‘Go Slow to Go Fast’ Could Transform Your Leadership Pipeline

What if the way we build leaders in the Kingdom is fundamentally flawed? Many movements push for rapid multiplication, but without a strong leadership pipeline, they often collapse under their own speed. The missing ingredient? A model of leadership development that mirrors the way fathers raise children.

Jesus didn’t build an organization—He built a family.

He took twelve men, invested deeply in their lives, and equipped them to lead others. This approach wasn’t about efficiency but effectiveness. Too often, modern leadership strategies prioritize quick results over deep formation, recruiting leaders instead of raising them.

So how do we build a leadership pipeline that doesn’t crumble?

The answer lies in community, discipleship, and spiritual fatherhood.

In this article, we’ll explore how leadership development must be embedded in relationships, why fatherhood is the biblical model for multiplication, and how we can balance speed with depth to create lasting impact.

Leadership Pipelines and the Need for Community

Movements rise and fall based on the strength of their leadership pipelines. When leaders are developed in isolation, the movement may see short-term success but will ultimately lack sustainability.

The key to long-term impact isn’t just making disciples—it’s embedding leadership development within a thriving community.

The Problem with Isolated Leadership Development

Many church planting movements and disciple-making strategies focus on rapid multiplication, but without a structured leadership pipeline, they end up building a house of cards. Here’s why isolated leadership development fails:

• Lack of Accountability: Leaders who are trained in isolation don’t have a support system for growth, correction, or encouragement.
• Skill Without Character: Recruiting leaders without embedding them in a discipling community often results in gifted individuals who lack the character to sustain their leadership.
• Short-Term Gains, Long-Term Losses: Fast growth can be exciting, but if leaders aren’t deeply rooted in community, movements stagnate or collapse.

A movement cannot survive on leadership recruitment alone—it must embrace leadership formation through deep relationships.

Why Leadership Must Be Developed in Community

Jesus modeled leadership development in a community setting. He didn’t handpick individuals, give them a job title, and send them out. Instead, He walked with them, shared meals with them, and demonstrated what Kingdom leadership looked like.

Community-based leadership development provides:

• A Refining Process: In a community, leaders are tested, encouraged, and shaped by real-life experiences.
• Shared Wisdom: Leaders don’t develop in a vacuum; they need others to challenge, inspire, and guide them.
• Sustainability: When leaders are embedded in a community, they have a relational network that supports them through challenges.

Multiplication happens not when leaders are merely appointed but when they are raised within a disciple-making community. If we want to see movements last, we must rethink how leadership is formed—through relationships, apprenticeship, and the slow but steady work of community-based disciple-making.

The Role of Fatherhood in Leadership Development

Leadership in the Kingdom is not about filling positions—it’s about raising sons and daughters who will one day become spiritual fathers and mothers.

Too often, leadership development is approached like a business strategy rather than a relational, fathering process. If we want to build lasting leadership pipelines, we must recover the biblical model of fatherhood.

Spiritual Fatherhood vs. Business Leadership Models

The business world often views leadership development as an investment model: put in resources, get out results. In this model, people are seen as assets to manage, not sons and daughters to raise. While efficiency is important, Kingdom leadership requires something deeper—relationships that shape both character and skill.

Here’s how spiritual fatherhood differs from corporate leadership:

• Identity Over Productivity: Fathers focus on who their children are becoming, not just what they can accomplish. True leadership development is about shaping a person’s heart, not just their output.
• Long-Term Commitment: Business models often move people up the ladder based on performance. Fatherhood is about long-term investment, even when progress is slow.
• Love and Correction: A boss fires an employee when they fail. A father disciplines, restores, and continues investing in his child’s growth.

Spiritual leadership isn’t about managing people—it’s about raising them up. Leaders who are fathered well become fathers themselves, continuing the cycle of healthy multiplication.

How Fatherhood Shapes Future Leaders

The Bible repeatedly uses family imagery to describe leadership in the church. Paul refers to Timothy as his son in the faith (1 Cor. 4:17). Jesus calls His disciples not just servants, but friends and brothers (John 15:15). This isn’t just poetic language—it’s a leadership strategy.

Fatherhood shapes leaders in three key ways:

• Discipline and Growth: Fathers teach through correction, helping their children learn from mistakes. In leadership, this means walking alongside emerging leaders and allowing them to fail forward.
• Modeling Over Lecturing: Children learn by watching, not just listening. The best leaders are formed by seeing spiritual fathers and mothers live out what they teach.
• Ownership and Release: A father’s goal is to raise a child into maturity so they can stand on their own. Leadership development should follow the same principle—leaders must be given responsibility and released into their calling.

If we treat leadership development like a corporate strategy, we may create efficient teams, but we won’t create multiplying movements. Leaders are not built in classrooms or training programs alone—they are formed in the context of deep, discipling relationships.

The question is: Are we building leaders, or are we raising spiritual sons and daughters?

The Tension Between Rapid Multiplication and Deep Development

In the world of disciple-making movements, the word rapid often takes center stage. The goal is to see the gospel spread quickly, disciples multiply, and churches planted at an exponential rate.

