Conversations move life forward. They can also stop things from moving forward. Relationships end on conversations and begin. Teams are formed and broken apart. Goals are made, expectations laid out, visions happen, all around conversations.
Feelings get hurt in conversations, lies are told, deception, betrayal, all of these can happen in conversations.
Enter the book Crucial Conversations Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. I heard Joseph Grenny, one of the authors speak on this topic recently at the leadership summit and got a lot out of his session.
But what is a crucial conversation and is that different from a regular conversation? Here’s a simple diagram:
All of us know the feeling of this kind of conversation and we know that this is where life changes.
Here are 10 things I got from the book that I have found helpful in my life and leadership:
- When we face crucial conversations, we can do one of three things: We can avoid them, We can face them and handle them poorly, or We can face them and handle them well. At the heart of almost all chronic problems in our organizations, our teams, and our relationships lie crucial conversations—ones that we’re either not holding or not holding well. Christians and church staffs are notorious for avoiding crucial conversations. This is why churches often split, people leave hurt and visions never move forward. Instead of doing the hard work in a conversation, they are avoided. When in reality, because of what is at stake (salvation) and because of the calling of Jesus, we should do a better job of having crucial conversations.
- Individuals who are the most influential—who can get things done and at the same time build on relationships—are those who master their crucial conversations. We all know this to be true. If you aren’t very good at dialogue, you sit back in wonder at those who are. They are able to gain more influence, get more done and people want to be on their team and a part of what they are doing. This is why raising the value of this skill and getting better at it matters so much. Things move forward or stop around conversations.
- The mistake most of us make in our crucial conversations is we believe that we have to choose between telling the truth and keeping a friend. Grenny said this at the summit and it grabbed my attention. This is one of, if not the main reason, most conversations stop and things do not move forward. Fear. Fear of a relationship ending, something stopping, getting fired or hurting someone. Yet, if we don’t tell the truth, we often can’t be a friend.
- People rarely become defensive simply because of what you’re saying. They only become defensive when they no longer feel safe. The problem is not the content of your message, but the condition of the conversation. If you are a boss and want honest feedback and conversation, people can’t fear for their jobs or that you will yell at them. Recently, there has been a lot of writing online about pastors abusing people, creating a culture of fear, yelling at staff members, elders and volunteers and it blows my mind. If you are known for that as a pastor, you should be embarrassed.
- Be careful not to apologize for your views. This can be easy to do and it often happens as a way to soften your opinion or the blow in a conversation, but you shouldn’t apologize for what you think. It is what you think. It might be hard or unpopular to say, but don’t shy away from it. You may be wise to change how you phrase it, but always be willing to share what you think in a conversation.
- One of the ironies of dialogue is that, when talking with those holding opposing opinions, the more convinced and forceful you act, the more resistant others become. I done this very easily in the past. Yet, this practice keeps people from buying in and helping to make something happen. When we do this, we don’t understand why people aren’t on board. The reason is the harder we push our way, the harder they push their way.
- Speaking in absolute and overstated terms does not increase your influence, it decreases it. The converse is also true—the more tentatively you speak, the more open people become to your opinions. The more harshly we speak or the more we give the impression that there is only one way, the less likely it becomes that people will speak up. Now, on issues like vision, it must be clear and have agreement. But, in conversations, if we give the impression that something has been decided or that we aren’t open to suggestions, we will kill discussion.
- When we feel the need to push our ideas on others, it’s generally because we believe we’re right and everyone else is wrong. This is another way the previous one. If you find yourself pushing your ideas, you aren’t having a good dialogue and instead are simply giving out orders. That may be your leadership style, but it won’t accomplish a healthy team environment and in the end, your church or business will never reach its full potential.
- The more you care about an issue, the less likely you are to be on your best behavior. As a leader or a person in a relationship, you must learn this well. This was an eye opening insight for me. I get very passionate about things, as most people do, and when I do, I can shut down dialogue and end up hurting people. We do this, often unintentionally because we care about something, because we believe we are right and have the only way forward.
- The fuzzier the expectations, the higher the likelihood of disappointment. When a crucial conversation ends, there must be clear expectations and guidance moving forward. It cannot be fuzzy or gray. Otherwise, a conversation has not ended, it is simply on pause.
