Celebrating Wins from 2016

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Celebrating Wins from 2016

Tuesday, January 3, 2017

Every year at this time it’s common to look back and review the wins from the previous year. This is particularly timely as the leadership team for The Unstuck Group gathers in the coming days to refresh our vision and action plan for 2017 and beyond.

Here’s what we discovered in looking back at 2016. There’s a lot to celebrate and thank God for here:

We had the opportunity to serve over 75 churches by helping them through a health assessment, development of an action plan and reviewing their staffing and structure.
We added Blake Stanley, Lee Button, Gabe Kolstad and Jacinta Livingston to our team. That now helps position us to serve churches in the United Kingdom and the Northwest here in the United States.
We traveled to 30 states, Canada and the Costa Rica to help churches get unstuck.
The churches we served ranged in size from 65 to over 8,500 in attendance. In case you’re curious, the average size church we serve is 1,082 people.
We worked in 18 different denominations. That included extending our initiative supporting denominations that want to resource their healthiest churches.
We engaged 64 leaders in coaching networks to help them take their next steps in their leadership.
We rolled out a new multisite service to help churches that are “MultiStuck.” The service is designed to help these churches clarify their ministry model and their multisite strategy to effectively lead one church in multiple locations.
We launched The Leadership Unstuck Podcast where we share relatable stories to inspire hope and give practical steps to get your church unstuck.
We released a new edition of Vital Signs: Why Church Health Matters and 14 Ways to Measure It. This resource now includes benchmarks from the analysis of over 200 churches.

You are allowed to cheer along with the Unstuck team as we celebrate these wins. In addition to that, though, we would appreciate your prayers as we continue our mission to help churches experience health and growth. We continue to strive to help more churches get unstuck.

I encourage you to take some time yourself to thank God and celebrate the wins of the last year before you dive headfirst into everything ahead.

Posted in Leadership, Staffing

Top Posts of 2016 #3 “What Growing Churches do Differently”

Thursday, December 29, 2016

We’ve finally made it to the top 3 posts in our countdown from 2016!

It’s not faith, it’s not luck, and it’s not some leadership secret. Growing churches are actually doing something differently than the other 80% of churches in America that are stuck or declining.

At the Unstuck Group we work with 100’s of churches every year and we’ve discovered that growing churches are actually doing some very tangible things differently than other churches. Below are just a few of them.

1. Staff Led

Look at the statistics across America and you’ll discover that growing churches have very few congregational votes. These churches are Staff led instead of Board led or Congregationally led. Practically speaking that is because Church Boards are part-time thinkers and they simply don’t have the time to give to a full-time job of running the church. As a result decision making and implementation slow down because the staff are constantly catching the Board or the church up on the past instead of leading the church into the future. I know this isn’t always an easy transition for churches to make. I’d suggest you pick up a copy of High Impact Church Boards to read through with the Board at your church and get the conversation started.

2. Intentionally Develop Leaders

Growing churches develop leaders at an exponential rate compared to most churches in America. They do this intentionally, not just “organically,” (which is code for we don’t have a plan and we hope it somehow magically happens). They don’t just use people to fill volunteer roles, they see volunteering as an essential part of the discipleship process. They delegate responsibility and empower volunteers with real ministry decision-making power. They develop some kind of formal content that is specific to the culture of their church and train up and coming leaders in that content. This allows them to hire from within instead of hiring from outside and jeopardizing their culture.

3. Embrace Technology

Growing churches embrace technology. This may simply be evidence that they are more likely to change methodology based on effectiveness more readily than other churches and that they are open to new ideas. But whatever the case they are embracing the use of technology through social media engagement, online marketing, big data, video teaching, and use of technology in weekend worship services. This isn’t new. I don’t think it’s a mere coincidence that the protestant reformation took place during a similar time period to the printing press and the Bible being translated, printed in the hands of the everyday guy. With advancements in technology come opportunities for advancements in the Gospel for churches that embrace them.

