Number
130
Nehemiah
A Case Study on Leadership and Implementing Change
by Patrick Morley
Introduction
“Why do some men’s discipleship programs succeed while others languish or fail?” Over the last two and a half years I have been reading relevant scholarly literature on implementing organizational change (especially for new programs) looking for clues to answer this question.
Apparently the problem of failure isn’t limited to men’s discipleship programs. Despite a rich and diverse literature about organizational change, it may be safe to say that only about one-third of organizational change initiatives survive beyond initial implementation (e.g., Beer, 2003; Kotter, 1995; Miller, 2002; Senge, 1999; Yin, 1978).
I found nine major themes for implementing sustainable programs, and wrote about each in a series for the Weekly Briefing emails. These themes apply broadly to the successful implementation of any change initiative -- whether at work, church, in the family, ministry, or community.
Ironically, all the themes discovered over the last 100 hundred years about implementing sustainable change can all be found by reading the book of Nehemiah -- written nearly 2,500 years ago! (I gave a message on this at the Man in the Mirror Bible Study entitled, “What a Leader Needs to Know to Do Something Great for God” -- download or stream it for free in audio or video at http://www.maninthemirror.org/biblestudy/series.htm).
Nehemiah was a high official to the king of Persia. Nearly a century had passed since the Jews had returned to the land of Judah. When Nehemiah’s brother came for a visit, Nehemiah asked his brother how things were going for the people and for Jerusalem. He reported that the wall of Jerusalem was broken down and the city was in shambles. Imagine how you would feel if the Capitol in Washington, D. C. had laid in ruins for a century!
Here are brief summaries of the nine themes and an introduction to what the book of Nehemiah has to say about each one...
Theme One: Leadership
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Commitment to long term results
- Transformational style
- Involvement in the change initiative
- Support from the CEO, the senior or top management, the implementation team, the champion, and the implementing managers.
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Nehemiah, chapter 1, portrays a man who weeps, mourns, fasts, prays, and repents for his people -- a humble man. Jim Collins found leaders of Good to Great companies were a mixture of personal humility and professional will -- what he termed a “Level 5” leader (Collins, 2001). The rest of the book of Nehemiah gives a case study of a transformational leader with an iron will who was personally involved in making his vision become reality. And Nehemiah found support from his CEO, the king. Nehemiah said, “Let him send me to the city in Judah where my fathers are buried so that I can rebuild it” (Nehemiah 2:5), and the king granted his request.
Theme Two: Ideas
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Gathering and analyzing information
- Creating a clear and compelling vision
- Creating a sense of urgency for change
- Introducing an initiative that works and is perceived to work
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
After Nehemiah had gathered information from his brother (1:3), he prayerfully thought about it 1:4-11). God put a vision into his mind to rebuild the city of his fathers (2:5). He first shared his vision with the king (2:4-5). Once he arrived in Jerusalem he secretly surveyed the damage under cover of darkness (2:11-16). When he introduced his vision and plan, it captured the imaginations of the leaders in Jerusalem. They believed his plan would work! (2:17-18).
Theme Three: Resources
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Creating structures
- Building in enough time
- Allocating budget
- Assigning staff with needed expertise
- Training those who need it
- Providing rewards and incentives
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Nehemiah carefully assembled the resources he would need -- written authorizations (2:7), timber for construction (2:8), capable people to do the work (3:1-32), and money (7:70-72). He created an organizational structure to assign the work (3:1-32).
Theme Four: Planning
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Making the adoption decision
- Formulating strategy
- Developing concrete plans
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Nehemiah formulated his strategy while still in Persia (1:8-11). He developed a comprehensive plan to rebuild the wall once he arrived in Jerusalem and analyzed the situation (2:11-16).
Theme Five: People
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Expertise: Tasking capable, committed people who understand what is expected from them.
- Training: Those people must be trained with the skills required to implement the change.
- Culture: Creating a culture that offers psychological safety for people to dialogue about their reservations is a key factor of implementation success
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Nehemiah challenged his people with a compelling vision to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem (2:17). He created an atmosphere for people to speak up (2:18). He recruited the leaders of the city to do the work (2:16).
Theme Six: Execution
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Conducting pilot projects
- Implementing the change
- Getting feedback
- Making adjustments
- A contingency for taking too much time
- Obtaining systematic feedback to evaluate results
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Forty leaders and their crews work side-by-side and shoulder-to-shoulder to rebuild the wall (3:1-32). (Think Baptists, Methodists, Assemblies of God, Church of God, E-Free, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Non-Denominational, House Churches, Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Main Lines). Some built large sections; others built next to where they lived. The each did according to their ability and resources. The wall was just the pilot project for Nehemiah’s plan to restore the nation (7:1-4). He had feedback mechanisms in place to get feedback about progress (4:6). Nehemiah also had a contingency plan (4:16-18).
Theme Seven: Resistance
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Mechanisms to identify resistance
- Processes to deal with behavioral and systemic resistance
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Sanballat and Tobiah fiercely opposed Nehemiah and his plan, so they “prayer to our God, and posted a guard” (4:9). But that wasn’t all -- there were other types of internal resistance. The workers got tired, the rubble made it difficult to work (4:10), and others ran out of money (5:1-6). He also had mechanisms to identify resistance (4:11-12). When they faced opposition, Nehemiah had worked out a communication plan to deal with resistance (4:19).
Theme Eight: Communication Plan
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Publicize the benefits of change
- Publicize short term successes
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
When Nehemiah was ready to go public with his ideas, he called the leaders together and extolled the virtues of his vision and plan (2:16-18). They celebrated the short term success of completing the wall with a great celebration (12:27-43).
Theme Nine: Sustainability
Implementation Factors essential to success from literature:
- Enfold the initiative into the routines of the organization
Some of what Nehemiah has to say about this theme:
Despite fierce resistance from within and without, Nehemiah and his team rebuilt the wall in 52 days. But the city was large, and the people were few (7:4). To sustain the vision and plans Nehemiah had started to implement, the city needed ongoing leadership. So Nehemiah appointed his brother to lead them (7:2). He appointed staff to maintain the city (7:3). And he repopulated Jerusalem with people (7:4-5). He repopulated the towns of Israel (7:73). He normalized Jerusalem and stabilized the land promised to his fathers.
Conclusion
It’s not enough to have a committed leader. It’s not enough to have a good plan. All nine themes make a difference. A football team may have the greatest quarterback who ever lived, but they will be losers unless they also have the right game plan, the right players, and call the right plays in the huddle.
Likewise, our men’s discipleship programs (or any other initiative) need leaders who can articulate a vision, gather resources, put together a plan, recruit the right people, execute the plan, overcome resistance, communicate what’s going on, and sustain the momentum. Bring these nine themes together in a spirit of humility and prayer, and you can be a Nehemiah to your people.
If you want more on the nine themes go to www.maninthemirror.org/weeklybriefing/index.htm (they are numbered 136 through 146).
References
Beer, M. (2003). Why total quality management programs do not persist: the role of management quality and implications for leading a TQM transformation. Decision Sciences, 34(4), 623-642.
Kotter, J. P. (1995). Leading change. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
Miller, D. (2002). Successful change leaders: what makes them? what do they do that is different? Journal of Change Management, 2(4), 359-368.
Senge, P. (1999). The dance of change. New York: Currency Doubleday.
Yin, R. (1978). Changing urban bureaucracies: how new practices become routinized. Santa Monica: The Rand Corporation
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