All in all, this was an incredibly helpful book. Some of it covered things I already knew but showed some helpful insights. I’ve already seen a change in some of my conversations with leaders at my church and in my family through this book. Definitely one I’d recommend.
Recently, I read through Dave Ramsey’s leadership book EntreLeadership: 20 Years of Practical Business Wisdom from the Trenches. The title is right. There is tons of wisdom in this book and it is incredibly practical and helpful.
Here are 11 things I learned or was reminded of that I think are helpful for other pastors:
- The very things you want from a leader are the very things the people you are leading expect from you. Credibility, empathy, integrity, passion, vision. We want these things from leaders and our followers want them from us. The standard we hold people to, is the standard others hold us to. Step up to it.
- You cannot lead without passion. Passion causes things to move, and passion creates a force multiplier. The longer I lead Revolution, the more I am reminded of this. The times when we lacked momentum or energy, I lacked momentum and energy. This doesn’t mean a leader needs to be a loud cheerleader or an extrovert or can’t be tired sometimes. It does mean that you need to take care of yourself so that you are excited and energized. For a pastor, you need to make your schedule work so that on Sunday morning your game face is on and you are ready. This may mean you do very little on Saturday’s, but whatever you have to do, do it.
- The mission statement is one way we create culture. If you can’t give a clear win for your church, close your doors. You should be able to give a clear win for everything you do, this is what motivates people and pushes them to give their time, talent and treasure to something.
- Just because an idea is a good idea does not mean it is good for you or your company to take it on. Keep your eye on the ball. Pastors are notorious for not following this. Churches get complex, a powerful elders wife has an idea so you feel pressured to do it, the loudest person won’t stop complaining about why you don’t have a certain ministry. Someone says, “If we do ___, we will be able to reach people” and so the ideas seems sound. We can reach people? Then we should do it. The problem is, all kinds of things reach people, that doesn’t mean every church should do them all. TV ministries work at reaching people. Should every church have one? No. Focus on what you can do well and do that. The reason this is hard is because by staying simple and focused, you will lose people, but you will be more effective and healthier as a church in the end.
- If you spend fifteen minutes planning your day on paper every morning, you will add 20 percent to your productivity. I’ve come across this idea in a number of books recently and have put it into practice and seen a ton of results from this. By clarifying my wins for the day, I know where to spend my energy and time. I also know at the end of a day that maybe has little to show for it, that I accomplished what I set out to accomplish. This helps to put wind in your sails for the next day.
- The larger your dream, the larger the organization, the more complicated and emotionally draining your decisions. Leaders with small dreams don’t lay awake at night worrying and praying about their church. The ones who have things they feel called to, things that overwhelm them, they sweat the decisions they make. Hiring is now not just about filling a role, but can make or break a ministry for years. Where you meet, when you make a change, all of these decisions carry more weight.
- You put all you dream about in jeopardy when you are indecisive. Because of the season of growth and hiring that Revolution is in, this statement stopped me when I read it. While you should not rush things, you should take time when you can to make a choice and look at as many possibilities and angles as you can, at some point, you must decide. If you as a pastor are paralyzed about something, your church stops. That can’t happen. You can’t second guess something, you must decide and move forward.
- If you don’t have any good options then you don’t have enough options; search for more. If you are like me, it is easy to focus on one thing and just do it without finding good options. I realize others are in the other end of the spectrum of finding too many options and then aren’t sure how to move forward. I’ve always felt like I need to make a choice, when in reality, I could wait and find better options and that is a choice.
- Team members leave, or are let go, most often because they should never have been hired in the first place. Every pastor knows this is true. They have volunteers that shouldn’t have been given leadership roles, staff members that they want to fire or are firing that they should never have hired.
- Hire people you like; you will be trusting them and spending lots of time with them. I’ve made this mistake in the past and it hurt me. I overlooked something, whether in ability or simply personalities clashing and it hurt my team every time. Now, I spend lots of time with people before I hire them. I went to see someone in another state once just to get a feel for them before bringing them to Revolution.
