Mission
The mission of the Leadership Development Service Area is to provide programming and leadership development services to member congregations of the MDD. It will provide people in the district with a sense of identity and purpose as congregational leaders. It will meet congregational needs by addressing issues of location of training opportunities, ease of access to learning, specific concerns of leadership in a congregational setting, and a variety of delivery methodologies

Needs
1. Understanding of common congregational needs in this area
2. Regional training opportunities
3. On-line materials when appropriate
4. Curriculum with a logical progression
5. Library
6. Keep RLLS and the emerging Leadership Institute as part of the development program

Activities
1. Learn the needs of the congregations
2. Familiarize team with materials and resources available from the UUA and other sources – assuring that they are applicable to congregational leadership development
3. Design/find training opportunities for use by Clusters
4. Formulate methodology for training and using volunteer facilitators
5. Pay attention to good marketing practices
6. Follow-up after training to determine effectiveness
7. Promote existing resources
8. Promote methods to allow more district UUs to attend annual conferences

Organization
This service area has at least two groups that currently are working – RLLS and the Leadership Institute. An organizational structure is needed that will include both groups in all plans and ideas, that will attend to the needs of the congregations, and that will incorporate the benefits of clusters.