What's Coming for the Church: Trends, Readiness, and the Leadership Shifts Nobody Is Talking About

In this episode, Alan Briggs sits down with Holly Tate, founder of The Ready Network and a consultant who has spent 15 years serving churches, ministries, and organizations at the intersection of leadership development and strategic clarity. Holly brings a rare vantage point: nearly a decade at Vanderbloemen doing executive search for churches, four years as Chief Marketing and Services Officer at a leadership software company serving over 600 ministries, and now running her own coaching and consulting practice helping leaders and teams scale. The conversation covers a lot of ground and moves fast. From the moment organizations outgrow their basketball team culture and have to become a football team, to the trends Holly is watching unfold in real time around shared leadership models, AI adoption, spiritual formation, and what it means to actually be ready for what's coming next. If you lead a church, serve on an elder board, work as an executive pastor, or simply want to understand the challenges facing ministry leaders right now, this one is for you. And if you lead a business or nonprofit, Holly estimates about 70% of this conversation will translate directly. What You'll Learn in This Episode: Holly's 15-year leadership pathway — from cold calling at a radio company to executive search at Vanderbloemen to chief marketing officer at a leadership software company — and what all of it taught her about organizational health The doer to developer jump — why top performers get promoted into management roles they were never equipped for, and the tension that creates between executives and managers The basketball team to football team analogy from Larry Osborne's Sticky Teams — what breaks down when organizations cross that threshold and what leaders have to change about themselves to navigate it The READY framework — Reality check, Evaluation, Action plan, Delegation, Yes barometer — and how Holly uses it as a 90-day strategic planning process for churches and organizations Why the Yes barometer is the hardest part of the framework to implement — and why psychological safety determines whether it works The emerging trend of shared and co-leadership models in churches — Holly's two hypotheses for why it's happening and what's making it work What's really driving fear around AI in church culture — and why Holly believes leaders should be the first to explore it, not the last The discipleship disruption — why churches are rethinking spiritual formation from the ground up and what that means for buildings, campuses, and Sunday morning models What men on leadership teams are accidentally doing that excludes female colleagues — and the simple habit shift that changes it What Holly is obsessed with right now: the concept of readiness and what it means to be a truly ready leader in a world changing faster than ever Reflection Questions: Is your organization still running basketball team systems inside a football team reality — and what would it cost you to acknowledge that honestly? Where does your team need a Yes barometer — a shared language for what you're saying no to when you say yes to something new? As a leader, are you approaching AI and rapid change with anticipation or dread — and what would it look like to move toward curiosity instead? Resources Mentioned: Sticky Teams — Larry Osborne The Ready Network — thereadynetwork.com Leading Smart Podcast — Tim Stevens and Holly Tate (find it wherever you listen to podcasts) McCrindle Research — multigenerational leadership data H2 Leadership Coaching — h2leadership.com Connect with Holly: Website: thereadynetwork.com Want more? Visit h2leadership.com for coaching, resources, and tools to help you lead well.