4. Clear Strategy

Growing churches don’t just hope and pray for growth, they plan for it and build a clear actionable strategy to grow. Hoping your church will grow won’t make your church grow and growing churches understand this. They develop clear strategies (strategy answers the question “How are we going to do this?”), to help them get to their vision (vision answers the question “Where are we going?”). This informs all of their decision-making and allows them to align resources (people, time, money, facilities, etc.) to get them where they believe Jesus has called them to go. They’re also fanatical about clarity, because they understand the clearer they can make things, the faster they can go and the more effective they can be.

Interested in getting your church unstuck and growing again? I’d encourage you to reach out to the Unstuck Group. We’ve built a trusted track record and have a proven process to help your church get unstuck!

Posted in Leadership, Spiritual Formation, Staffing

Top Posts of 2016 #4 “7 Core Issues that your Church needs to Address in 2016”

Wednesday, December 28, 2016

I wrote this way back at the start of the year. This list was generated by listening to the pressure points that church leaders around the country are currently dealing with. Chances are your church is facing one or two of these as well. This post checks in at #4 on the year.

Recently I had the opportunity to facilitate a round table discussion for Executive Pastors of large churches. Nearly 20 large churches were represented in the discussion. We began by working through an exercise to identify the greatest pressure points that the group was experiencing at their churches and then we used those key items as our agenda for the conversation that ensued the following two days. Below are the 7 biggest items that consumed our time and energy. If you’re anything like these churches, then the following 7 Core Issues are items that the Sr. Leadership Team at your church needs to address in 2016.

#1 Multisite

According to the most recent research conducted by Leadership Network there are nearly 8,000 churches in the U.S. that have adopted a multisite model. Yet few would say that they’ve perfected it. Instead most are faced with a new set of challenges that they never anticipated. Ready to make Multisite work for your church? Don’t miss this free Multisite webinar hosted by Tony Morgan and the Unstuck Group!

#2 Volunteers

Volunteering is discipleship. It’s not just about roles that need to be filled anymore but people that need to be developed. The role of the Church Staff Member isn’t to do the ministry but to equip the church to do the ministry. While most church staff would generally agree to that statement, few are actually doing it. Want to learn more about developing an effective Volunteer Strategy at your Church? Check out these 10 Articles that will Help your Church Build a Stronger Volunteer Culture.

#3 Re-Structuring for Growth

Your church is perfectly structured for the size and results you’re getting today. But like most churches, it’s probably not structured for growth. What is the next staff re-organization that your church needs to make in order to prepare for, accommodate and even catalyze growth?

#4 Generosity

Wherever you find people who truly understand grace you’ll find people who are generous. Money can be a difficult subject for church leaders to talk about with their churches. At times it can come off as though churches want something from their people instead of something for them. Does your church have an effective generosity strategy? This post will help: “20 Ways Church Leaders can Help their Church become More Generous”

#5 Staff Development

How deep is the leadership bench at your church? Most churches are struggling to identify their up and coming young leaders. Is your church attracting, identifying, and intentionally developing young leaders? Most are hopeful that it will somehow happen, but hope isn’t a strategy. Check out these 10 Articles that will Help your Church Develop Young Leaders.

#6 Discipleship Pathway

The majority of churches in North America have no true discipleship pathway. They may have a class or a multitude of ministries that compete for time, promotion, money, and participation. But they do not have a true clear strategic pathway for people who are new to following Jesus to move towards knowing and following Him. What is the next step that you want people to take at your church to become a more fully devoted follower of Jesus?

#7 Communication Strategy

In most churches a weekend bulletin and announcements in the worship service is the extent of their communication strategy. And most of the ministries in the church are competing for “air time” on those announcements. If it’s not announced from the stage they spam people to death with constant emails, to the point that they are ignored. Interested in learning more about church communications? Check out these 10 Findings from New Research on Church Communications.

It would be worth talking about this list of Core Issues for Churches in 2016 with the Sr. Leadership Team at your church to make sure you’re all on the same page with how you’re addressing them.

Posted in Leadership, Spiritual Formation, Staffing