- People whose first question is about pay are not people you want. I had a mentor in college tell me this, so I never brought money up in an interview. Now that I’m interviewing people, it tells me a lot about someone. While pay matters, buy in to a vision matters more. Sometimes people will sacrifice pay to be a part of something great. This doesn’t mean you pay people pennies, but it means the DNA and vision lining up is more important.
If you preach on a regular basis or give any kind of lesson or business presentations, the one book you need to read this year is Carmine Gallo’s book Talk Like TED: The 9 Public-Speaking Secrets of the World’s Top Minds. I’ve been a fan of his since I read The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs, another great speaking book.
In his latest book, Gallo gives nine lessons every speaker can learn from the best TED Talks. Here are 9 lessons I took away for pastors:
- The world was and still is clearly hungry for great ideas presented in an engaging way. While many lament the changing culture and the lack of morals and change of opinion towards Christians. This is all true. Yet, the world is still looking for hope. Whether they are a follower of Jesus or have never walked into a church, those who show up on a Sunday are looking for hope, they are looking for change. They are hungry for the gospel.
- If you can’t inspire anyone else with your ideas, it won’t matter how great those ideas are, because great communicators reach your head and your heart. Pastors tend to reach either the head or the heart of someone. They are either incredibly smart so they engage them intellectually or they have a passion and can tell stories so they reach the heart. You have to reach both. Depending on your ministry background and theological camp, you know which one comes naturally for you. For me, I can reach anyone’s head. The speakers I listen to so that I can grow as a communicator tend to be the seeker-church guys (Andy Stanley, Perry Noble, Craig Groeschel, etc). Why? They know how to do something that doesn’t come naturally for me and I want to grow.
- You cannot inspire others unless you are inspired yourself. For many pastors, they preach because it is Sunday, not because they have something to say. This has to do with their own heart, devotional time, sleep patterns, eating habits and how they are protecting themselves. Your church knows if you are inspired by what you are sharing or if you are just giving a sermon. Take care of yourself, prepare your heart, confess your sin and preach because you can’t keep it in any longer.
- Positive leaders are perceived as more effective and therefore more likely to persuade their followers to do what they want their followers to do. While their is a time for seriousness in a sermon, people must walk away feeling hopeful and knowing you believe what you said and knowing that you believe the gospel has the power to do what you said it can do.
- If you start with something too esoteric and disconnected from the lives of everyday people, it’s harder for people to engage. Always, always start with something that connects to real life. You have 30 seconds to convince people to listen to you. Showing them that you understand where they’re coming from and that you can help them move to a place they want to go goes a long way in raising the interest level in your sermon.
- Giving a presentation that truly moves people takes hard work. Let’s face it, many pastors are lazy. They become a pastor because it seems easier, they read a lot and most people don’t have a high expectation for a sermon to be great (sadly). They are simply hoping for short. Preaching is hard work. If you aren’t willing to put in the hard work, don’t preach. At the end of the day, someone pays a price for a sermon, the pastor or the church.
- Authenticity doesn’t happen naturally. This seems counterintuitive, because authenticity just happens. It takes practice. It takes learning how to share, what to share and when to share it. Sometimes, pastors in an effort to be authentic sound creepy. Sometimes, they skip it and sound like they never struggle with anything they are preaching on. One question I ask each time I preach and seek to answer in my sermon is: How has this passage affected and changed me?
- When you walk into a classroom you have two jobs: one is to teach and the other is to recruit everyone in that classroom to join the pursuit of truth. Let’s face it, preaching is about moving people to action. It might be for them to take a next step, follow Jesus, get baptized, start giving, work on an area of their life or join the mission of a church. A sermon is a call to move from where you are to somewhere else.
- If you can’t explain your big idea in 140 characters or less, keep working on your message. I’ve talked a lot in blog posts about having 1 big idea, one thing you are trying to get across. Not 3, 5 or 7. A pastor recently asked me to critique a sermon and after listening to it I asked him, “What was the main point?” He couldn’t recall it. Neither could his church. I love how Gallo says, “Every talk should be a twitter headline. If it can’t fit, you aren’t ready to talk.” For some great examples, just listen to Andy Stanley preach. By having a twitter headline, you are able to help control and influence what people walk out knowing.
As I said, if you speak, this is the one book you need to read this year. So, so good.
