Tag Archive - system

0

The Blame Game

I recently caught up with Rick Calcutt to talk about his new book, “The Blame Game.” This book is a great resource for you if you’re trying to improve your weekend worship services, the creative process, or the relationship between your Pastor and Creatives.

It recently released on iBook, Amazon, and Nook! Click any of those links to get your hands on a copy and check out the interview below.

I’m giving away a free copy of “The Blame Game” to one of my readers! Just sign up here and I’ll let everyone know the winner next week!

 

 

Paul: Multiple times in this book you elude to what you call, “The Creative Process.” Doesn’t creativity just “happen” when you gather a group of creative individuals together? Can you actually plan for creativity?

Rick: “The Creative Process” is the system that a truly creative environment thrives on. It does so by normalizing, simplifying, and qualifying the creative workflow. This is essential because when the “day to day” and “week to week” tasks become creative habits, the creative team is allowed to focus more on their skill and passion. In the book I call those on the creative team (worship leader, video & audio techs, etc) Creatives. It is true that creativity happens naturally, but it is also a fact that you can plan for creativity. Creatives create, but a strong creative process gives structure and timeline that permits multiple Creatives, a creative team, to sync their creative schedules, efforts, and skills. The creative process found in “The Blame Game” equips the individual Creative and the creative team. It provides them adequate time for creation; clear schedules that remove confusion about deadlines; innovative possibilities that stimulate creative collaboration. Everyone’s happy. The Creatives get a great environment for creation. The Pastor, staff and church community receive impactful, inspiring, and clear worship experiences.

Paul: When most people hear churches talk about “Creative Arts” they automatically start thinking, “this is just a conversation for mega-churches.” But you assert that the principles in this book apply, “regardless of the size of your church”. How are the concepts in this book helpful to “normal” churches like the one I grew up in?

Continue Reading…


Posted in Creative Arts, Leadership

0

the blame game

Anyone who has watched an episode of Donald Trump’s “The Apprentice” has witnessed how the “boardroom” explodes when an initiative fails. Team members rarely choose to take responsibility for their actions and, instead, they resort to pinning the blame on a convenient scapegoat. What results is executive-level combat in which the candidates sell each other out in a bid to survive.

You can find the same less publicized bickering and back-biting in churches all across America.

When a church engages in the Blame Game, it is often because the creative process has failed. But unlike the Apprentice, church leaders must go on working together. And what is it stake is more than a job at Trump Enterprises; it’s often the well-being of our ministry and our community’s ability to live out its mission.

The creative process falters for a number of reasons. Sometimes the church rushes into creativity without being thoughtful about roles or infrastructure to support it. Other times, communication channels are unclear, creatives are micro-managed and relationships become strained.

Too many times, when our church’s journey to be creative takes a downward turn, we resort to finger-pointing. Fault is often assigned to the wrong things and the wrong people.

During my 25 years as a leader in the creative ministry, I have found the following issues to be at the heart of the Blame Game:

Continue Reading…


Posted in Creative Arts

0

getting unstuck

Most of us know exactly what it feels like to be stuck. We’ve been stuck in traffic, stuck in the wrong checkout line at the grocery store, or even stuck going to some chic-flic in an attempt to be a better husband. It’s a bad feeling…feeling stuck. And it can be unbearable when you’re leading a church that’s stuck. You feel strongly that you have a clear and compelling picture from God about where the church needs to go…but…you’re stuck. No matter how hard you try it seems like you can’t get the church to move from where you are, to where you know God wants it to be. And the longer things stay stuck the more you begin to doubt the picture you think God gave you about that preferred future, or that you’re even the person to lead it there at all.

Last week I had the opportunity to sit down with author, coach, and consultant Tony Morgan and discuss this issue of “stuckness” that so many churches and leaders are facing today. In the middle of the conversation something he said really resonated with me, “Where churches typically get stuck isn’t on the vision and dream, but rather the gap between vision and ministry.” Vision alone isn’t enough. Churches get stuck on the “how.” How you are actually going to get it done and make the dream reality.

We went on to discuss his latest installment of the Leisure Suit Series, “How to Get Unstuck.” In which he unpacks the following issues that must be addressed if you’re going to move towards the dream God has placed on your heart:

Continue Reading…


Posted in Leadership

0

building a culture that creates a movement

If you haven’t read Will Mancini’s book, Church Unique, go and buy it now! If you’re a leader than even the subtitle should get you going a bit, “How Missional Leaders Cast Vision, Capture Culture, and Create Movement.” In it he does a masterful job of reframing the conversation about vision that has been so overcooked in “Church-World.” Instead of selling everyone on a secret method, philosophy, or model that we should all adopt he lays out a roadmap to a journey that will lead you, and those you lead with, to discover the unique part that God has created your local church to express and play. The conversation goes far beyond simply coming up with mission, vision, and values statements to build an organization around and instead discusses, in a totally integrated fashion, the underpinnings of building a culture that frees the Church up to be the movement that it was intended to be from the beginning. In it you’ll find helpful tables that simplify the takeaways and the right kind of questions and exercises for you and your team to wrestle through and discover your uniqueness together! In the Author’s own words, he lays the book out in four major parts:

Continue Reading…


Posted in Leadership, Spiritual Formation
Page 2 of 2«12