Leading Through Change: What Game is Your Church Playing?

Sunday, August 10, 2014

On a regular basis at Sun Valley Community Church (the church I have the honor of serving at) we get the staff together from all three campuses for leadership development and training. This past week one of our Lead Pastors, Chad Moore, shared about the different games that churches play. I thought I’d share with you some of the key take-aways and learnings. Do you know what game your church is playing? Follow this link to learn more about the “4 Stages of a Church Staff Team.”

“When the organization changes, there are changes within the organization.”

1. Never forget, growth changes everything

A small church, mid-sized church, and large church are completely different animals.
There is a big difference between an organizational shift and a cultural shift…and often times it’s hard to see the difference.
Leaders who are leading through significant growth and change are typically accused of being unloving, unkind, or uncaring.

2. 4 Games that Churches Play

Game #1: The Track Star The track star performs alone. They may train with others and their score may affect an overall team win, but they operate by themselves. This is the solo pastor.

Game #2: Golfing Buddies The primary value is the relational feel of the team. The score doesn’t matter. High performers and low performers can still play the same game together and have fun.

Game #3: The Basketball Team Basketball is a team sport not a friendship sport. It requires working together, trusting one another and sharing the ball.

Game #4: The Football Team Football can be a dangerous game if you think you’re still playing track, golf, or basketball. In the game of football there are highly specialized roles and teamwork is essential.

3. The Two Biggest Challenges of Game Change

Relational overload: You know that the game has changed when you find yourself spending a lot of time managing relationships.
Increased miscommunication: Exponential growth increases complexity.

4. How do You when know You’re Stuck and the Game needs to Change?

You’re focused on the past instead of the future (fear instead of faith)
You’re continually hanging around the 19^th hole with the same people (same staff / same volunteers)
You tend to value the experience more than the results (protection instead of progress)
You tend to value your personal role more than the mission (instead of asking what’s best for the church I ask what’s best for me)

Photo Credit: Mariano Kamp via Compfight cc

Posted in Leadership

1

How Fresh Eyes can Help Your Church get UnStuck

Sunday, April 6, 2014

They wanted to reach people for Jesus, but they were stuck. The numbers couldn’t lie. They had been running 200-300 people for the last 10 years, but decline was settling in. Something felt off. The changes they had tried to implement–like creating a “blended” traditional/contemporary worship service–only left them more frustrated when growth did not come. They needed a fresh perspective.

In 2012 I met with Joe Stewart. Joe was the new Lead Pastor at Sabino Road Baptist Church and he was hopeful about their future. He refused to let this ministry stagnate into irrelevance. In my time with Sabino Road I walked them through a Health Assessment to lend new eyes to its strategies, systems and structure and provide a current snapshot of the ministry’s health.

“It was an incredible asset to have someone from the outside say what he saw and provide me with an ally for change,” said Pastor Joe. “The Unstuck Group has a unique way of facilitating discussion and helping staff and key leaders gain understanding of how to move forward.”

Sabino Road did not have a culture of change, which made the process move slowly. Some things were difficult, like transitioning to a new worship pastor and building a new website, but the mindset shift that occurred began to gain ground. The church realized its culture had unintentionally become insider-focused and was able to clarify its mission, vision and values to be about reaching out.

The “transition team” that Pastor Joe rallied set a goal of seeing 100 new guests visit the church between May 2013 and May 2014. As of today, they’ve already exceeded that goal, and they’ve retained 37% of the new folks.

The church has seen more growth in the last two years than it had in the previous 10.

“Through wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established; by knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches.” Proverbs 24:3-5 (NKJV)

Click the following links to learn more about the Unstuck Group and the Ministry Health Assessment or other services we provide to help churches get unstuck!

Posted in Leadership

0

How Churches Communicate in 2014

Monday, March 17, 2014

At the Unstuck Group we work with all kinds of churches across America, and one of the common trends we’ve observed is that increasingly church leaders feel stuck when it comes to communicating beyond the pulpit. The options have increased significantly in recent years, giving us both more effective possibilities and more overwhelming decisions. Websites, social media and smartphones have transformed the ways we interact. With these new opportunities, we know it’s tough to stay on top of what your church should be doing to effectively communicate to people.

We want church communications to get unstuck, and we need your help!

Today, we’re asking you to take a short survey–just 7 minutes–that will help us compile communications data from churches across the country. Our team will analyze it to find clear benchmarks for what your digital and print media should actually look like to be most effective.

Every church, every size–your input is valuable to us. The more diversity we have in responses, the more useful our data will be to the Church.

Please consider participating in this brief survey. If you take the time, we’ll send you a free copy of our findings before we make them available to everyone else. We thank you in advance and we look forward to sharing the insights with you to help your church get unstuck!

Church Communications Survey

Posted in Creative Arts

0

5 Articles to Help You Make Vision Real

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Thank you for helping make December a great month here at Helping Churches Make Vision Real! It’s fun to be a part of the interaction on social media and hear about how helpful the content has been. So, thank you for connecting with me through the content on this blog! You made these the top 5 Posts from this last month. If you missed out on any of them, here they are all in one place for your convenience!

