{"id":12689,"date":"2019-04-27T06:00:19","date_gmt":"2019-04-27T11:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/smallbizsurvival.com\/?p=12689"},"modified":"2019-04-29T08:52:34","modified_gmt":"2019-04-29T13:52:34","slug":"if-they-want-to-lead-empower-them-to-lead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/smallbizsurvival.com\/2019\/04\/if-they-want-to-lead-empower-them-to-lead.html","title":{"rendered":"If they want to lead, empower them to lead"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Changing your questions can help you change the leadership of your community, empowering a new generation to lead. Photo by Becky McCray.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Guest Post by Paula Jensen<\/p>\n

Leaders are the essence of small towns and rural communities. The success or failure of any housing, community or economic development efforts in the places we call home often rests upon the level of engagement and investment of local citizen leaders. Yet, in so many communities I work in across South Dakota there is an invisible divide holding back the development of a strong leadership base. I hear experienced leaders saying, \u201cYoung people just don\u2019t want to be involved in the community!\u201d\u00a0 and I hear emerging leaders saying, \u201cThe people in charge won\u2019t let us try anything new!\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, I am asking you, \u201cHow can we empower more people to lead in our rural communities?\u201d<\/p>\n

To begin searching for a solution to this question, I want to help you understand two community leadership systems that exist:<\/p>\n

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  1. Most community leadership systems currently operate in a traditional hierarchy \u2013 meaning top-down (like a triangle)<\/strong> \u2013 the board\u2019s officers propose ideas to the members based on their knowledge of what the community needs. Then, following a decision of the board, the tasks gets allocated to the members who carry out the projects with board supervision. Traditional leadership systems define levels of authority and decision-making within the organization and invite you to join the work they are currently doing.<\/li>\n
  2. The non-traditional community leadership system being implemented by some rural communities has a core leadership team that is structured as a network \u2013 meaning connected (like a circle) \u2013<\/strong> with the basic goal of allowing distributed decision-making to empower and raise up resident leaders while giving everyone in the community the opportunity to identify priorities and go to work on projects they are passionate about. The non-traditional community leadership system can be chaotic and allows community leaders to collaborate, innovate, dream, and experiment which creates increased optimism and hope for new possibilities within the community.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The two systems listed above are quite different, yet if we are going to show emerging leaders that they do have the power to innovate and have real impact on the community, then we need to begin transforming the community\u2019s leadership structure.<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Experienced community leaders can initiate this process by asking good questions, listening with curiosity, and taking new ideas seriously. Below are some sample questions to help these transformational conversations begin.<\/p>\n

    Questions to transform rural leadership:<\/strong><\/p>\n