PODCAST | Finding Your Leadership Voice

In today’s podcast, William speaks with one of our strategic partners, Kadi Cole, founder of Kadi Cole & Company. Kadi is the author of the bestselling book, Developing Female Leaders, founder of MinistryChick.com, and host of The Together Project Podcast.

In this conversation, Kadi shares about her newest book, Find Your Leadership Voice, which gives females practical guidance on how to step into leadership roles with confidence. We are so thankful for her wisdom and leadership and hope this conversation is helpful as you navigate your leadership and ministry journey. If we can help you further your mission, please contact us to get started.

Resources:

• Kadi Cole - Strategic Partner
• Kadicole.com
• Kadi Cole Resources

Transcript:

Christa Reinhardt:
Welcome to the Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Christa Reinhardt, senior marketing coordinator here at Vanderbloemen. In today's podcast, William speaks with one of our strategic partners, Kadi Cole, founder of Kadi Cole & Company. Kadi's the author of bestselling book, Developing Female Leaders, founder of ministrychick.com and host of the Together Project Podcast.

Christa Reinhardt:
In this conversation, Kadi shares her newest book, Find Your Leadership Voice, which gives females practical guidance on how to step into leadership roles with confidence. We are so thankful for her wisdom and leadership, and hope this conversation is helpful as you navigate your leadership and ministry journey. If we can help you further your mission, please reach out and contact us. We would love to help you.

William Vanderbloemen:
Well, hey, everybody, thanks for joining us today for one of our podcasts on leadership. And as we've been highlighting women in leadership this month, it's Women's History Month, just thrilled to have my good friend, Kadi Cole, back on the podcast and with us. Kadi, you and I have done a lot of things in front of Zooms, particularly over the last two years, right?

Kadi Cole:
Yes. I'm very familiar with the backgrounds of your office, William.

William Vanderbloemen:
Yeah. And you have much better looking ... I want to go sit in your space, mine's not so much. But yeah, in fact, we probably did stuff where I was in the bunker, literally the bunk room of our house, during that lockdown time. Hey, for those who have not become familiar with you, why don't you introduce yourself to our listeners? So, they know a little bit more about you and what God's doing through you right now.

Kadi Cole:
Thank you. Well, thanks so much for having me on the podcast. It's always fun to hang out and chat with you. Yeah. So, I'm Kadi Cole. I've been in full-time ministry about 25 years and worked in very large multi-site church environments. Was an executive director at a really large church in South Florida. And since that time, I've started working more with churches on leadership development systems, on growth strategies. I did a lot of work with Leadership Network. And the last couple years, we've been working with a lot of churches who have been struggling to try and figure out how to access the female leadership on their teams better.

Kadi Cole:
And so, I wrote a book called Developing Female Leaders, in 2019, that really tried to crack the code for men about how do you approach this topic? It's an emotional one. It gets really heated pretty quickly. And so, what can we do really without violating our theology, but how can we make sure we're actually living to the fullest of what our theology is wherever you're at on the spectrum? And then most recently, I've been working a lot with women, trying to coach them and help them step into these new leadership roles with confidence and joy. Sometimes it can be a little overwhelming to step into these new spaces that are being opened up. And so, trying really hard to help women find their way in that and really enjoy leadership the way God has intended it.

William Vanderbloemen:
That's excellent. And in the middle of that, you've gotten two books put out, I mean, one for Mars and one for Venus, right?

Kadi Cole:
Yeah. That's probably a way to look at it. That's funny.

William Vanderbloemen:
Well, it's one for guys like me, well, not guys like me. For males who are in ministry and are trying to maximize the females around them. And I'm trying to say that in a way where no matter your theological persuasion, you're not offended. I grew up in a Presbyterian church. I can't remember a time that there wasn't a female pastor on staff. So, we were very progressive in that way as evangelicals. And yes, there are evangelicals that are also Presbyterians, that do have women as pastors. So, sorry, we just had some unsubscribes.

