| New coaching ministry can unlock pastors potential  By Mary Ka Kanahan
In what may be a precedent-setting move, the Baltimore-Washington Conference has launched a coaching ministry to support pastors in initiatives of the Board of Congregational Life and the equitable compensation grant program. Coaching is not, as some people think, a division of any new sports and recreation ministry, nor is it an effort to get our pastors into top physical condition.  Coaching is a relationship in which a skilled individual, called a coach, works with pastors to accomplish the vision and mission God has given them through the ministry of The United Methodist Church in this conference.
Corporate CEOs and top managerial leaders have been using personal coaches for years to enhance performance, increase profits and break through barriers to creative thought processes to find innovative solutions. Trends in corporate America indicate that individual and group coaching can support natural leadership development. I believe those results can be generalized to address the ministry of the local church. The Board of Congregational Life believes it too and has chosen to invest initially in pastors who are ministering in initiative churches. Biblical images of coaching include the relationship between Moses and his father-in-law, Jethro, in Exodus 18, in which Jethro encourages Moses to enlist the support of additional leadership to manage his growing number of believers. In the New Testament the Holy Spirit is promised as a gbwc_superusere, offering wisdom and truth. And of course, Jesus was a model of a coach, patiently mentoring and equipping his disciples. Today, the coaching relationship is not about advising, counseling, teaching or imposing knowledge on a pastor. It is a supportive, equipping and empowering ministry that involves learning and discovery. Coaching is unlocking peoples potential to maximize their own performance. It is helping them to learn rather than teaching them, writes John Whitmore in his book, Coaching for Performance. Coaching provides an environment in which pastors regularly work with a dedicated person on the most important areas of their lives. The coaching ministry focuses primarily on results toward the vision and mission of the church. However, because pastoral ministry is a calling and not just a job, there is an integrative element to coaching which considers the whole person and the quality of the persons life with God, oneself and others, especially ones family and core congregational leadership team. In addressing the mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ and develop local churches, there is sometimes a natural desire to buy the answers in a packaged ministry program rather than do the work it takes to find the solution. But all too often, what pastors end up with is a package sitting on a bookshelf, rather than a solution that meets their specific needs. The investment in a coaching relationship is in identifying how pastors are individually and uniquely equipped in gifts, leadership, personality and aptitudes to work with a core leadership team in a congregation to fulfill the vision and mission God has given them. They begin with the resources at hand and work to remove barriers and obstacles with an action plan to achieve agreed upon goals. The coach is there to help them move in an intentional, demonstrable way toward those goals. Once a pastor/team agrees to an action, they are powerfully linked in a commitment to achieve it. This commitment accelerates the achievement of the vision and mission of the church with transformational results. As this new ministry grows and develops, the Board of Congregational Life will be looking for individuals who possess the giftedness, passion and relational skills for coaching ministry. Mary Ka Kanahan, of Bethany UMC in Ellicott City, is helping to develop the conferences coaching ministry. She coaches a group of pastors in the equitable compensation grant program. She can be reached at
, or at (410) 4188-8530. | 
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