5 Simple Ways to Invest in People

As a leader, you have the ability to help those on your team stretch and expand their gifts and serve the Lord with excellence. That is why it is so important to invest in people well.  Here are five important focuses to invest in your team members:

1. The number one way we lead people well is by showing we value them. When we value the people who are serving more than their act of service, we see their development into healthy followers of Christ as a higher priority than completion of a task.

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves. Philippians 2:3

2. When we value those who serve alongside us, we ensure they encounter grace. We know people will make mistakes, so we choose to believe the best and utilize the mistakes as an opportunity to have teachable moments with the people who are serving.

Though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the Lord upholds him with his hand. Psalm 37:24

3. Intentionally equip those who serve on your team by considering the individual team member’s gifts, skills, and needs. Look to connect that individual with the needed skills and opportunities that will best fit their desire to serve.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. I Corinthians 12:12

4. Encourage people by ensuring you understand and support them to serve at a sustainable, healthy pace. This care for them will go a long way to creating a healthy team. When you are proactively caring for people who are serving: assessing their fit, fulfillment, and fruitfulness, you are focused on long term health, not short term fixes.

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. Acts 20:28

5. Endeavor to entrust to people the opportunity to serve and lead. When you delegate but do not abdicate responsibility, you embrace the risk and accept the responsibility of delegation. By promoting a culture of expansive leadership where leaders are trained, empowered, and released to lead at every level, you are building influence and breadth among the people who serve.  

And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. 2 Timothy 2:2