4 Ways to Empower Your Student Leaders

As youth leaders, we find ourselves at different places in the ongoing conversations of raising up student leaders. Sometimes, we’re in the early stages of engagement, drawing that “gold” out of them. Other times, we’re right where we are today, empowering those students to begin leading out. For what it’s worth, I believe this is a conversation that never truly ends, even though it may change and grow over time.

As students begin to take on leadership roles, part of the growth process is that we keep asking them the important questions and give them real opportunities to lead. In this blog, we’ll look at four different ways to empower your students and truly give away leadership to them.

Give It Away

To empower those we lead to step up and step out takes a unique leadership mindset. Leaders who focus on holding onto and maintaining their position rarely give leadership to anyone beyond what may benefit them. Leaders focused on the team, with a mission-first mentality, will empower those they lead. This sounds like a very corporate, business mindset towards leadership, but we actually see a lot of it in Scripture. To hand over the reins of leadership, in my opinion, is to put those we lead in positions of leadership roles, often before they’re ready. I believe the best way to verbalize this is that leaders teach their teams to lead and give their teams the lead. Teaching our teams to lead means we’re equipping them. Giving them the lead means moving ourselves out of the way and letting them make the calls, even though they may not always make the best ones. Part of empowering them is graciously allowing them to make mistakes. I do this in a few ways, but I call the two “introductory roles” passive leadership and active leadership.

Active Leadership

Active leadership is what it sounds like. It’s a leadership role that’s typically out front, actively leading others. For my ministry, this is typically someone who leads a small group, teaches from the stage, helps to plan events, and the like. They step into, by many standards, a more prominent leadership role. It’s not always the case, but it appears that way. Those who step into these active leadership roles are often comfortable being in the spotlight, but it doesn’t mean they crave it. These roles can also often be viewed as hard things to do, but I don’t think that’s the case for all of them.

Passive Leadership

On the other side of that coin, we have what I like to call passive leadership. As opposed to active leadership, passive leadership is a little harder to define, but for me, it’s giving leadership roles to my team that aren’t necessarily out front (although sometimes they are) but are just as important. An example of passive leadership may be someone acting in a greeter role for people coming in for the first time or possibly some tech role behind the scenes. Other times it may be asking someone to do announcements or a welcome at a gathering or service. Yes, I’m aware those are “up front” roles, but I’ve found that those have less pressure than teaching or leading a small group discussion. For the people stepping into these roles, it’s usually a pretty big deal. 

Continuing The Conversation

Whether you have active leaders or passive leaders (you probably have some of each), both groups require coaching and follow-up. Give them guidance for improvement and ask their thoughts on whatever they accomplished. Of course, always be one of their biggest cheerleaders! There’s nothing quite like seeing someone you’ve led and developed step into a leadership role and succeed. That beaming pride they feel not only empowers them to continue but also gives them permission to take ownership in the ministry or organization. I guess the only thing left when it comes to empowering leaders is, again, the continued conversation. Some will move from active leadership roles to deeper roles relatively quickly, and others will need to hang out in passive roles a little longer. We have to know the people we’re leading if we’re going to gauge their next best step. Encourage them and continue to allow them to lead out.

Share your thoughts with others in our YM360 community:

1. In what ways are you currently passing leadership opportunities on to your students? What could you do to allow your students to take more ownership in your ministry?
2. What are some active and passive leadership roles you currently have available? As you can, begin attaching students’ names to these roles.