Category Archives: BookNotes

The Rebirth of Aesthetics

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aes – thet – ics – (noun) a set of principles concerned with the nature and appreciation of beauty

An idea is only an intention until it has been perfected, polished, and produced.

– Marty Neumeier

According to Marty Neumeier, Director of Transformation at the Liquid Agency, the same principles that activate other forms of art will soon become essential to the art of leadership. The more technological our culture becomes, the more we’ll need the sensual and metaphorical power of beauty.

aesthetics

Take a look at the chart below, and see how the aesthetics of the single word on the left inspires your curiosity of leadership through the questions on the right.

The Aesthetics of Leadership

Contrast – How can we differentiate ourselves?

Depth –  How can we succeed on many levels?

Focus – What should we NOT do?

Harmony – How can we achieve synergy?

Integrity – How can we forge the parts into a whole?

Line – What is our trajectory over time?

Motion – What advantage can we gain from speed?

Novelty – How can we use the surprise element?

Order – How should we structure our organization?

Pattern – Where have we seen this before?

Repetition – Where are the economies of scale?

Rhythm – How can we optimize time?

Proportion – How can we keep our strategy balanced?

Scale – How big should our organization be?

Shape – Where should we draw the edges?

Texture – How do details enliven our culture?

Unity – What is the higher-order solution?

Variety – How can diversity drive innovation?

What beautiful thing are you creating in your organization today?

When I’m working on a problem, I never think about beauty. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.

– Buckminster Fuller

inspired by and adapted from Marty Neumeier’s The Designful Company

The Designful Company

How Do You Get Dreamers and Doers on the Same Page?

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Most pastors will invest more time on preaching preparation for the next month than they will on vision communication for the next five years. How about you?

That quick experiment is a great way to introduce a special two-part SUMS Remix devoted to the visionary planning problems you must solve.

Will Mancini, founder of Auxano and author of God Dreams, has never had a pastor disagree with him about the simple time analysis above. Most quickly nod with agreement, and understand that something is not quite right about it.

Of the many reasons (let’s be honest… excuses) given, one of the most important is that no one has shown the pastor how to spend time on vision planning. That’s what God Dreams is designed to do. Central to the book’s process is the Horizon Storyline, a tool leaders can use to connect short-term action steps with the long-range dream, while leveraging the power of storytelling to make the plan stick.

Vision Planning Problem #4: People who like to dream and people who like to execute are rarely on the same page. 

THE QUICK SUMMARY – Sprint, by Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky, and Braden Kowitz

From three partners at Google Ventures, a unique five-day process for solving tough problems, proven at more than a hundred companies.

Entrepreneurs and leaders face big questions every day: What’s the most important place to focus your effort, and how do you start? What will your idea look like in real life? How many meetings and discussions does it take before you can be sure you have the right solution?

Now there’s a surefire way to answer these important questions: the sprint. Designer Jake Knapp created the five-day process at Google, where sprints were used on everything from Google Search to Google X. He joined Braden Kowitz and John Zeratsky at Google Ventures, and together they have completed more than a hundred sprints with companies in mobile, e-commerce, healthcare, finance, and more.

A practical guide to answering critical business questions, Sprint is a book for teams of any size, from small startups to Fortune 100s, from teachers to nonprofits. It’s for anyone with a big opportunity, problem, or idea who needs to get answers today.

Solution #4: The Horizon Storyline will bring your dreamers and doers together around one vision.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION 

The fact that most primary leaders in the church communicate for a living amplifies this problem. Sermon development is intuitive, creative, and idea-oriented. It’s often hard to get conceptual thinkers like that sitting down with the operational leaders who manage, budget, and make decision after decision, day after day. These two staff functions usually pass like ships in the night hardly recognizing the other is present.

Entrepreneurs and leaders face big questions every day: What’s the most important place to focus your effort, and how do you start? What will your idea look like in real life? How many meetings and discussions does it take before you can be sure you have the right solution?

Good ideas are hard to find. And even the best ideas face an uncertain path to real-world success. That’s true whether you’re running a startup, teaching a class, or working inside a large organization.

The sprint is Google Venture’s unique five-day process for answering crucial questions through prototyping and testing ideas with customers. It’s a “greatest hits” of business strategy, innovation, behavioral science, design, and more – packaged into a step-by-step process.

Sprint is a DIY guide for running your own sprint to answer your pressing business questions. On Monday, you’ll map out the problem and pick an important place to focus. On Tuesday, you’ll sketch competing solutions on paper. On Wednesday, you’ll make difficult decisions and turn your ideas into a testable hypothesis. On Thursday, you’ll hammer out a realistic prototype. And on Friday, you’ll test it with real live humans.

Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky, and Braden Kowitz, Sprint 

A NEXT STEP

The sprint, as outlined in the book of the same name, is a five-day process for answering tough questions through design, prototyping, and testing ideas. First developed at Google Ventures, it’s now been used by hundreds of organizations around the world.