William Vanderbloemen:
But no, it's just not new to me, but a lot of people are like, "How do I do that? What do I be careful about? What do I not be careful about?" And that's the first book you've written, but I want to focus on this second book, which I kiddingly said is for Venus. And it's like finding your leadership voice, which I guess you wrote toward women who are coming into ministry, but I would love to know, this has got to apply to both Mars and Venus, right? So, if-

Kadi Cole:
Oh, absolutely.

William Vanderbloemen:
If we're on the elevator together for a five floor ride, how do you pitch the book to me?

Kadi Cole:
Sure. Well, I've actually had quite a few guys read the book and they tell me it's excellent. So, we are trying to give some leadership content through a female voice at these higher levels of leadership. And so, finding your leadership voice is really learning about how to speak up and stand out with confidence and be able to communicate clearly what it is that God has given you to say, but to do it with honesty and honoring of the system that you're in.

William Vanderbloemen:
That's great. That's great. And if your theology is such that you really just don't believe women should be in leadership or pastors, and there's a spectrum, right? I don't want anyone here to feel offended. One of our values at Vanderbloemen is broadband love. And the way I tell our team this is, "At the end of the day, when I have to have my sit down with Jesus, I would rather get in trouble for serving too many kinds of churches than too few." So, we serve churches that have all kinds of different perspectives on this.

William Vanderbloemen:
I jokingly tell my friends who are in complementarian settings, "It's hilarious that y'all think that women don't run your church, because they do. It's just whether it's in title or not." So, tell us, if you're a female trying to find that voice, like you've come into your first leadership position, what are some of the most common mistakes you've seen people make as they try and step into a new leadership role?

Kadi Cole:
Well, I think one of the things, you brought up the issue of theology. I think it's actually a really important one in this topic, because we do have different theologies. I am not a theologian, so I don't try to take on the theological debate at all. I am a leadership person. I think the biggest issue that we have to figure out is, how do we make sure our cultures are living up and matching our theology? And in most of the research that we've done, we found that we are bad at empowering women across the board. So, from very conservative, all the way to very progressive, we're not great at really raising women into leadership in all of those spheres.

Kadi Cole:
And so, what we're trying to do is really highlight those issues and open doors for women. And then to your question, as women step in, some of the most common things are that, first of all, if we don't have a clear understanding of our theology, women can spend a lot of time and energy questioning themselves, wondering if they should be doing this, especially if maybe they're one of the first women to step into a higher level leadership, maybe they're the director of a ministry department or they're working at the executive level.

Kadi Cole:
There can be a lot of resistance in the culture. Again, even if your theology, which I'm assuming it is, good with that, if you're hiring a woman to lead at that level. A lot of times there are people in your congregation or even on your staff teams, even some of your pastors who maybe have a different point of view about that, or who have not seen a woman lead in those areas. And so, there can be resistance or there can be question marks. And for women stepping into that, if that theology isn't really clear and there isn't a big roadway open for her, it's easy to spend a lot of times wondering if, "Have I said too much, have I not said enough? Am I not representing women correctly?" We take a lot of pressure and put that on ourselves. So, that's one of the first things we talk about.

Kadi Cole:
Another is that a lot of times women have had very different leadership development journeys than the guys have had. Men in churches, most men who go into leadership in church have been in church for a long time and they've had a lot of pastors see potential in them, identify giftedness, particularly leadership gifts or teaching gifts in them, give them opportunities. Most women have not had that. Most women have had maybe success in the marketplace, maybe they've read some books, maybe when they were younger, they got opportunities. But once they crossed into adulthood, it was no longer welcome for them to lead in these larger areas.

Kadi Cole:
So, sometimes women get promoted because they do have ability, but they're just under practiced or they haven't had as many repetitions as the guys have had. So, they're getting these big opportunities, but they carry with them younger levels of fear or younger levels of insecurity that we can also work through. It just takes time, you have to identify it. But for many women, it's easy to misinterpret that insecurity as, "I shouldn't be doing this." Or, "I'm not gifted at it." Instead of recognizing it for what it is, which is, "I just haven't had as many opportunities as my peers have had."

