Center for Women’s Ministries, Inc. ®

Center Director Manual

Center Directors Mentoring and Accountability Partners

A Program to Support and Strengthen Center Directors and Assistant Center Directors

Explanation:

All of us feel overwhelmed at times with the emotional, spiritual, and physical responsibilities that go along with accepting the responsibility of being a CD. If each CD will heed the recommendations presented in this program, God will cause her to flourish and the ministry will expand because she has taken the time to go deeper with another and with the Lord. This study phrase pretty well sums it up: “…that we might be presented whole and complete, a Bride without spot or wrinkle, to the One who has set us free for the glory of His name and the furthering of His kingdom.”

In the Message - 2 Tim. 2: 20-21: In a well-furnished kitchen there are not only crystal goblets and silver platters, but waste cans and compost buckets—some containers used to serve fine meals, others to take out the garbage. Become the kind of container God can use to present any and every kind of gift to His guests for their blessing.

That's what this is all about: becoming a better vessel by which He pours in to us and we have more to pour out on those who are in need of Him.

The purpose of these suggestions is to foster the atmosphere of being the body of Christ, one part supporting another so that we can grow up to the fullness of Him. We want every CD to know that she is not alone, but that she is part of a sisterhood committed to helping and supporting one another in the Lord.

This program has two parts. A center director/assistant CD may participate in either the Mentoring portion or the Accountability Partners portion or both, if desired. New center directors (CD) will be assigned a mentor for a minimum of 12 months. This assigned mentor is usuallythe regional director (RD), but it could also be another CD in that region or from another region. The length may be extended at the discretion of the executive director or assistant to center development in the US.After the 12-month period, participation is optional. However, the board of directors and headquarters encourage CDs to continue meeting with a mentor/accountability partner for continuing support and strengthening leadership skills. See pages 3-6 for more explanation and rationale.

Center Director Mentoring Program

Definition of a mentor: A friend and advisor, a teacher or coach

Biblical Examples of mentors: Paul to the many churches of the New Testament

Moses to Joshua

Elijah to Elisha

Jesus to the 12 Disciples

Deborah to Barak

Qualifications of a mentor:

  1. Be continually striving to live a life of integrity in all facets of life: Spiritually,Relationally, Financially and Emotionally
  2. Be always growing in your walk with the Lord. Mentors, much like counselors, are just a

little further down the road than the mentored. None of us arrives this side of Heaven.

  1. Be a person of prayer. Seek the Lord for wisdom on how to mentor your particular CD.
  2. Be a person of encouragement as well as boundaries.
  3. Be humble. Recall how far God has brought you and be thankful. If it were not for the grace

of God, where would any of us be?

  1. Be willing to be transparent: Share your struggles and God’s provision fromexperience.
  2. Be willing to invest in the life of another with your time, talents, and experience.

Responsibilities:

  1. Develop a strong Center Director who can mentor others.
  2. Pray for the Center Director regularly.
  3. Utilize God’s Word in mentoring and hold her accountable for follow-through.
  4. Contact regularly by phone, e-mail, or in person at least once a month.
  5. Be willing to be “on call” as needed. Be willing to be a sounding board.
  6. Offer advice sparingly; give encouragement, offer experience and resources for difficult situations she may be facing.
  7. Genuinely care for her. Remember what it was like when you began as a CD.
  8. As a mentor, you will need a prayer partner with whom you can share confidentially and pray for strength and wisdom.
  9. Maintain confidentiality.

Suggestions for Monthly Meetings:

  1. Journal meetings. Include needs, concerns, prayer requests, and any assignments.
  2. Follow through with what you say you will do in a timely fashion.
  3. Utilize e-mail, phone calls and notes of encouragement to foster strong rapport.

Be the mentor you always wanted and remember the example of others to you.

  1. Set a time that is convenient for both of you to meet by phone or in person.

Ask for one or two areas she would like to address before you meet, to give you time to

be prepared.

  1. Each session should:
  2. Open with prayer, asking God to lead you both
  3. Share concerns – one or two issues to address at the meeting
  4. Offer encouragement – share scripture, personal experience, resources you havefound helpful
  5. Reinforce the need for balance between home, center, work, church
  6. Set a time for the next meeting and give an assignment or follow-up to be completed
  7. Close in prayer
  8. Remember, mentoring is a support role, not one of employer and employee.

Genuinely love and pray for the CD. Be concerned for her personal well-being aswell as the work of the ministry.

Commitment:

  1. Be willing to commit to the role of mentor for at least one year, with annual evaluation as to whether the CD needs continuing mentoring.
  2. Be accountable to the ICWM with quarterly updates

Center Directors Accountability Partners Program

Definition: Accountable, responsible, liable

Biblical Examples: Paul and Barnabas

Esther and Mordecai

David and Jonathan

Qualifications:

Much like that of the mentor, both CDs share, encouragingand supporting oneanother.

  1. Be continually striving to live a life of integrity in all facets of life: Spiritually, Relationally,

Financially and Emotionally

  1. Be always growing in your walk with the Lord. None of us arrive this side of heaven.
  2. Be a person of prayer.
  3. Be a person of encouragement as well as boundaries.
  4. Be humble. Recall how far God has brought you and be thankful. If it were not

for the grace of God, where would any of us be?

