Jean Benson grew up in a Christian home and accepted Christ as a young child. He holds a Masters in Economics and Computer Networking. He worked for many years in various Christian organizations before becoming a pastor in 2015. 

Jean first learned of LeaderSource in 2018 through Bill Frisbie, and subsequently attended in-depth trainings in both Building Healthy Leaders (BHL) and Building Healthy Church (BHC) courses in Zambia and Cote d’Ivoire. As he had opportunity, he began training other leaders in these models, eventually joining LeaderSource in 2020. 

Jean is passionate about building people and strong relationships. In his spare time, he enjoys spending time with his wife and children, playing football, and swimming.

During Jean's time with LeaderSource, he has noticed the following paradigm shifts in his life:

In my case, I ended up coming up with this slogan: “Before I met LeaderSource, I spent a lot of energy for a few results; today, I spend less energy for a lot of results.” This stems from three major paradigm shifts:

• Intentionality: I'd never heard of “intentionality” before I joined LeaderSource, which meant that we operated on the fly, hoping for the best. With LeaderSource, I focus on objectives and tell the person concerned that I want to build them. There's enthusiasm because he now knows where he is and where he's going. Being intentional helps to pool efforts and focus tasks – thinking before acting.
• Accustomed to scientific training (I taught math and technology), I expected nothing more than good marks in class. And when I finished, there was nothing that required transformation, because for me it was all about performance. But with LeaderSource, it's a matter of coaching to reach objectives. Leaders develop autonomy and learn how to bring about change in others around them. In addition I just want to say that I was used to teaching mathematics and technology. In that field, it is binary: 0 or 1, black or white ... I used to only consider the marks a student obtained, not how he felt. And I adopted a dualism view. In that field, all is about performance and competition; nothing about coming alongside without pay. Everything is about the job. Just the opposite, “build a leader” is totally involved in helping people to succeed, caring for them and supporting them. That is unusual in normal teaching, even in theology.
• Observe transformation, not results and figures. I'm used to results, which has always made me get discouraged when I don't see them coming. I get impatient and look for techniques, not substantial change. In the end, my desire to lead people to a better condition proves to be a failure. With LeaderSource, in order to be effective I'm concerned with transforming people and their condition. I'm even concerned with my own health. What's more, as a teacher, Malcolm prayed for the gift of teaching. Things have come together beyond my expectations today. My whole perception has changed and I'm still learning.