William Vanderbloemen:
That's great. So, one thing that came to mind as I was preparing for our talk, I'm a little strange, which now we got new subscribers, because he's finally telling the truth. No, I'm strange for a lot of reasons, but one reason is, golly, we have the best clients, we have the best churches and schools and nonprofits we work with. A lot of them are run by very strong women and robust, like no decaf, this is full on espresso. Right? I get energized by that.

William Vanderbloemen:
And Eric says, "Well, do you really like working with strong women?" I'm like, "Have you met my wife? I prefer a good strong personality, but it seems that I might be in the minority. And it's almost like a puzzle for guys to figure out, like they don't really know what to do when they run into a strong female leader. Have you got any pointers for guys out there that are like, "I don't even know what to do when I run into a strong woman in leadership."? Keep them from paying the stupid tax, what are some common mistakes you've seen?

Kadi Cole:
Well, I'll do my best to represent this. You might have more tips than I do on that specifically. But I think one of the things that can easily happen when, especially if we've grown up or for a long time have been around environments and cultures where there was a lot of gender stereotyping. And we tend to think of men as leaders and women as supporters or helpers. And although there are many men who are leaders and many women who do have giftedness around support, we also find that there are men who don't have leadership gifts and really shouldn't be leading. And there are women who do and they really should be leading.

Kadi Cole:
And so, when we come across women who have leadership gifts, if we're not used to seeing it, particularly in church environments, maybe you had school teachers or a principal in your life growing up, or a college professor, and that seemed okay for a female to have a leadership role in those environments. But when we see them in the church, it really is outside the normal of what we think. And for many women, we spend a lot of time, often in church, doing what we call camouflaging, which is where we let go of those stronger gifts, those louder gifts, those bigger pieces of our personality, camouflage them, and talk a little bit more about the kids and a little bit more about the coupons I'm clipping, and a little bit more about the things that are acceptable in those more gender, female stereotypes.

Kadi Cole:
And so, when a woman takes that camouflage off and we actually get to see her lead in her full capacity, it can be a little surprising to the people, not just to the men, by the way, but also to other or women. In fact, most of the resistance we see in churches who are trying to help female leaders lead at higher levels, is from women. We're not used to it, particularly older women or women who have felt like they've missed out on opportunities in their years. Oh, you need a time out on that one?

William Vanderbloemen:
Time out. Time out. I want to park here and I want to learn, because I don't know what I'm doing.

Kadi Cole:
Okay.

William Vanderbloemen:
I was pastoring a church and we were evangelical, biblically driven. We were of the egalitarian persuasion. Right? And so, one of my associate pastors was teaching a Sunday school class about the role of women in leadership and that our position is this and such, and there's smart people who disagree with us, but that's ... And he had a group of women come to him after the class to complain. And he was like, "William, they wanted me to tell the class that's not biblical, and what do I do with that?" And I didn't have any answers, Kadi. All right, this is how dumb I am. All right? So, I said, "John, you tell them to sit down and shut up."

Kadi Cole:
Yeah. I would maybe have a different suggestion.

William Vanderbloemen:
Well, I mean, if that's what they believe, if they think they ought to be submissive, then just tell them to submit and be quiet, and teaching the thing. How do you deal with that, when you get the female pushback for empowering other women on your team?

Kadi Cole:
Well, I think the first thing is to really understand what it's like to grow up with a giftedness that isn't affirmed by your church. It is a very difficult way to grow up spiritually. It's a difficult way to find your place in the kingdom. The sense of calling is elusive, and for many, many women, especially women who are older than us and women who have lived or grown up in areas of the country where that's not just something taught in their church, but it's a part of their culture, part of their family of origin, those are really challenging pieces.

Kadi Cole:
And I think the thing that most men don't understand is that, and again, I want to be respectful of all theologies, but for many women, when what is spoken over us more than anything is to be more quiet than assertive, to keep your opinions to yourself, even in areas where, in even conservative churches, women would be welcome to have an opinion. Most women interpret that as, "I don't get to have an opinion." Or, "I shouldn't lead anywhere." And in those environments particularly, we tend to be really loud on the places women are not welcome and very quiet on the places women are welcome to lead.

