Founder’s syndrome is a common difficulty faced by organizations that have been shaped around the personality and beliefs of their original founder. It is characterized by “paternalistic, autocratic, and overzealous leadership, that makes it difficult for other stakeholders to get a grip on the organization.” (Freeman, 2006) It is more common in churches than we might think. Understanding what Founder’s Syndrome is will help explain what has become prevalent in many of our churches. In my opinion it is one of the main explanations for poor decisions and bad behavior on the part of many church planters. My hope is to bring a better understanding of why churches often start well but many end so poorly. Also, I hope to encourage leaders to correct this syndrome so we may maintain healthier churches with better ends in mind. Please see the list below to learn what Founder’s Syndrome is and why this is a significant subject to understand and pray for.
Founder’s Syndrome Characteristics
Self-driven and ego centered decisions
Resistance to planning, policies, procedures, and changes
The founders are the custodians of organizational information
Owner decision making dominancy
Founders expect others, e.g. employees, to rubber stamp their decisions
Hiring of new members and removal of members opposed to their ideas
Committed to past strategies that maintain their power and control
All-knowing and all owning…have all the answers and wisdom [Muriithi, Samuel & Wachira, David. (2016). The Founders’ syndromes, challenges, and solutions. Research Journal’s Journal of Entrepreneurship. 4. 1-11]
My personal observation is that, when found in a church organization, Founder’s Syndrome is rooted and grounded in the founder’s fear of losing control of the very thing that God calls His own. The ramifications of this gets worse when the founder has narcissistic behaviors. These types of leaders get their identity by what their ministry looks like and the influence that it gives them. These bad behaviors are overlooked and even justified by the growth and success that some of these churches achieve. One of the easiest sins that I have observed that takes hold of so many people in ministry is when they start treating the things that God calls Holy as common. For example, as a leader gets older and more established in their position, they can become more entitled and treat the finances of the church as if it was their personal money. There have been instances where a founder takes their adult children (who happen to be employed by the church) on vacations where the founder can waive his/her wand and give family members a bonus $9,000.00 shopping spree at a Gucci/Louis Vuitton store (paid for by the church). Or the founder may get tired of his/her vehicle and go to the church bookkeeper and get $28,000 to pay off his/her title without board approval. There has been the selling of church property so a founder can immediately be funded with $700,000 for their retirement. Private Inurement is a big deal when it comes to Founder’s Syndrome because not only does the IRS frown on it but it’s just wrong. As I stated in an earlier post, “a 501(c)(3) organization must not be organized or operated for the benefit of private interests, such as the creator or the creator's family, shareholders of the organization, other designated individuals, or persons controlled directly or indirectly by such private interests…” I once came home from a meeting at church thinking I had wasted my best years of my life by working there. I had never thought that until that day. I was in a meeting with this founder’s family and listened as they described the church as their family business. Many more details were discussed in that meeting that I won’t write about at this point. Leaving that meeting, I kept thinking that in all the years I had spent there we were not on the same page. To them, this was their family business, and they were looking for the rewards that would come from it. This had never been about what was best for the church community, but what was best for the founder’s family.
Some of you might ask, so what, what’s the big deal? The well-trusted Barna Group is a research organization that found that although there are more churches in America that are growing to mega-church status, overall church attendance in America is in a decline. In other research they also found that pastors on average are getting older. For example, in 1992, 24% of pastors in the U.S. were 56 and older while 6% of them were 65 and older. In 2017, 50% of pastors were 56 and older while 17% of them were 65 and over. In 2017, pastors that were 40 and under only made up 15% of the pastor population. The point is that pastors who suffer from Founder’s Syndrome could be thought of as barnacles on this ship that are dragging and slowing us down from getting to our destination. Imagine the vacuum of pastoral leadership that will take place when Father Time catches up to us. If a pastor who suffers from Founder’s Syndrome were to explain their ministry hierarchy through a pyramid structure, the top level would say FOE, the middle segment would also say FOE and its base….you guessed it…again, FOE. Family Over Everything is what matters most. Loyalty over honesty! Staying in control and keeping it in the family is the most important thing. No matter how you reconfigure this pastor’s ministry hierarchy it will continue to say FOE.
I have heard pastors tell me that pastoring is the hardest job out there. They convince themselves that no one else is under greater pressure or works longer hours. It would be more accurate to say that no one else lives in such cognitive dissonance than these pastors. These pastors travel the most, they take unparalleled amounts of PTO, in addition to taking 4-6 week sabbaticals (a fancy word for vacations). They truly believe they have sacrificed the most and deserve every benefit a founder can receive. They make statements about how they deserve it all because if it wasn’t for them there would not be a church. They have no problem asking for $100,000 severances packages when resigning from small churches and way more for larger churches. Founder’s syndrome shortens the life span of a church and never allows the church community to mature because of the immaturity and selfishness of the founder. The theme here is that God requires our obedience more than He does our sacrifice. Sacrifices do not impress God, just from the fundamental understanding that you can not sacrifice something that was never yours to begin with. It’s like when God called Saul to obey Him or when He called Moses to lay down his shepherd’s staff, to relinquish his old identity for a new missional one. God is looking for those that are willing to be obedient by relinquishing their desires for His. Obedience is the first domino that will determine whether all the other dominos fall in the right direction. When we choose to shortchange God on our obedience, it begins the one-degree of misalignment that at first might not seem like a big deal but later it will cause us to be off course by miles. Pastors and leaders that do not take care of this in their early years will find it will eventually get the best of them.
Is there a solution? There is and it’s not one size fits all, but it has to start with accountability and end with an exit strategy. The board/council are key to this. Do they understand their roles and responsibilities? Many of our churches are suffering from the effects of Founders’ Syndrome because no one addresses it. Ask the questions and create timelines and parameters when it comes to the leadership of your church. Let me encourage everyone, it does not take much to recalibrate when the people involved all want to have a healthy, thriving church. The more common problem is when leaders would rather not fix these imbalances if it means their valve of prosperity would be shut off as well.
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