11 Ways Churches Can Improve Hiring
The church I lead is in the process of hiring two new staff members so I’ve been reading blogs, articles and books on hiring this summer. There is a ton of incredibly unhelpful stuff out there, but also some great things that applies greatly to churches. One of them is It’s Not the How or the What but the Who: Succeed by Surrounding Yourself with the Best by Claudio Fernández-Aráoz.
I think people applying for a job should do a better job of interviewing the boss they’ll work for and understanding the church culture, but churches need to have a clearer hiring process as well.
Here are 11 things I learned from It’s Not the How or the What but the Who: Succeed by Surrounding Yourself with the Best:
- Success is rooted in relationships, in the people around you. You are hiring to make your church more effective, to move the gospel and the mission forward. Hiring should take a large part of your time if you have open positions. Yes, use other staff members or hiring firms, but you can’t delegate the whole thing. You must spend time on it if you are the leader.
- Humans aren’t programmed to make great people decisions. The first step in surrounding yourself with the best is to recognize—and correct—your own failings. Churches are notorious for being too nice and overlooking their tendencies. It is amazing to me how much of this book was about how to get past your personal biases. We have them and they hinder us from effectively finding leaders, volunteers and staff members. Studies show that adults gravitate toward those with whom they share something, whether it’s a common nationality, ethnicity, gender, education, or career path—even the same first-name initial! It is important to recognize these in ourselves and put a team around us to help us make these choices so we don’t fall into traps.
- Overconfidence in predictions is a pervasive human bias that has a dramatic impact not just on our financial or weather forecasts but also on our people decisions. I can easily make a choice right away based on my bias and be wrong. All leaders do this. We need to make sure we stick with our process that we laid out and not jump forward too much. One of those he pointed out was, “Unconsciously, we make choices based on what we already know.” Again, our bias gets in the way.
- Most of us are bad and slow at getting the wrong people off the bus. This is true of almost every church. Our goal is to serve, care and love people so it makes sense this would be a struggle. Yet, when this choice must be made, we must make it. For the sake of the church and the person. If they aren’t meeting expectations, it isn’t good stewardship to keep them in a role. If they need help or coaching, we need to do our best to make that happen. Sometimes though, a person’s time is done and they need to get off the bus and that is okay.
- Why hiring matters. At most companies, people spend 2 percent of their time recruiting and 75 percent managing their recruiting mistakes. Take the time to make the right choice, even if it means your ministry suffers some in the short term.
- Should you hire from inside or outside of your church? It is popular now to hire only from inside a church and sometimes this is the right move. Sometimes, you need an outside perspective to shake things up or take things in a new direction or add an element you don’t have on a team right now. Most churches though, do not evaluate the same. We simply don’t work as hard to evaluate insiders—not only in cases of CEO succession but in all appointments—and this is especially true when things are going well.
- Schedule interviews correctly. Don’t simply schedule an interview, make sure it is at a time when you are awake, alert and can focus. Great decision makers never schedule endless back-to-back meetings, and they never work hungry.
- Interview 3 people for a position. My expectation was that a larger pool of people interviewed would increase the stick rate, and that happened up to a point. But after three or four candidates, it rapidly declined, confirming that too many options generate suboptimal decisions. So three to four seems to be the right number, just as it is with the interviewers you involve in your key people decisions.
- Most people assume that the best hiring strategy is to find the best performers in a given field and get them on your team. I found this fascinating in that someone can be a star at one company or church, but not at another. The DNA, culture and systems of a church can often help someone and if those things aren’t at a new church, their star can diminish. This is important to keep in mind. Also, you don’t always need a star.
- Identifying potential should be our first priority. Most people look for a proven track record, and that is important. A proven track record is also attached to someone usually set in their ways, committed to one way of doing things and sometimes you have to untrain someone. This reminder of looking for what someone could be is crucial.
- Team effectiveness explains perhaps 80 percent of leaders’ success. Leaders, if you needed a reminder of why hiring matters, this is it.
If you’re hiring, you must read this book. I haven’t found a more helpful book out there on the topic.
10 Ways to Simplify Your Life
I love simplicity and the idea of simplifying your life so that you can be more effective and be healthier. In fact, it is a large part of my new book. So I was really excited to read Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown.