Kadi Cole:
So, many women grow up interpreting that, no one probably says it, but many women interpret that meaning, "I should not lead at all. I shouldn't have an opinion anywhere. I need to keep everything to myself." And so, when you see a young woman who's 25 or 30 or 40, get up and take charge of something or get to be on the staff full-time and do things that these women know they could have done, if they did do it, because leaders have a hard time keeping strong gifts to themselves. They probably did it through other people. They were served on the committee, but weren't in charge. Maybe they're married to someone who has a leadership role and they had a big influence that way.

Kadi Cole:
When you start to see that actually women are welcome to use that, it is conflicting, because this isn't just a theological issue about women in leadership. This is a theology about who I am, how God sees me, and that my gifts that I actually thought were sin and character issues, that I've been fighting my whole life, are actually to be celebrated and unleashed for the kingdom. That is a big pill to swallow. It takes a lot of time and unraveling. There's a lot of hurt that comes with that. There's a lot of disappointment in the leaders that I had growing up, that gave me messages, either intended or unintended, but messages I took to heart.

Kadi Cole:
And so, it takes a while to lead that change. And so, this is where I really try to walk alongside pastors and leadership teams and say, "This is not a debate that needs to be hostile. This is about giving clarity to theology and helping people see the biblical backing." And I know everyone can do that, because this is a biblical and theological debate. You can make a biblical case for both egalitarian and complementarian, and what I try to champion, which is all the pieces in between. It's not just a binary choice, there's actually a spectrum.

Kadi Cole:
And for those of you who are ... If this conversation is piquing your interest, I do have a theological cheat sheet that really helps people identify, "Where is my theology on that? How does that play out in church, at home, at work? What does my church believe versus what do I believe? And where do I go, what do I do with that now?" So, I really recommend that resource. It just gives you language to begin to have conversations about this and figure out where you're at, where your church is at, what that means for you.

Kadi Cole:
And so just, I encourage men, especially those who are gung ho on this, they either have a wife who has great leadership that they see now, they have daughters who have come in age and their daughter's like, "Hey dad, you've taught me to be a leader, what am I supposed to do now, go to someone else's church?" We have a lot of people who are re-looking at the application of their theology and some are even shifting in their theological view. And so, as you do that, like any change management, you just want to not announce it one Sunday and expect everyone to jump up and cheer for you. You want to really go slow, work with your leaders, work with your elders, define your theology, have a biblical rationale for why you're making a change or why you're bringing clarity. And then slowly roll it out with your leaders and give people time to process. I know they will follow your lead if you lead the change well.

William Vanderbloemen:
Well, and I would bet you would agree with this, but I can't urge listeners strongly enough, that if you haven't had women in leadership, follow all those steps. By the way, the resource that Kadi mentions we use in training our staff, super, super, duper good cheat sheet for just understanding the whole spectrum of where the church is. If you're like, "I can't believe there are churches that don't ordain women." Well, you know what? About 80% of Christendom does not ordain women. So, hello, it's worth knowing the spectrum.

William Vanderbloemen:
But as you get into your position paper and where you are, preparing for that first hire or that first appointment, man, you just do not want to set that person up for failure. So, it's like train, train, train, tell your staff the why behind the what, hire and appoint very slowly. Maybe even get some help with that, which is what we do. But just, the last thing you want with that first female to step into a role, whether it's ordained or non-ordained, is for them to be set up for a failure. And then, you've got to go undo a hire, which is even more painful.

Kadi Cole:
And I would say, there's a lot to leading culture and shifting culture. And so, even as you're talking through these things, using women for projects, hiring people in for short-term things. Like, if your goal is to shift women, I see a lot of teams put a female on their executive team, but you're exactly right, William, you have to prime the culture and then you have to make sure you give that female leader the support she needs.

