by Eddie Pipkin

Image by Kate Cox from Pixabay

I was doing some shopping last week when I picked up a carton of eggs from the case and realized that one was broken.  What does one do? Put it back right where you found it (not my problem)?  Put it back in the case, conspicuously off to one side (not my problem, but why be a jerk)?  Put it in the hands of a helpful store associate (doing all the good we can in all the ways we can)?  It is not my nature to get involved, so I’m usually an option one guy, sometimes option two.  On this afternoon, however, the sales associate just happened to be passing by, so I magnanimously chose option three.  And lived to regret it.  Why is it human nature to disdain unsolicited assistance?  In ministry and in the grocery aisle?

“Hi,” I said.  “There’s a cracked egg in this one.”

She took the carton from me with a smile, but I would say reluctantly, like she was calculating how to non-awkwardly not take them.  “Oh, I’m sure there is,” she said.  “I’m sure there’s plenty of cracked eggs in there, but I’ve got so many other fires to put out before I get to that.”

“Oh, sorry?” I mumbled.  I kept walking one way; she kept walking the other.  I didn’t look back, but I swear she opened the case and stuck the compromised carton right back in there.

Ouch.  I felt like a doofus.  I felt chastised.  My moment of warm, helpful-citizen fuzzies had morphed into a clunk of cringey embarrassment for having gotten involved.

It’s not a feeling that anybody wants to have, yet we do it all the time to people who put themselves out there and risk engaging our ministry.  Whether they are sharing an opinion, offering an idea, or attempting to volunteer, we can be disdainfully dismissive if it’s not what we’re looking for.

Sometimes it can be an opinion, idea, or offer to volunteer that is well thought through and needed, but it just comes at exactly the wrong time or through the wrong channel.  In a different setting we would welcome it, but out of synch with our ability to process it in the moment, we protest and push back.  It’s hard for people to know what our preferences are, and it’s natural for them to offer up their thoughts when they intersect with us, however ill-timed (from our point of view) such a convergence might be, but what is a nuisance to us may be the pinnacle of their courage in finally putting themselves out there.  We should respect that.  In fact, we regularly encourage people to make that leap.

When people are volunteering to help, there may be reasons that we are skeptical:

  • They clearly are not the right person for the job at hand for which they are volunteering.
  • They clearly do not understand the job at hand for which they are volunteering.
  • They have the skill set for the job at hand for which they are volunteering, but they have a reputation for being difficult and unwieldy, or they have prior negative history with someone on the team with whom they would have to work.

If someone approaches us in person to volunteer, we inevitably have an instantaneous gut reaction, and some of us telegraph this for all the world to see.  This is especially true if we are caught off guard or pressed for time.  It’s one thing to have a chance to steel ourselves against any unfortunate, inopportune response, but under pressure and in the moment, it’s hard to control a natural reaction.

Controlling our responses takes commitment and diligence.  We have to be committed to the proposition that we will always, under all circumstances give measured, positive encouraging responses, and we have to practice good habits diligently in order to pull off that goal.  Simple rules:

  • We will not react negatively.
  • We will always express gratitude for the offer.
  • We will defer if necessary, stating an apology for needing to defer and stating a clear path for follow-up.
  • We will follow up in a timely manner, having had time and space to process the offer.
  • We will involve other members of our team in processing the offer, as needed, consulting them for feedback or expertise, thus moving beyond our own assumptions or prejudices in processing the offer.

Time is our friend in taking such volunteer offers seriously and compassionately, but an immediate response is necessary from the standpoint of the person who has worked up the nerve to make the offer.  If the offer turns out not to be compatible with organizational needs, it is an opening to help that person figure out what is the right fit for them.  This is sacred work, and we should treat it as such.

The same process is true for people who approach us with ideas, no matter how crazy those ideas may be upon first hearing them.  We should not blurt out things like, “That would never work!” or “Oh, that’s been tried here a million times before.”  It’s a good thing that anybody cares enough about what we are doing that they would come up with an idea and find a way to share it.  Organizationally speaking, we should have processes in place for how people can share their ideas and how we move forward in evaluating the feasibility of those ideas.

The same process should also be true for people who are just sharing opinions and critiques, no matter how barbed those observations may be.  We all get those on a weekly basis, if not daily, and they can be demoralizing, but having a clear process for, well, processing them can ease the sting.  We listen, we acknowledge, we say thanks for the feedback, then we send the feedback to a useful place and follow up on it in some manner.  Some of the ways such a process works effectively include encouraging feedback from everyone and having a formalized way of sharing it, as well as making sure the feedback gets to the right person.

Healthy processes make for healthy exchanges, exchanges that are good for both those sharing their passions to serve and create and contribute and those on the receiving end of those passionate expressions.  I have stated these processes in relentlessly positive terms, but there are, of course, exceptions to such a rose-colored, adulatory approach:

  • Frustrating Recurring Characters: The person who is consistently disruptive, the fly-in-the-ointment, the one who brings their negativity and dysfunction forward at every opportunity.  Such persons require special handling appropriate to their context.
  • Legitimately Sacred Off Limit Moments: There are some times when people should not be approaching us with their offers, and we should be politely clear about exactly when those moments are, times like during communion or prayer or maybe even at your daughter’s softball game or a meeting for dealing with an exclusive topic at which we must deflect people from getting sidelined.
  • Legitimately Overloaded Bandwidth Moments: I had a standard response, delivered with a smile on Sunday mornings – which is, of course, when everyone wants to share whatever is on their mind, because that’s when they intersect with leaders.  Since I, however, had a million things going through my head on a given worship morning, responsibilities with which I had been entrusted, I would smile and say, “Hey, I love it that you’re thinking about that, but I will never remember that we talked about it this morning because there is so much going on, so here’s my contact info, and I want you to follow up with me on that in the next couple of days.”  I would hand them an old-school business card with my contact info.  One of the beauties of this technique, is it put the onus on them to follow up, which helped determine if they were just talking or were serious about the topic.  There is a variation in which you have them write down their contact info, and then you take the initiative on following up with them.
  • Legitimately, I’m Not the One: Sometimes a person has an idea or makes an offer and you genuinely or not the person to follow up.  If you can walk a person over to the right contact (and if the team is agreed on taking such conversations seriously), this is the best outcome.  But you can do the “delayed contact” strategy in this case, too, directing them to the right person.  It’s always good to follow up with that right person a few days later to be sure that they got back to the original supplicant.  Also, if someone approaches us with what is obviously going to be a longwinded idea or offer, it’s fine to say, “Hey, before you get too deep in the details, you need to know I’m not the right person.  Let’s get you to that person.”

When you think back on times when you have reacted in a less than stellar fashion to someone who was just trying to help, what do you wish you had done differently?  Have you and your team talked openly about ways that you can seem more welcoming to people who are putting themselves out there to be a part of your mission?  Share your comments below!