Leading from the Second Chair: Serving Your Church, Fulfilling Your Role, and Realizing Your Dreams

IF . . .Staff communication and Egos are healthy enough to take it.This book elevates the role of second chair pastoral staff. As the lead pastor of a church I appreciate the public acknowledgment of the immense value of second chair leadership. Any senior pastor who feels a need to micromanage or minimize the role of others is guilty of leading the church to mediocrity, sort of like an engine only running on one cylinder. I always want my second chair leaders to be LEADERS in every sense of the word.This book also cautions second chair leaders to check their personal egos at the door when they enter. Subordination is a great American weakness that does great damage to the church. Often second chair leaders excell in vision, energy, and drive, but too often are weak in areas of savy and experience. If the first chair leader feels threatened, things quickly go from bad to worse. This book builds savy.This book is timely, important, and could potentially prevent many ministry wrecks. I suggest that every multiple staff church use it as a study guide for a series of staff meetings. I wish it had come along earlier in my ministry.

This is an excellent book! This was one of the supplemental text books for a recent class and it offered wisdom and great information for those serving as the second chair whether in ministry or the workplace. I highly recommend it!

I'm someone who recently transitioned from first chair to second chair by choice due to a recognition of my strenghths and weaknesses. This book helped in that transition as I felt my way around this new role. It also helped confirm for me that I had made the right choice. I found especially helpful the section on the "deep/wide paradox" in seeing the need for balance between minutia and grand vision. Also helpful (and humbling for a former first chair) was the section on the "subordinate leader paradox". This book will be extremely helpful to the second chair leader who feels trapped in a bad situation with a bad first chair (not me) but is still full of great wisdom for the person in a great situation with a great first chair leader(like my church). I recomended this book to a church planter in Hawaii and he read it along with his potential second chair guy, which I thought was a great use of this book. Every second chair leader should read this, especially young guys like myself.

Good reading for any Christian Church Leader who is not the current Church Pastor.

Great condition and quick delivery. I am very happy.

This book was an eye-opener. It confirmed much of what I've experienced in various staff roles and as a lead pastor. The paradoxes of tensions faced by anyone serving on a staff was well explained. If there was one negative, it might be the absence of testimonies of second chair leaders from smaller churches. Still, the book's tenets are easily transferred into any church of any size. Even as a lead pastor, I came away from this book recognizing myself as a "second chair" that follows the Lord Jesus Christ. This book is not another leadership book full of theory and technique. Instead, the book lays out material that can be used by pastors and staff in their churches.

If you are going to lead under and alongside a main leader, this book is a must. There is great wisdom and practical application to grasp.

Wish it had an audiobook version

This is a great book to inspire you to be more than “just” a second chair; be a great second chair! I pray more first chairs read it to understand more fully what it means to be a second chair.

very helpful book despite being American and about huge churches with teams of teams. the principles are still the same.

Helpful insights.

This book was very useful as part of my Reader training in the Church of England. It was recommended reading.

I liked how this book was very encouraging by looking at the second chair from all angles. It inspired me to keep growing in this position God has placed me.