Buidling Working Relationships

Being a Christian:

“How Does It Help or Hurt Managers in Building the Best Working Relationship with Staff?”

Adrienne N. Manning

Belhaven University

October 30 2014

A Christian is a person who believes in Jesus Christ, accepts Him as Lord and Savior, and lives by His teachings and instructions (Webster, 2003). So, what is a Christian manager? A Christian manager is a shepherd and servant to the flock, shows humility, is a good steward of their resources, and believes in building good relationships with those being managed. There are, however, Christians that are managers, but, do not manage according to Christian discipleship. They are as cynical as the unsaved men and women of the world. Therefore, being a Christian can help as well as hurt the ability of a manager to build the best working relationship possible with his/her staff.

Employee engagement is a good example of how being a Christian can help or hurt the ability of a manager to build the best work relationship with staff. A Christian manager knows the rules of engagement. They consider the questions: 1) How do we engage each other/our employee; 2) how do we have those difficult conversations with each other/employees; 3) are we comfortable with conflict? Are our employees comfortable with conflict; and what’s behind our tendency to take things personally (DevelopMe, 2014)? Good Christian managers know the effects of accepting confrontation and exemplify good rules of engagement. They understand that a conflict is not good and "listen carefully to people and show them they've heard them by responding verbally or taking action" (Woolfe, 2002).

Managers that are Christians, on the other hand, tend to not have many disagreements on their teams because, team members are afraid to speak up because they fear management or being fired. Managers that lead in this manner have decreased employee engagement. Managers acting in this manner are outside of Christian leadership. According...