  1. Be willing to be transparent: Share your struggles and God’s provision fromexperience.
  2. Be willing to invest in the life of another with your time, talents, and experience.
  3. Be accountable to the regional directorfor quarterly updates

Responsibilities:

Much like that of the mentor, both CDs share, encouraging and supporting one another.

  1. Agree to meet on a regular basis by phone, e-mail or in person.
  2. Share experiences for mutual edification.
  3. Pray for each other regularly.
  4. Challenge each other in the Lord and hold each other accountable. (A series of possible questions is provided on a separate page.)
  5. Encourage each other in the Word, to live lives of integrity inside and outside CWM.
  6. Genuinely care for one another.
  7. Meetings are to be a time of mutual edification, sharing experiences, prayer, and challenging each other to mature in her personal walk with the Lord.
  8. The purpose is to build each other up and strengthen the workof the local CWM.
  9. The meetings are not intended to be gripe sessions.
  10. Maintain confidentiality.

Commitment:

  1. Be willing to commit to the role of Accountability Partner for one year
  2. Be accountable to the regional director (RD) with quarterly updates

Potential Problem:

Encountering issues where neither the mentor or accountability partner has experience

refer to the RD orheadquarters for advice and prayer.

Organizing Accountability Partners:

  1. Mentors can also have accountability partners and vice versa.
  2. Two, three, or four can form an accountability group. (There should be no more than four for sharing purposes.)
  3. Two or three CDs of adjoining counties could form a team.
  4. Out-of-state CDs could join with the CD closest to them and share by phone,e-mail, and personal notes.

Suggestions for Successful Accountability Partner Relationships:

  1. No one is forced to participate, but hopefully will see this as an opportunity to grow.
  2. Be willing to be honest;share what is going well, ask for help and discuss the areas with which you struggle. Be specific: personal growth, leadership skills,management, volunteers.
  3. Encourage each other to balance work at the center, home and church. Set effective boundaries.
  4. Share how you can pray for one another. Pray not only during meetings but foreach other between meetings.
  5. At meetings focus on only one or two items. Building relationships and makinglasting changes take time. Don’t try to conquer too many mountains at once.
  6. Send e-mails and notes of encouragement periodically.
  7. Challenge each other with assignments and hold each other accountable to any assignments you agree upon.

Guidelines for the Mentor/Mentoree Relationship

  1. Be sure your motive for mentoring is growing and leading your mentoree, not controlling them. Some mentors like to control others because they themselves are insecure. Some mentorees accept a mentoring relationship not from a quest for maturity but an emotional need for surrogate father or mother. They seek to fill the voids where there was no authority, affirmation, or rebuke. These people need counseling, not mentoring.
  1. Encourage your mentoree to develop her own gifts, temperament, and personality style. She need not be a copy of the mentor. When these things are forcefully modified, they do not disappear; they are simply suppressed and usually await another time to spring out. When they do, they emerge in their original immaturity. The development process has been defeated. Mentors are not out to change people, they are out to grow them.
  1. The mentor must guard against attempting to assert domination over personal decision making. The following things should be avoided:
  1. The mentoree may not be permitted to engage in interpersonal relationships without the mentor’s approval.
  2. She is not to discern the will or purposes of God without consultation.
  3. There is no freedom to make decisions without fear of being berated or rebuked.
  4. The use of one’s time is carefully controlled and critiqued.

The mentoree should never be ridiculed or threatened with relational isolation. She should never be told she is departing from the will of God, or accused of diminishing spiritually. The relationship should be one of encouragement, not one of authority.

  1. The mentoring relationship, unlike friendship, needs a termination point. Healthy

mentoring is preparation for someone for a function or a level of character quality

and must always have an end. Mentors, as a rule, have a difficult time letting go of their protégés, just as do parents of emerging adults. Refusal to terminate results in stunted growth often ending in frustration, anger, and rebellion.

  1. After the termination it is important that there is a continual flow of affirmation and appreciation between the mentor and the mentoree. When the mentoree lives a confident, fruitful life without constant oversight, the mentor is tempted to feel unneeded and unwanted. She needs to realize that is exactly the “not needed” role for which she has been preparing the mentoree. Jesus trained His disciples to go far beyond the quantitative limits of His own ministry.

Adapted from “Disciple Abuse”by Gordon MacDonald

Discipleship Journal, No. 30 f1f1

Mistakes to Avoid in Mentoring

By Paul D. Stanley and Robert J. Clinton

  1. Don’t be too dominant in establishing the purpose of the mentoring relationship. Draw the mentoree into it for his or her motivation, ownership, and appropriate focus.
  1. Do not give out too many tasks too early. Let the mentoree set the pace.
  1. Watch out for midway relational ‘sag’. The mentoring relationship tends to lose its

original zest at about the midpoint. Ensure that the mentoree makes bite-size progress, and keep frequent contact.

  1. Assess and select mentorees carefully. Check motivation, responsiveness, and right timing.
  1. Be careful of “weak closure” and sloppy accountability. Be faithful to the mentoree during the mentoring experience and end well.

From: Connection:The Mentoring Relationships You Need to Succeed in Life

Accountability Questions

  1. What has happened this week where you believe God has been pleased with you?
  1. What has happened that you feel God is asking you to change?
  1. What is your plan for obedience for which I (we) can hold you accountable?

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