Elaine Vitikainen – Healthy Leaders

Welcome to the Healthy Leaders Archive, a collection of quality writing on healthy Christian leadership. New articles are now published at www.healthyleaders.com.

Author

Elaine Vitikainen

About the Author

Elaine Vitikainen is a visual facilitator living in Helsinki. She manages EV Visuals, a company that supports communication processes through visual creation and facilitates conversation through the use of visuals. Originally from the Philippines, Elaine has always been inspired to serve others. She started as a dentist volunteering among the mountain tribes before specialising in multilingual education and in leadership position in Cambodia. She moved to Laos and worked across Asia in facilitating change with local organisations. After15 years in Asia, Elaine moved back to Finland in 2015 with her husband and two sons. Elaine believes passionately in the importance of integrating faith in professional life. You can find her at ev-visuals.com and spaceforgrace.network.

The Culture of Mistrust

Trust is such a fragile commodity. It can easily be broken even before it is built. Yet we know trust is the foundation for healthy organizational behavior.

Elaine Vitikainen

God, the Giver of Strength

God-given strength is not solely for the purpose of fulfilling a task or even just to help us to be kind to one another.

Elaine Vitikainen

A Language of Hope

Our language plays a crucial role which way people turn. Leaders in times of crisis need to choose words carefully. People need to be encouraged in a crisis.

Elaine Vitikainen

Valuing Others

Simply by valuing others, we can open up lines of communication that we thought were closed.

Elaine Vitikainen

Finding a Critical Friend

Leaders need people they can trust to give them honest feedback, however uncomfortable. Without such people, leaders will not see their blind spots. They will lose their humility. Their growth will be stunted.

Elaine Vitikainen

Equipped for Others

“Will you equip yourself for yourself or for others?” This question challenged Rita so much that she took two years off work, went abroad, studied hard and returned to her hometown to equip others. That was 27 years ago.

Elaine Vitikainen

See, I Am Doing a New Thing!

Isaiah 43:18-19 is a very popular verse in the New Year. It’s in social media, as a part of church sermons, in devotions and even on greeting cards. But what does it really mean?

Elaine Vitikainen

Where Did I Put My Identity?

My identity as a child of God is unchanging and it is something that can’t be taken away from me. Being a child of God gives me hope for the future, whatever the future may bring.

Elaine Vitikainen

Is Leadership Worth It?

Who on earth would choose to be a leader? It is such a tough calling. It rarely leads to fame or fortune. Over the years as a leader I’ve often wondered about the cost and whether it is all worth it.

Elaine Vitikainen

Reminding Ourselves of God’s Presence

James 4:8 encourages us to come near to God. And as we come near to God, God will come near to us. But how do we do this in practice? How do we practice the presence of God at work; or as we sit in front of a computer?

Elaine Vitikainen

I Just Want

We are all restoration projects, but disdain and run from the remodeling. It is too close, too painful. We do not value what God is working to produce in us.

Elaine Vitikainen

We Are Related

They don’t speak my language. I don’t speak theirs. I live very differently and my habits are very different from theirs. But in many ways, we are very similar.

Elaine Vitikainen

Is Caring a Weakness in Leadership?

As Rick James once wrote, “Effective leadership is not simply about skills, qualifications, titles, positions or even responsibilities; it is actually about who we are and how we relate to God and to other people.“ What kind of leader are you?

Elaine Vitikainen

Remembering Why We’re Here

It’s amazing how easily we forget why we do what we do. It is so easy to get caught up with our day-to-day roles and forget the vision that God has given us for our life.

Elaine Vitikainen

Facilitating With Grace

Ephesians 4:2 says, "Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." How can we have grace with the unexpected disturbances in our work?

Elaine Vitikainen

Finding a Critical Friend

We all need people who encourage us and affirm us. We all enjoy positive feedback. But more precious still are people who will be honest with us about where we are failing.

Elaine Vitikainen

No Longer Boasting About Tomorrow

We are all faced by the great uncertainty of the future. A colleague told me that planning has now been reduced to what can be done in the next three days, instead of planning for the months to come.

Elaine Vitikainen

Hope

False positivity is an easy trap to fall into. However, I cannot face my circumstances through mere positivity and misleading assurance that everything will be alright.

Elaine Vitikainen

Listening to God

God does not typically speak in an audible voice, but God is speaking to us. Will God’s voice be a background noise which competes with the noise around us?

Elaine Vitikainen

Leading from a Place of Rest

Like Jesus sat by the well, God is calling us to rest. Let us not be afraid of empty spaces but instead be thankful for those moments of rest.

Elaine Vitikainen