Get Your Church Staff & Org Structure Unstuck

Tag Archive - unstuck

Get Your Church Staff & Org Structure Unstuck

Sunday, September 14, 2014

Do you feel like your team is achieving its full potential?

Staffing and structure is an area of ministry that The Unstuck Group (the consulting group I’m a part of) is consistently asked about. Regardless of a church’s size or success, few leaders feel like they fully have the right people in the right seats. We want to get church staffing and structure unstuck. We believe that the quality of the team significantly impacts a church’s level of impact. And we’re ready to see your staff start running on all cylinders. That’s why we’re partnering with Vanderbloemen Search Group to seek better solutions.

We need new truths about church staffing and structure. Conventional answers to church staffing problems don’t seem to be cutting it. Today’s challenges will only be overcome by new truths about staffing. Here are a few of the questions we’re looking to answer:

Where do growing churches find new staff members?
How does the size and health of a senior leadership team impact the effectiveness of a church?
Are larger or smaller churches more efficient with staffing?
How does a church’s structure affect its growth or decline?
In multisite churches, what is the most effective staff structure?

We need your help. To uncover new truths, we must explore new research. If you are on a church staff, your experience is vital to this initiative. Will you take the next 8 minutes to complete a short survey? When you do, you’ll earn free early-access to everything we discover. We’re excited to see what happens when churches across the nation get their staff and structure unstuck!

Click to take the Staffing and Structure Survey

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Posted in Staffing

4 Principles of Highly Effective Churches

Sunday, August 3, 2014

This past week the Unstuck Group met in Atlanta for our annual planning and team gathering. Not only is it an incredible team to be a part of but also it’s incredibly rewarding to help churches all around the world get unstuck, which ultimately results in the Kingdom of God taking ground and more people saying yes to follow Jesus!

There is genuine excitement on the team, a sense of unity of purpose and calling to help churches get unstuck, and frankly there’s momentum. But even with the positive momentum and sense of winning there were a few key principles that came up repeatedly in our time together. And as a local church guy at heart I was reminded of these four key principles that all highly effective local churches employ.

1. The Team Outperforms the Individual

It was exciting and humbling to be in the room with the whole Unstuck Group at the same time. It really is a high powered, highly talented, experience rich group. When you hire the Unstuck Group you’re not just hiring a single consultant, you’re bringing the experience of the whole team to the table. As we dreamed about the future and built plans to get us there it was incredible to watch the team make ideas stronger than any individual would alone.

2. Plan Your Work & Work Your Plan

An old Japanese Proverb states that, “Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare.” Most churches are either busy daydreaming or stuck in a nightmare. Fortunately the art of planning and turning vision into focused action is a core strength of the Unstuck Group. It was fun to apply tools that we typically use to help churches get unstuck to our own future and action required to get there.

3. Guard the Gate

You become who you hire. Successful churches are borderline fanatical about who they allow to join the team. They know that people build culture and with each hire they either move closer to, or further away from the culture they’re trying to build.

4. Lean into the Fountain of Youth

Every great ministry started as an idea, but not every idea ends up being a great ministry. The key question is are you generating new ideas? Do you have a drawer full of “fountain of youth ideas” to implement when the time is right. If you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got. And you’ll age out as a church. Great churches innovate, are idea rich, and discover new solutions to old problems.

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Posted in Leadership

10 Findings from New Research on Church Communications

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Recently, The Unstuck Group released its latest research report: Say What?! Key Research on Church Communications. We paused to ask 186 churches about the ways in which they communicate. Here are the 10 most interesting findings from that research:

Smaller churches (1-499 attendees) have significantly higher levels of social media engagement on all major platforms.
Churches are most engaging on Facebook.
Study resources are one of the least offered components online.
More churches communicate their beliefs than their vision online.
Smaller churches (1-499 attendees) engage more volunteers per capita in the area of communications.
Larger churches (500+ attendees) keep communications more focused on church-wide programs than individual ministries.
The average church bulletin includes 7 announcements. (In our experience, that is too many to be effective.)
The average church service includes over 4 stage announcements. (In our experience, 1-2 is most effective.)
Most churches do not have a style guide to communicate with consistency.
Nearly half of churches with a style guide do not use it consistently.