Kadi Cole:
So, most guys don't realize that when you walk into your staff meeting, you have an entire room full of mentors and cheerleaders and friends and people you can vent to. When a female walks into a room and it's mostly men and maybe some female admin or support staff, she doesn't have that kind of coaching built in. She doesn't have mentors who can help her navigate those things. She doesn't have people who have gone ahead of her and are examples of what female leadership looks like in this kind of environment.

Kadi Cole:
And so, I really encourage leaders, and really this is for minorities of any kind in your environment, is to make sure you're budgeting for coaching and resources and supplemental pieces. Not because they need extra help, but they need the same support you're giving everyone with your staff, that you just don't have available for her yet.

William Vanderbloemen:
Yeah. I always say all the time, anytime we're asked to help an organization find a key staff member, it's like a, organ transplant and competency is not the ball game. The ball game in transplants is tissue match. And if you put a healthy kidney into a healthy body and if they don't match, ball game for everyone. So, as you're preparing for that first person of difference ... When we built our diversity practice, it was mainly to coach people up in like, get ready for that first hire. So, you make it a place where there can be success. And that might take longer than you think it's going to. Yeah. Well, Kadi, how would people find that resource that you mentioned? Where can we go? It's Kadi Cole, with a D.

Kadi Cole:
Yes.

William Vanderbloemen:
Kadicole.com, right?

Kadi Cole:
Yep. K-A-D-I-C-O-L-E.com. And there's a tab that says resources. So, I've got quite a few things on there, around this topic, things for guys trying to figure it out, things for teams trying to figure it out. If you're a female leader, we've got some resources for you also. And then of course, the book, Find Your Leadership Voice. And there's a small group video curriculum with that also, that is really helping a lot of women and teams find the way to work in the kingdom and lead together.

William Vanderbloemen:
That's great. Hey, we're going to resurrect an old practice we had on the podcast. We always ask people on the fly at the end of our time together, tell me a book that you've read recently, not Finding Your Leadership Voice, or the Bible. Those two you can't use. A book that's been on your nightstand and been good, doesn't matter genre. And then, maybe an app or a new piece of technology that you've gone, "Man, I am glad I latched onto that."

Kadi Cole:
Oh, great. Well, let's see. I am a huge, avid book reader, so I've always got about five or six books going on at the same time. So, the one I'm really enjoying now is actually a compilation of Martin Luther King Junior's sermons. And it's been really fascinating to read the pastoral side behind his leadership voice. So, I've really enjoyed that. That has stretched me in a lot of different ways.

Kadi Cole:
And as far as tech goes, let's see. I'm not sure if I've got a new app. I do spend a lot of time on Basecamp. I'm sure everyone's got a organizational system, but I think even moving all of those things, especially coming out of COVID, back to my phone and just operating a little bit more digitally free, has been really encouraging to me. So, I've enjoyed that.

William Vanderbloemen:
That's great. Well, Kadi, it's always a joy to have you join us and so good to see how God's using you, and watching your ministry grow. I would encourage everybody listening to go to kadicole.com and at least download that resource that we mentioned. In fact, we'll probably just put a link in the show notes directly to that. If you're not on the ... How do I get the show notes? Go to vandercast.com and give us your email address. We're not going to beat you up with 1,000 different emails on, if you order today, and the Ginsu knives and all that. No, none of that. Just the show notes and what's coming up next.

William Vanderbloemen:
We're thrilled you're here. If you've got suggestions going forward for our program, we'd love to hear them and love to know what you want to hear about. Thanks for joining us today. Kadi, appreciate you making the time. And thanks to all of you for tuning in. We look forward to talking to you again soon.

Christa Reinhardt:
Thanks for listening to the Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast. At Vanderbloemen and our sister company, Christian Teams, we help Christian organizations build their best teams through hiring, succession, compensation, and diversity consulting services. Visit our websites, vanderbloemen.com and christianteams.com, to learn more. And subscribe to our Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts, keep up with our newest episodes. Thanks for listening.