Studies reveal that 60-80%  of the success of any organization is attributed to two things: 

• Vision – having clear direction
• Recruiting – having the right team of players

This is why few things are as important as putting the right people in the right positions.  How do we do that?  Half the job of successful recruiting is having clear direction of what you want done.  Once you have that you can then put together a group of people who are gifted to carry out the mission. 

Recruiting is one of the most important parts of successful leadership.  Great athletic coaches know they must have talent to win, and therefore they take an active role in choosing the players.  Teams that just happen will get happenstance results.  It is critical for a church or Christian organization to pray for wisdom in choosing the best staff.

Often as an organization, church or ministry grows or if it plateaus  it will need to reorganize.  The organization will sometimes out grow a person.  In 1981 the founding pastor of Skyline, Dr. Orval Butcher was retiring after 27 years.  The church was about 1000 but had been at a plateau for years.  When Dr. John Maxwell arrived he met with each staff to access individual abilities.  He immediately discovered why the church had flat lined.  The staff were good people, but they weren’t strong leaders.  No matter what he did with them, he knew they would never be able to take the church to the next level.  John knew Skyline’s potential would be determined by those closest to him.  His task was to bring in better leaders.  That was the only way he would be able to turn the situation around.  When Skyline had the right staff their potential skyrocketed. 

Who you recruit is extremely important.  Small organizations or churches often make the mistake of thinking they can get by with inferior staff because they are small.  The opposite is true.  In a group of 100 staff, if one is inferior, the loss is only 1 percent.  But if an organization has a staff of 3, the loss is 33 percent.  The bright side is that it is easier to pick one excellent leader than a 100!

No matter what your size set a high standard of excellence.  How can we find and recruit such people?  One lesson I have learned is that we are not hiring friends.  We are gathering capable people around us who are able to do what we cannot do, perhaps able to do things better than we ever could.  We may become friends in the process but I do not have to be chummy with the person, and she does not have to be my girlfriend.  But we must respect each other.  A lot of leaders make the mistake of hiring people they like rather than people they respect.  They end up choosing individuals like themselves, duplicating their own strengths and weaknesses, which will not advance the mission. 

The higher the position being filled, the more time we should spend filling it.  A few months ago I began to sense that God is about to do something new with WIN.  Something bigger than me.  I felt God leading me to begin writing  a list of the very sharpest and most dynamic Christian women I know of in America.  For a month all I did with the list was pray for these women and their ministries.  Next I began to ask people I respect who they thought of when they thought of high quality Christian women in leadership.  In addition  to prayer and godly counsel of others I began to research each name on the list.  After these steps I narrowed down my list and knew who I wanted to pursue. 

Perhaps the more difficult part of recruiting is recognizing the quality people and the next post will be about the top 10 qualities I have learned to look for.