Great article Ron! Teamwork and mentoring are qualities that are somewhat covered in your last two points: "Practice humble servanthood" and "Place energy into others". Also, your article at http://www.ronedmondson.com/2015/09/7-attributes-... touches on this as "Releases more control".

Leaders should not just delegate, but also really empower people, otherwise the leader can be controlling and end up limiting the team. Over time a controlling leader will often loose their best people and find out they are left with team of "yes" people that may limit the team's growth, or the team may struggle to be successful without the leader. We are called to multiply, and delegation can help by adding to the team, but empowerment has a better chance of multiplication!

Paul is a good example of team leader. Although Paul is the leader, in places like 1 Thessalonians, he talks about the apostles’ ministry in the plural as “we”. Silas, Timothy, and many other people played a key role the ministry accomplishments. When you look at the long list of Paul’s ministry helpers in the NT and all that they accomplished, you will realize he had a lot of help. Ministry is a team effort!

In the NT we see Paul mentoring Timothy who not only helps Paul to be successful, but Timothy is also being discipled and prepared for more leadership. A good team thrives even when the leader can't be there in the short term, as the team understands the vision and the strategy, they are empowered, and those being mentored can step in to fill any short term gap. Paul followed Jesus’ example in 2 Tim 2:2 and his reproduction was infinite: Paul -> Timothy -> Faithful Men -> Others, etc…

A quality that goes along with your great points “thinks beyond today” and "releases more control" is mentoring (or discipleship). In the NT we see Paul mentoring Timothy who not only helps Paul to be successful, but Timothy is also being discipled and prepared for more leadership. A good team thrives even when the leader can't be there in the short term, as the team understands the vision and the strategy, they are empowered, and those being mentored can step in to fill any short term gap. Paul followed Jesus’ example in 2 Tim 2:2 and his reproduction was infinite: Paul -> Timothy -> Faithful Men -> Others, etc…

Great list... have you considered adding Delegate?

Since a good leader usually wants the ministry to grow beyond his/her capacity, he realizes he cannot perform all the tasks needed, and provides the vision for a team where he delegates responsibility and authority to another person or team to help. Accountability still rest with the leader but is also shared with the person or team delegated to. Delegated authority allows the person to have enough independence to the do task effectively. With authority comes an equal amount of responsibility. Some biblical examples of delegation can be found Gen 2:15, Exodus 18:17-27, Matt 28:16-20, Luke 10:1-18, Acts 6:1-7. When leadership and delegation are effectively, the organization continues to function well and grow when the leader is gone for a short time; although the long term vision may suffer if they are gone for an extended time.