Here are 10 things I learned in the book on how to pursue less and get more:
- If you don’t prioritize your life, someone else will. This is so true and if you understand this, everything in your life changes. Most of us allow someone else to dictate our schedule, life, pace and purpose. It might be a boss, spouse or child, but we don’t say “no” or stop signing up for things. Most people if they are honest, when they are in a stressful, hectic, unsustainable season, it is because they didn’t prioritize their life, someone else did.
- Essentialists see sleep as necessary for operating at high levels of contribution more of the time. Sleep is important. Everyone knows this and yet, many live as if they can survive on small levels of it. We hear stories of the leaders who get 3-6 hours per night. Some can do that, but most of us still need 7-8 hours each night. Make it a priority and get a good night sleep.
- If the answer isn’t a definite yes then it should be a no. This insight has been so helpful as we are hiring new staff members right now. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve waffled on a choice and went back and forth but this idea, if it isn’t a definite yes, than it is a no. Worth the price of the book in my opinion. I’ve applied this more than any other concept in the book.
- When people don’t know what the end game is, they are unclear about how to win, and as a result they make up their own game and their own rules as they vie for the manager’s favor. If you are a leader, listen up to this point. This might be why your team is in shreds, never having a good debate on an issue or simply infighting. They want your attention because they think that is the win, unless you’ve given them a win.
- One strategic choice eliminates a universe of other options and maps a course for the next five, ten, or even twenty years of your life. Once the big decision is made, all subsequent decisions come into better focus. I’ve believed this idea since we started Revolution. Targeting 20-40 year old men has answered so many questions without having to think about them. It has shaped our logo, songs we use, ministries we do and don’t do. All of it. Most pastors struggle with this idea and their churches suffer because of it.
- People respect and admire those with the courage of conviction to say no. Our head tells us this isn’t right, but in our heart, we know it is true. Mostly because few people have the guts to say no. We wonder if we’ll miss something, if our kids will fall behind or their future will be in jeopardy for not doing every sport. Say no, remember #1, take control of your life or someone else will.
- It’s true that boundaries can come at a high price. If you’ve pulled a boundary with someone, you’ve felt the hurt of this. Things that come at a high price though are often the best things in life.
- Of all the things that can boost emotions, motivation, and perceptions during a workday, the single most important is making progress in meaningful work. At the beginning of each day, I lay out what I hope to accomplish in that day. The most important things I need to accomplish. At the end of the day, I’m able to know if I moved the ball forward based off what I felt was most important. This also helps me know if I’m doing too much, need to delegate something or take something off my plate.
- The Essentialist designs a routine that makes achieving what you have identified as essential the default position. We all have habits and routines and they shape how we live. That isn’t the problem. The problem is that few of us have thought through how to make routines and habits that move us forward instead of falling behind. We don’t structure our lives proactively. Effective people make routines that work, they organize their lives so they move forward.
- “Fewer things done better” as the most powerful mechanism for leadership. Yes, yes, yes! Pastors, stop doing everything at your church. It is diluting your mission and keeping you off target. Most churches could cut half of what they do and become 10 times more effective. Why? Because the level of excellence in those things would skyrocket. Do a few things well and let everything else go. Every company that does this is more effective and yet churches, with the mission of the taking the gospel to the nations, the gospel that saves and gives eternal life, we are diluting ourselves into thinking we can do everything and be effective. We can’t.
Overall, this was one of my favorite books of the year. I can’t recommend it enough.
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I am a big fan of being more productive, organizing your life for effectiveness and I’m always on the lookout for a helpful book in this area. What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done by Matt Perman is one of the best books on this topic. What sets this book apart from others on productivity:
- Its emphasis on understanding how the gospel impacts productivity.
- How the gospel frees us to be productive.
- It also brings together some of the best ideas from other books on productivity to show a better system that combines the strengths of different systems.
