John Stanko

"So the Lord said to Moses, 'Take Joshua son of Nun,
a man in whom is the spirit of leadership, and lay
your hand on him. Have him stand before Eleazar
the priest and the entire assembly and commission
him in their presence. Give him some of your authority
so the whole Israelite community will obey him. He is to
stand before Eleazar the priest, who will obtain decisions
for him by inquiring of the Urim before the Lord. At his
command he and the entire community of the Israelites
will go out, and at his command they will come in'" Numbers 27:18-21.

Joshua had served Moses and been close to him as Moses led Israel out of Egypt and through the Wildnerness. Now it was time for Moses to help Israel make the transition to Joshua's leadership after Moses had ruled for 40 years. First, notice that Joshua had the spirit of leadership on him, so he was obviously God's choice to lead. Then Moses was to establish Joshua in front of the people so people could mentally and emotionally make the transition to a new leader. Finally, Joshua was to have access to the priest so he could make decisions with God's guidance and assistance. Leaders must pay attention to the issue of succession, making sure that their successor has everything he or she needs to do the job effectively and is known and accepted by the people.

LEADERSHIP STEP: No matter what position you have in your organization., you must realize that you will not have it forever and will have to turn it over to someone else someday - and you are not always aware of what day that will be! Your Step today is to make a decision to begin training one person (or a team of people) in what you do, or at least preparing a document outlining your job duties so that someone (or a team) can replace you when the time is right to do so.