The Upside Of Tension

• They myth Andy grew up believing was that you would solve all your problems and get rid of all the tension.  If you did not, you had a leadership issue.
• The opposite is true.  In fact, great leaders and organizations leverage problems and tensions to help grow.
• The right amount of pressure or tension will allow you to go further faster as a leader.
• Every organization has problems that shouldn’t be solved and tensions that shouldn’t be resolved.
• Some problems and tensions are just things you manage.
• Learning to manage them properly allows you to create progress.
• Every church should wrestle with the tension of creating a safe place for those outside the church and creating a place to mature believers.
• The role of leadership is to leverage the tension to the benefit of the organization.
• As a leader, you cannot afford to lean one way or another around a tension or problem.  You need to give value to both sides.
• Don’t allow strong personalities to win the day.  You need passionate people to champion their side.  But you need mature people to realize that the tension will always exist.  Don’t give up the passion but realize that there is this third category of something that will never be solved.
• When applying this principle, don’t think in terms of balance, think rhythm. What does the organization need right now. Don’t try to be fair.  Fairness is not a Biblical value.
• As a leader, one of the most valuable things you can do for your organization is differentiate between tensions your organization will always need to manage vs. the problems that need to be solved.