If I had one criticism about the book, it would be how much time he spent convincing the reader that it is biblical to be productive. I know why he did this and the reasoning is sad: Christians seem to think productivity, organization or systems are unbiblical and have no place in the church. Sadly, this is why most churches are ineffective and why business leaders often feel like they don’t fit in churches. One of the best reminders I took from this book and it immediately changed my stress level was planning my day in advance. I tried doing this the night before, but I then laid in bed thinking about the coming day. I now spend my first 5-10 minutes each morning at my desk, praying through and thinking through what I need to accomplish and list what is most important and remove everything else from my calendar or to-do list for that day. If productivity is a struggle for you, or if you want to take your productivity to the next level, I’d highly recommend checking out this book. You won’t regret it. [Image]
Ben Horowitz’s new book The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers is quite possibly one of the best church planting books I’ve ever read and it has nothing to do with church planting.
Horowitz shares so many insights from starting businesses, which is very similar to church planting. The hard road of raising funds, building teams, keeping great people and how to handle the high’s and low’s of being a CEO. The insights for lead planters are incredible. I found myself nodding over and over with all the lessons for pastor’s.
The whole book is great. If you are a church planter, thinking about planting or leading a church right now, this is the next book you need to read. It is that good.
Here are a few insights from it:
- If there is one skill that stands out, it’s the ability to focus and make the best move when there are no good moves.
- A healthy company culture encourages people to share bad news.
- Build a culture that rewards—not punishes—people for getting problems into the open where they can be solved.
- You don’t make yourself look good by trashing someone who worked for you.
- Hire for strength rather than lack of weakness.
- If your company is a good place to work, you too may live long enough to find your glory.
- Being a good company doesn’t matter when things go well, but it can be the difference between life and death when things go wrong. Things always go wrong.
- There are only two ways for a manager to improve the output of an employee: motivation and training.
- The most important difference between big and small companies is the amount of time running versus creating. A desire to do more creating is the right reason to want to join your company.
- If you don’t know what you want, the chances that you’ll get it are extremely low.
- The right kind of ambition is ambition for the company’s success with the executive’s own success only coming as a by-product of the company’s victory. The wrong kind of ambition is ambition for the executive’s personal success regardless of the company’s outcome.
- While I’ve seen executives improve their performance and skill sets, I’ve never seen one lose the support of the organization and then regain it.
- A company will be most successful if the senior managers optimize for the company’s success (think of this as a global optimization) as opposed to their own personal success (local optimization).
- Nothing motivates a great employee more than a mission that’s so important that it supersedes everyone’s personal ambition.
- The CEO job as knowing what to do and getting the company to do what you want.
- When an organization grows in size, things that were previously easy become difficult.
- The further away people are in the organizational chart, the less they will communicate.
- Evaluating people against the future needs of the company based on a theoretical view of how they will perform is counterproductive.
- There is no such thing as a great executive. There is only a great executive for a specific company at a specific point in time.
- Everybody learns to be a CEO by being a CEO.
- If you don’t like choosing between horrible and cataclysmic, don’t become CEO.
- When my partners and I meet with entrepreneurs, the two key characteristics that we look for are brilliance and courage.
- Some employees make products, some make sales; the CEO makes decisions.
To see other book notes, go here.
Creativity Inc.
I recently read the new book Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull on the story of Pixar and the culture of that company. The lessons churches and pastors can learn from them are numerous. There were so many, I’m actually going to share the lessons in multiple blog posts. You can read the first 10 here and the next 9 here. Below are 8 more:
- The more people there are in the room, the more pressure there is to perform well. This is counterintuitive, which is probably what makes it correct. The more people who are part of making the decision, the more clouded it will be. Everyone fights for their turf, their perspective and it is easy to get off track. As well, if you lead a team, the larger it is, the harder it is to connect with them all. I’m not advocating for smaller teams, but smaller amount of people who report to a leader in terms of giving that feedback. I know many pastors have committees with 20 people on them so everyone has a voice. That is often problematic and halts things from happening. Give a chance for people to give feedback and then have a smaller team make a choice.
- People need to be wrong as fast as they can. The sooner someone can move into leadership, have a chance to mess up, the better. The fastest way to learn is failing yourself. Churches can wait too long to give someone the room and authority to fail and learn. This doesn’t mean you should make a second time guest an elder or teacher in the kids ministry, but give people a chance to lead and fail faster than you might normally.
- To be a truly creative company, you must start things that might fail. If you haven’t tried anything that might go poorly recently, you aren’t really trying. Experiment, think outside the box. If you’ve never used a video sermon, use one. If you’ve never tried a certain style of music, use it. Bat around the craziest ideas and see if something sticks.