But is speed always a good thing? Many movements fall into the trap of pursuing growth at the expense of depth.

True multiplication isn’t just about spreading fast—it’s about sustaining that growth for generations.

The Dangers of Prioritizing Speed Over Depth

When leaders focus solely on rapid expansion, they often cut corners on the very processes that create healthy movements. Here’s what happens when speed is prioritized over depth:

• Shallow Roots, Weak Leaders: If leaders aren’t given time to develop deep biblical convictions and character, they won’t last when trials come.
• Burnout and Collapse: Movements that push too hard for rapid multiplication often burn out their leaders, leaving them exhausted and disillusioned.
• Reproducing Unhealthy DNA: If leaders are not properly discipled before they start discipling others, they pass on shallow, ineffective methods that weaken the movement over time.

As Don Dent points out, rapid obedience is more important than rapid multiplication. The focus should not be on numbers alone, but on developing disciples who walk in obedience to Jesus and reproduce faithfully.

The Balance: Go Slow to Go Fast

One of the most important disciple-making principles is: Go slow to go fast. At first glance, this might seem contradictory.

Why slow down when the goal is to multiply?

But in reality, the fastest way to see sustained growth is to start small and build a strong foundation.

Here’s why this principle matters:

• Jesus Modeled It: Jesus didn’t rush to reach the masses. Instead, He spent three years deeply investing in a small group of disciples. That small beginning led to a global movement.
• Multiplication Happens Through Maturity: A few well-trained leaders can reproduce far more effectively than a large number of poorly trained ones.
• Sustainable Movements Last Longer: When depth is prioritized, movements don’t just multiply rapidly—they endure for generations.

The key is to resist the pressure to scale too quickly without the right foundations in place. A strong leadership pipeline ensures that multiplication doesn’t just happen—it thrives for the long haul.

Practical Steps to Build Strong Leadership Pipelines

Understanding the need for leadership pipelines is one thing—building them is another. The key to sustained multiplication isn’t just raising more leaders but embedding leadership development into the DNA of a movement.

This requires intentional community, structured apprenticeship, and a long-term vision for leadership reproduction.

Creating an Intentional Community for Leadership Growth

Leaders are not made in isolation—they are formed in the crucible of relationships. A strong leadership pipeline requires an intentional community that fosters growth, accountability, and multiplication.

Here are three key ways to cultivate this kind of environment:

Establish Core Values and Non-Negotiables: Every leadership pipeline must be rooted in Kingdom values. Whether it’s obedience-based discipleship, servant leadership, or biblical character formation, these core principles must be embedded into the process.

Develop an Apprenticeship Model: Jesus trained His disciples through a “model, assist, watch, launch” model. Leaders must not only learn from experienced mentors but also practice leadership in real-life situations.

Encourage Accountability Through Small Groups or Teams: No leader should develop alone. Structured accountability—whether through coaching, mentoring, or peer groups—ensures that leaders grow in both character and skill.

The goal isn’t just to create more leaders—it’s to embed a culture where leadership development is a natural and expected part of disciple-making.

Raising Local Leaders Who Own the Mission

One of the biggest mistakes in leadership development is relying too heavily on outside leaders rather than raising up local ownership.

A movement’s sustainability depends on its ability to produce indigenous leaders who take full responsibility for the mission.

Here’s how to ensure local leaders are empowered:

• Give Ownership Early: Many potential leaders hesitate to step up because they don’t feel “ready.” The best way to train leaders is to give them responsibility early and walk alongside them as they grow.
• Release Leaders, Don’t Just Train Them: Leadership development doesn’t end with knowledge—it culminates in action. Instead of endlessly training leaders, movements must release them into real leadership roles and trust them to multiply.
• Provide Ongoing Support and Recalibration: Even after leaders are sent out, they still need a relational network for encouragement, coaching, and correction. Sustainable leadership pipelines ensure ongoing connection, not just initial training.

A strong leadership pipeline is one that is deeply embedded in the life of the movement, where raising and sending leaders becomes second nature. When disciples are trained within intentional community and released to take ownership, multiplication happens naturally and sustainably.

Conclusion

If we want to see multiplication that lasts, we must move beyond recruiting leaders and start raising them. Leadership pipelines aren’t built through quick strategies or training programs alone—they are forged in the context of deep relationships, intentional community, and spiritual fatherhood.

Jesus modeled this by investing deeply in a few, embedding them in a strong community, and releasing them to lead.

The movements that last are the ones that embrace this process: going slow to go fast, prioritizing depth over speed, and ensuring that leadership development is rooted in real-life discipleship.

The question is, are we building a house of cards or a Kingdom that endures? If we take the time to raise leaders as spiritual sons and daughters, rather than merely appointing them, we won’t just see rapid multiplication—we’ll see a movement that thrives for generations.

It’s time to evaluate our leadership pipelines.

Are we fostering a culture where disciples become disciple-makers, leaders become fathers, and communities take ownership of the mission? The future of multiplication depends on it.