Discover seven key signs that your church should begin the conversation about pastoral succession. From staff turnover to passion shifts, this guide will help you discern the right timing. Tune into episode 2 of The LeadingSmart Podcast for more insight into answering the crucial question: "When is the right time to start talking about succession?"

Most churches don’t have a culture problem. They have a clarity problem. Team culture isn’t created by a clever slogan, an annual retreat, or a ping-pong table in the fellowship hall. It’s built through dozens of daily decisions, often unseen, but deeply felt. Here are 4 tips on how to build a culture that lasts.

Welcome to Episode 1 of The LeadingSmart Podcast. We're kicking off our inaugural season with a timely and critical topic: pastoral succession. Pastoral succession is often delayed or avoided. Discover why churches must plan ahead—and how to avoid four major myths that can derail healthy transitions.

Most succession plans fail not because churches don’t care, but because they wait too long to plan. One of the best ways to honor a leader's legacy is to ensure that the mission continues seamlessly long after they're gone. Here are 4 steps to a successful succession.

The Executive Pastor is the bridge between vision and execution. Get this hire wrong, and your team will flounder. But get it right, and your Lead Pastor can soar. And so can your church. Here’s your guide to hiring the right XP for your church.

Church boards are vital. But when they step too far into day-to-day operations, things can go sideways. Staff feel micromanaged. Decisions get delayed. Trust begins to erode. And soon, you have a ministry team that is stuck waiting for approvals instead of moving forward in faith. Here’s how to fix it.

For the past four and a half years, Holly Tate has been a trusted partner behind the scenes at LeadingSmart—helping us serve churches and leaders with excellence. Today, I’m thrilled to share that Holly is stepping into an even bigger role with us as a LeadingSmart Consultant & Executive Coach.

Leading a church requires the strategic mind of a CEO, the emotional intelligence of a therapist, and the spiritual discernment of a shepherd. And you better be ready to do it all under a microscope, with limited resources, and in a culture that sometimes resists the very change it needs.

Dave is joining me at LeadingSmart as a Senior Consultant & Coach. He’ll come alongside senior pastors and executive teams to help leaders navigate the very same kinds of complex transitions he’s lived through. As someone who’s sat in the senior pastor seat amidst hardship and transition, he brings wisdom, empathy, and strategic insight that can only be learned in the trenches.

I've never been more proud of a church in how they have navigated a significant leadership transition. What I watched unfold last week in the announcement should become a case study on how to have a smooth, momentum-building, transition.

You carry the weight of the vision cast from above, translating it into action through the organization, often with limited autonomy. You stand in the gap between the top leader’s expectations and the realities of execution, shielding them from the pushback while managing the frustrations of those below you. It’s an incredibly difficult and often lonely position.

I was 23 years old and started a role in a new department at the organization where I had been working for 5 years. My boss (let's call him Pete) was twice my age, had multiple college degrees, and had significantly more experience than me. Everyone else on the team was also older and more experienced than me.

A few months into the role, the president of the organization called me into his office and asked me to take over running the department. Pete wasn't leaving. He not only was staying in the organization, he was staying in the department. I would be Pete's boss. I'd also be overseeing the other staff who were once my coworkers. Talk about awkward.

The intensity around racial injustice increased as the summer continued. Just as I had never been on offense around topics of race, I had never been on defense either. Every person we hired who was not a person of color was met with disappointment and questions. Why do we keep hiring white people? Why is our candidate pool all white people? Why aren’t capable leaders of color applying for our roles?

As is true with schools, corporations, small businesses, government agencies, non-profits and all human-led entities -- some of them are led by people who are self-serving and corrupt. The church is not excluded. A few scandals and suddenly we think every megachurch pastor is committing fraud or abuse, or at a minimum putting their own interests above that of their church.

It's 2025. The world is shifting. We are facing changes all around us: politics, technology, climate, artificial intelligence, family dynamics, and more. As leaders, while holding tight to our core convictions, we must never stop changing and growing and learning. Every day we wake up, the world changed over night. We won't get the same results tomorrow doing the same thing we did yesterday.

The role of Senior Pastor is a really hard job. Do you want to make it a bit easier? If I could sit down with your pastor and ask, “What do you need from the men and women on your team?" -- I’m fairly confident I know what they would say.

Here are 11 things your pastor needs you to be…

When the budget needs to be cut, often we zero out the learning and development for our staff before anything else. Here is the problem. If your leaders are empty, if they are void of ideas, if they are uninspired or unmotivated or isolated or just exhausted -- then you aren't going to be able to move your mission forward.

Last month I was on a flight to Seattle. I boarded early and made my way to seat 7F to settle in for the nearly four hour flight. Everyone was on board and in their seats when a flight attendant approached me and said, "Excuse me Mr. Stevens, the pilots would like to speak with you."

That was a first…

I've long been a believer in pastors having side hustles well before I knew that's what they were called. The term "side hustle" has a long history that has changed over time but has emerged in the age of the internet and Uber and Etsy with a new meaning.

A side hustle, as defined by Entrepreneur.com, is "any type of employment undertaken in addition to one's full-time job. These are often freelance or piecework in nature, providing a supplemental income." 

My worth, sometimes without thinking about it, can be wrapped up in what I do. Or how I’m perceived. Is this true for you? When that identity goes away, whether by choice or not, you can lose your balance in life. Identity will change several times over your life. When it changes, you will find out how much it mattered to you.