- If you don’t use what’s gone wrong to educate yourself and your colleagues, then you’ll have missed an opportunity. If someone makes a mistake, discuss it with them, walk with them through it, talk about it with them. Don’t miss this chance to coach them and help them learn.
- There is no growth or success without change. Churches and pastors don’t want to hear this because we love what we are comfortable with and what we know, but the reality is, if you don’t change, you’ll die. If you don’t adapt, you’ll fall behind. It is that simple. That doesn’t mean you change the message of the Bible, it means you figure out how to communicate things best to the environment you are in.
- We were going to screw up, it was inevitable. And we didn’t know when or how. We had to prepare, then, for an unknown problem—a hidden problem. From that day on, I resolved to bring as many hidden problems as possible to light, a process that would require what might seem like an uncommon commitment to self-assessment. Failure is coming. If you aren’t failing now, it is around the corner. Churches though are in the habit of playing it safe and working against failing. It isn’t that we are trying to succeed, we aren’t often trying not to fail. That is a recipe for disaster.
- Use the schedule to force reflection. If you are like most pastors, you have very little time for reflection. You run from one thing to the next, one fire to the next, one crisis, one email, one call or text to the next one. You are constantly dealing with what is urgent, not what is important. You have little time for solitude, thinking, planning, reflecting on your heart or what is working or not working. Build it in. It is that important. Build time into your schedule to learn, grow, and reflect.
- While everyone appreciates cash bonuses, they value something else almost as much: being looked in the eye by someone they respect and told, “Thank you.” This is one area I think churches have an advantage over profit companies. Our vision must be clear for people to serve, otherwise they won’t see it as worth their time. We can’t give people raises, but we can say thanks for what they do. We can show them their value by how they serve and help.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this walk through this great leadership book with me. I’d highly recommend you add this to your summer reading list. Such a fascinating story of how Pixar got started, the in’s and out’s of their movies and the leadership behind it.
Wess Stafford, President and CEO of Compassion International said,
I can think of many Christian organizations that have lost their spiritual commitment. I can’t think of one secular organization that found its way to a Christian commitment. Any leader who inherits a strong Christian commitment must shepherd the culture and steward that commitment.
In a nutshell, that’s why this new book by Peter Greer and Chris Horst Mission Drift: The Unspoken Crisis Facing Leaders, Charities, and Churches is so important. Having just preached a vision series at Revolution and going through a process of re-clarifying the win or why of Revolution Church, this book was incredibly refreshing to read, as well as incredibly challenging as I think through the task of keeping the mission clear, putting things into place to protect this clarity and keeping everyone on the same page.
The stories they tell of organizations who less than 50-100 years ago who were Mission True and had a clear Christian identity, to now simply collecting money is scary.
Here are a few things that stood out to me:
- Without careful attention, faith-based organizations will inevitably drift from their founding mission.
- According to studies, 95% of Christian organizations said mission drift was a challenging issue for them.
- Mission True organizations know why they exist and protect their core at all costs. They remain faithful to what they believe God has entrusted them to do. They define what is immutable: their values and purposes, their DNA, their heart and soul.
- Mission True organizations decide that their identity matters and then become fanatically focused on remaining faithful to this core.
- If we aren’t entirely convinced that our Christian faith is essential to our work, then we won’t be willing to make the tough decisions to fight for it.
- It’s often Christians who seem most likely to be the biggest critics of bold Christian distinctiveness in our organizations.
- Mission drift is a daily battle.
- Mission True organizations know who they are and actively safeguard, reinforce, and celebrate their DNA. Leaders constantly push toward higher levels of clarity about their mission and even more intentionality about protecting it.
- The single greatest reason for mission drift is the lack of a clear mission and vision.
- If leaders aren’t bleeding the mission, drift will always trickle down.
- When we begin to see our priority as a growing ministry, instead of a faithful one, we sow the seeds of drift.
- Leaders always act in accordance with their beliefs.
- Mission True organizations find a way of stating and measuring what they believe matters most.
- What’s not measured slowly becomes irrelevant.
Highly, highly recommend this book to any pastor or leader who works with a non-profit.