#1 “5 Self-Inflicted Wounds That Keep Churches Stuck”

Churches get stuck for all kinds of reasons. And while no church I’ve ever worked with has ever set out with the goal of being stuck, most eventually become stuck at some point along the way. Unfortunately the majority of churches that are stuck get that way not because of some insurmountable obstacle that is put in place by the enemy, but rather they become stuck due to self-inflicted wounds. Bad decisions that seem right in the moment, but lead to the church being stuck. Here are a few common self-inflicted wounds I’ve seen happen to churches:

#2 “Multisite Church Fast Facts”

This past week Jim Tomberlin the founder of MultiSite Solutions stopped by my current Coaching Network to spend some time talking all things Multisite and Mergers. He shared about how the multisite movement that originally began as a “band-aid” solution for megachurches that were out of space has quickly turned into a growth strategy for all kinds and sizes of churches. Below are 15 incredible facts that Jim in partnership with Leadership Network have discovered about the multisite church movement:

#3 “Top Posts of 2013: #1 10 Insider Focused Ministry Names”

This post generated the most traffic on Helping Churches Make Vision Real this year. Mainly because church-people did a Google search for ministry names and stumbled across this post. I sure bet they were surprised. The language we choose to use is important because it both reflects and builds culture at the same time. And one of the most obvious ways to tell if a church is insider focused or outsider focused is the language that they choose to use. It either says that the church is “inclusive” or “exclusive.” In helping churches get unstuck and make vision real I’ve run across a number of insider focused ministry names. In fact here’s a link to a post with a free tool that you can use as you begin to evaluate your own ministry names and language you’re using in your church. Remember it’s always more important to be clear than clever. Here’s a quick list of 10 insider focused ministry names to give you an idea of what I’m talking about.

#4 “7 Traits of Churches That Experience Repeat Success”

It’s one thing to experience success; it’s another thing altogether to repeat success over, and over, and over again. Many churches experience moments of success, but few experience repeat success. Fewer still, understand why they were successful in the first place and intentionally create behaviors in the organization of the church to make success become the norm. Below are 7 traits of churches that experience repeat success:

#5 “How to Keep Your Team When the Game is Changing”

In any growing church or organization there are going to be moments where the team that got you where you are, will not have the ability to get you where you need to go. This usually becomes an incredibly painful and difficult moment. In fact many churches get stuck here because they refuse to address the issue in an appropriate manner. What do you do when staff members begin to hit a leadership lid? Do you have any other course of action to take besides replacing them? How do you navigate these moments? The options below should help:

Posted in Leadership

1

5 Self-Inflicted Wounds that Keep Churches Stuck

Sunday, December 15, 2013

Churches get stuck for all kinds of reasons. And while no church I’ve ever worked with has ever set out with the goal of being stuck, most eventually become stuck at some point along the way. Unfortunately the majority of churches that are stuck get that way not because of some insurmountable obstacle that is put in place by the enemy, but rather they become stuck due to self-inflicted wounds. Bad decisions that seem right in the moment, but lead to the church being stuck. Here are a few common self-inflicted wounds I’ve seen happen to churches:

1. Blended Worship Services

In an effort to make everyone happy churches often attempt blend multiple in-congruent worship styles together into one service. The result? Instead of making everyone happy, everyone is frustrated because no one really gets what they want. This has failed over and over again, and yet I still see churches try to do blended services. They simply don’t work.

2. Quick Hires

Quick hires are usually hires based on convenience not mission. Every new hire you make either moves you closer to your mission or further away. It either helps you become more of who God wants you to be and further galvanizes your culture or erodes it. Sure, fire quickly. But hire slowly, because you put your culture at stake every time you make a new hire.

3. Departmentalizing Ministries

Occasionally I’ve been asked this question by a well-meaning church attender, “How much money does the church give to missions?” My reply is always the same, “100%., the whole thing is missions.” They quickly clarify that what they’re really asking, “Is how much money is sent overseas?” I could write a couple of posts on this subject, so I’ll spare you. Suffice to say, those of you who know me, understand how much the nations, not just our neighbors, mean to me. But ultimately that question leads to departmentalization. Churches get stuck when they create a missions department, discipleship department, or worship department etc. The whole thing is evangelism. The whole thing is discipleship. The whole thing is worship. This kind of thinking leads to silos and competing systems…and ultimately being stuck. Like I said…I can get rambling on that one.

4. Keeping Christians Happy

Many churches have a fundamental misunderstanding of what the church is for. Instead of being for people who have not yet said yes to following Jesus, many churches fall into the trap of believing they exist to provide nice safe programing for Christians for the purpose of biblical education. They eventually become insider focused and begin making decisions based on who they want to keep instead of who they want to reach. By the way I’m not sure God’s as interested in the happiness of his people as He is their holiness.

5. Feeding the Past

Ministry programs that experienced success in the past should be celebrated, just not fed. Everything drifts from the future to the past. Ministry that once reached outsiders eventually drifts towards impacting insiders and needs to be reinvented or it will ultimately become obsolete.

Is your church stuck in one of these or another area? The Unstuck Group, the consulting firm I’m a part of specializes in helping church get unstuck. We’d be happy to help you move from where you are, to where God wants you to be. Let’s talk!

Posted in Leadership