The sprint process is a literal “greatest hits” of strategy, innovation, behavior science, design thinking – packaged into a one-week process.

When your team takes on the process of a sprint, you can shortcut the endless debate cycle and compress months of time into a single week. It’s almost like having a team superpower: you will be able to fast-forward into the future to see the finished “product” – without having to make expensive commitments of resources.

Gather your team together and watch this video to help set the stage for the process.

It will be helpful for you to review this DIY page prior to this session.

Set the stage for the Sprint Process by downloading the kickoff PDF. Review it and be comfortable enough to lead the session as noted.

Download the Sprint Checklists and review the first three pages, “Setting the Stage” and “Supplies.”

Choose a big picture vision and use the Sprint Process with your team.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 47-4, August 2016.

 

 

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

The Playground of the Designer: Working in the Space Between Logic and Magic

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ChurchWorld leaders need to think like designers.

Before you rule that out by saying you’re not creative, consider the following thoughts, adapted from The Designful Company by Marty Neumeier.

The easiest way to understand the design process is to see how it differs from the traditional organizational processes you are used to. Most decision-making processes used in churches today were derived from the business world. Those processes came from the early management theory developed as the Industrial Age hit its stride. Those processes emphasized two main activities: knowing and doing. Leaders and organizations would analyze a problem, look to a standard box of options – actions that had been proven to work in the past – and then execute the solution. The traditional church organization is all head and legs. 

The designful organization inserts a third activity: making.

Leaders still need to analyze the problem (knowing), but they then “make” a new set of options, and then execute that solution (doing). By inserting making between knowing and doing, leaders can bring an entirely different way of working to the problem. The head and legs are improved by adding a pair of hands.

In reality, designers don’t actually “solve” problems. They work through them. They use non-logical processes that are difficult to express in words but easier to express in action. They use models, mockups, sketches, and stories as their vocabulary. They experiment and try new things. If they fail, that’s no problem – they’ve just discovered a way that won’t work.

Leader/Designers operate in the space between knowing and doing, prototyping new solutions that arise from four strengths of empathy, intuition, imagination, and idealism (more about this in a future post).

In the meantime, if you are a leader, you should be a designer. But don’t think you are creating a masterpiece right out of the gate. Designing, innovating, making – whatever you call it, it’s a messy, chaotic process.

One that you can’t afford to ignore.

When the great innovation appears, it will almost certainly be in a muddled, incomplete, and confusing form. For any speculation that does not at first glance look crazy, there is no hope.     – physicist Freeman Dyson

An organization that automatically jumps from knowing to doing will find that innovation is unavailable to it.

To be innovative, an organization needs not only the head and legs of knowing and doing, but also the intuitive hands of making.

How are you putting hands to work in your church?

inspired by and adapted from The Designful Company, by Marty Neumeier

The Designful Company

Lead Yourself Well to Lead Others Better

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It has been said that the people close to us determine our level of success. Moses learned this lesson in the wilderness and so implemented a plan to put competent, godly leaders next to him. David had his mighty men. Paul had Barnabas, John Mark, Timothy, Titus, and Phoebe.

When ministers decide to be leaders, they cross a very important line. They no longer judge themselves solely by what they can do themselves; the truest measure of the impact of a leader is found in what those around them accomplish. In God’s economy, our personal development happens most as we are developing those He has called around us.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – The 4 Dimensions of Extraordinary Leadership, by Jenni Catron

You have the capacity to become an extraordinary leader—if you are willing to embrace a deeper definition of leadership and take action to apply it.

In The 4 Dimensions of Extraordinary Leadership, Jenni Catron, executive church leader and author of Clout, reveals the secrets to standout leadership found in the Great Commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

Weaving a winsome narrative filled with inspiring real-life stories, hard-won wisdom, and practical applications, Catron unpacks four essential aspects of growing more influential: your heart for relational leadership, your soul for spiritual leadership, your mind for managerial leadership, and your strength for visionary leadership.

Leadership isn’t easy, but it is possible to move from ordinary to extraordinary. Jenni Catron shows the way. 

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

Look at almost any definition of a leader, and it will include something about others: influencing them, directing their work, guiding their development. And while this is true, leaders must remember that the first priority of a leader is to lead yourself.

Leaders like to lead. And when we say we like to lead, we usually mean we like to lead others, right? But if you can’t lead yourself well, you will be ill equipped to lead others.

Part of the responsibility of leadership is understanding your influence on others. Leadership is only as strong as the leader. And that responsibility, if you’re grasping the weight of it, is the reason why your leadership journey must begin with leading yourself well.

Self-leadership is a willingness to make yourself uncomfortable in order to lead yourself and others to bigger dreams and greater goals. It requires the humility of introspection. Many leaders skip over self-leadership because the discomfort of facing their own limitations is frightening enough to discourage them before they’ve even begun.

