do the same today, inviting others into simple practices of spiritual formation together.
Your organization is a place of formation
Humans are never not being formed. Even the smallest actions carve small neural pathways and thought patterns that, over time, shape the people we’re becoming.
So every organization is already a place of formation. The main question is whether that’ll happen by hodge-podge happenstance … or deliberately via well-considered plans, policies, and practices.
If you’d like to learn more about how to be intentional about these things – particularly #3 – I’d invite you to join others in the CAFO community for a webinar on December 11 at 2pm EST: “Your Organization as a Place of Spiritual Formation.”
We’ll explore ways that many in the CAFO community are seeking to do this with their teams, including both the “why” and the “how” of spiritual formation together. (You can RSVP here.)
Most of all, I pray that you’ll lean into each of these three ideas in 2025 – including the small but powerful practices that help you as a leader to:
- Set your heart towards your team
- Consider the whole person — intellect, emotions, body, relationships, and spirit
- Nurture their spiritual life together
I believe there’s no more consequential investment you can make as a leader!
-Jedd Medefind is the president of Christian Alliance for Orphans.
