What makes a missionary team healthy—and what can leaders do when things go wrong?
In this episode, we sit down with Rick Hicks, an experienced missions leader with a passion for team health, to explore the essentials of building strong, unified missionary teams.
In This Episode, We Cover:
✅ Why team health matters so much in cross-cultural ministry
✅ The root causes of team dysfunction
✅ Practical strategies for promoting unity and trust
✅ How to navigate conflict resolution on the field
✅ Advice for team leaders guiding missionaries through challenges
✅ Helpful resources for teams and team leadership development
Whether you're a new missionary, a seasoned team leader, or a church supporting missions, this episode offers biblical insight and practical tools to help you build stronger teams for long-term ministry impact.
Join us for a conversation with Dr. Rick Hicks about how to build healthy missionary teams. Rick has worked with missionary teams for many years and is currently serving as the Special Assistant to the International Director of Operation Mobilization, as well as training Boards of OM Fields in effective board governance. Operation Mobilization is a non-denominational, international mission agency, working in over 130 countries around the world, and comprised of about 5200 missionaries from over 100 countries. Rick’s previous roles in OM include President of OM USA for 14 years and North America Area Leader for 6 years.
At the end of 2023, Rick retired from WCM Investment Management, after serving for ten years as their Chief Culture Officer. His role there involved helping the company focus on organizational health to identify and stay true to their culture, develop a leadership team, and help employees understand themselves, the culture, and how they fit into the organization.
In addition to his current responsibilities in OM, Rick speaks at conferences, churches, colleges, businesses, and a variety of other groups throughout the country and around the world to promote world missions. He also speaks on the topics of effective board governance, organizational health and culture, the understanding of temperaments, value development, and generational differences, thus promoting understanding within groups. His Ph.D., although in Education, actually focused more on Developmental and Organizational Psychology.
Show notes and links:
https://www.kylefarran.com/missionslife/10-building-healthy-missionary-teams-rick-hicks
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