This is definitely the short list of everything contained in this report on church communications. In it, you’ll discover key findings that could enhance the way you communicate in five critical areas. You will also find suggested action steps to get unstuck along with a Communications Scorecard to see how well you’re really doing.

Best of all, this report comes at no cost to you! We simply want to resource your team to get unstuck. So take a moment and download your copy of Say What?! Key Research on Church Communications from The Unstuck Group.

Posted in Creative Arts, Leadership

It’s Time to Join a Leadership Coaching Network

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

I recently caught up with Micah Hutchison who serves as the Executive Pastor at Harvest Community Church in Mesa, AZ. Harvest Community Church started in August of 2009 with a small core team and in less than five years has grown to more than 900 people in attendance. Micah participated in one of my Leadership Coaching Networks and had the following to say about the experience.

“The coaching and leadership conversations we had over six months with Paul elevated my leadership in the church as much as any experience I’ve ever had. I gained valuable tools and strategies for developing the leaders under my care. Additionally our discussions provided a strong foundation for understanding why healthy churches grow, and the time to personalize theory to our specific ministry situation. Paul’s personal ministry and leadership experience and wisdom ensured each coaching session was a valuable experience!”
Micah Hutchison, Executive Pastor at Harvest Community Church in Mesa, AZ

Interested in Joining Us?

Here are all the details about the leadership coaching network in Phoenix. My teammate at The Unstuck Group, Tony Morgan, is facilitating a similar network in Atlanta

Complete the coaching network application and pay your initial deposit to hold your space. The deposit will be your first month’s fees. The next Phoenix and Atlanta networks will start in October 2014. The deadline for your application is August 15, 2014.

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Posted in Leadership

5 Articles that will Help You Make Vision Real

Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Thank you for making May a great month here at Helping Churches Make Vision Real! It’s great staying connected with you through social media and hearing about how helpful different articles have 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 “4 Indispensable Truths about the Art of Planning”

All of us have been in planning meetings before with a team that seemed to have had a break through moment. You know, that moment when everyone says, “Yes! That’s exactly the direction we need to move, and that’s exactly how we need to get there from here!” There was energy, excitement and unity as everyone left the meeting. But the more time that passed after the meeting dismissed the more that energy that was there faded and the less movement towards actualizing the plan took place. In fact a large majority of planning meetings don’t actually provoke much real change in most churches and organizations. Here are 4 reasons why many of your plans aren’t really getting you anywhere:

#2 “Leadercast 2014 Recap”

If you missed the 2014 Leadercast, then you missed some great content, great speakers, and incredible ideas that have the potential to shift your thinking when it comes to leadership. But no worries! Now you’ve got all the notes to every session right here at your fingertips for free! Hope you enjoy!

#3 “Take the 2014 Church Budgeting Survey”

Participate in the survey & get a free copy of the Executive Summary! Get answers to questions like:

What percentage of our budget should go towards Staffing, Operations, Ministry, and Missions?
How much debt do churches of similar size carry?
Do these percentages change as the size of our church changes over time?
How do different churches go about building their annual budget?

#4 “New Leadership Coaching Networks Launching this Fall”

Over the last 3 years of working with The Unstuck Group one of the most rewarding and enjoyable things I’ve had the opportunity to do is facilitate leadership coaching networks for Sr. Leaders serving in local churches around the country. I’m excited to let you know that I’m receiving applications for my next coaching network beginning this fall. Be sure to get your application in before the deadline of August 15. A couple of the spots have already been filled so space is limited!

#5 “Helping Your Church get Unstuck”

Churches get stuck for all kinds of reasons. It’s okay to get stuck, it’s just not okay to stay that way. There’s too much Kingdom potential on the line. That’s why 2014 needs to be the year that your church finally gets unstuck! At the Unstuck Group we help churches grow their impact through church consulting and coaching experiences designed to focus vision, strategy, and action. At the Unstuck Group we don’t just offer consulting solutions. We help churches get unstuck!

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Posted in Leadership