Jenni Catron, The 4 Dimensions of Extraordinary Leadership 

A NEXT STEP

The centerpiece of Jenni Catron’s book is based on the fundamental biblical truth found in Mark 12:28-30, commonly known as the Great Commandment: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your strength and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

Using this scripture as a foundation, Catron develops a multi-dimensional leadership model that requires leading from our whole selves – heart, soul, mind, and strength.

As noted in the quotations above, Catron feels that first learning to lead yourself is a critical foundation of influence. With this model in mind, set aside time to inventory yourself in each area.

You will find the self-assessment described in the book in an online version listed in the Recommended Resources below, but first, reflect on these questions developed from the book.

Heart – Relational Leadership

  • How are you connecting with those you lead?
  • Do you know their stories and what inspires them?

Soul – Spiritual Leadership

  • What does spiritual formation look like for you?
  • When do you most feel like you’re experiencing spiritual growth?

Mind – Managerial Leadership

  • What systems do you have in place to instill disciplines that transform ideas into accomplishments?
  • How do you demonstrate stewardship in making good, consistent decisions about how to best manage your resources?
  • What principles do you follow in creating a culture of accountability for yourself?

Strength – Visionary Leadership

  • How strong do you feel about the vision you’re working toward?
  • Is there anything you need to do to help own it more?

Once you spend time taking this inventory, prioritize three actions to take in the next three months, with specific and measurable markers of success.

Excerpted from SUMS Remix 44-3, July 2016

 

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

Effective Collaboration Requires Separating Critical and Creative Thinking

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Effective teams do not just agree on vision, they own it and align every ounce of energy and effort toward accomplishing the vision. As a leader, you can sense the difference between your team liking the vision and your team leading toward vision.

In most instances, simple agreement feels like an invisible wall sits somewhere within the team. A divide of mistrust, misunderstanding, or missed input often exists in the origination of the vision. This always leads to misalignment and missed opportunity in the execution of vision.

Every busy week brings a fresh truckload of glass bricks for your team to stack on this invisible wall. No one has ill motives. No one intends cement separation, but the walls go up without conscious notice as the pace of ministry continues.

The good news is that it’s NOT rocket science to take down a wall. Haven’t you noticed it’s easier (and usually more fun) to demolish than it is to build? What your team needs are sledgehammers to take down these hard-to-see barriers.

How do you tear down your team’s invisible walls? To help your team build ownership and collaboration at the source of your vision, learn to separate critical and creative thinking.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – Hatch! by C. McNair Wilson

Most Corporate Brainstorming Isn’t Brainstorming… not even close. (Usually what’s going on is playful arguing with snacks on the table.)

McNair Wilson spent a decade inside Disney – mostly at Disney Imagineering designing theme parks. His teams hatched so many ideas he was invited to teach his methods through Disney University. His “7 Agreements of Brainstorming” will assist your team in launching world-class products, services, and programs. You will create competition-crushing concepts using brainstorming that works! (And you can keep the snacks on the table.)

Whatever’s next for your organization, why not make it best? HATCH! is a highly entertaining book filled with the author’s witty drawings and scores of examples of McNair’s 7 Agreements in use by big corporations and small non-profits.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

The problem with brainstorming is that everyone thinks they already do it.

The reality is that nobody knows how to brainstorm anymore. It’s not your colleagues’ fault – or yours. Nobody knows how to brainstorm anymore because it is likely every model we have seen contains significant roadblocks to actual innovation.

Far too often, the “way you’ve always done it” is the wrong way – the least productive and the most frustrating.

According to former Disney Imagineer C. McNair Wilson, real brainstorming is both fun to do and very productive- all at the same time.

Done right, brainstorming produces amazing results because “we are smarter than me.”

Start your brainstorming by separating Creative Thinking and Critical Thinking. Both must be done, but they must be done separately if anything of lasting value will be accomplished.

Creative thinking is idea generating, imagining, wondering out loud, dreaming, “what-iffing.” The decidedly different activity of Critical Thinking is not so much thinking negatively as it is thinking with analysis, focus, intentionality, and purpose.

You will have made huge strides toward powerful Creative Thinking once your team embraces and agrees to this important distinction: Creative and Critical Thinking are not part of the same activity and do not, cannot, must not occur simultaneously. It doesn’t work. They cannot occupy the same space. They are the beginning and end of the process whether it is five minutes or five months. Folding them together means doing neither activity effectively. And it is not brainstorming.

You cannot be fully, actively, creative if you are simultaneously thinking critically.

It is vital that you learn to postpone judgment, evaluation, and analysis until you and your team get everything out of your head and up on the wall. You are hatching a plan. Every chicken, eventually, leaves the egg. During Creative Thinking you are offering thought fragments, whims, notions, doodles, bits, and pieces.

The key to Creative Thinking is to learn not to care. That is to say, get to a point where you learn not to care of your ideas make sense, are possible, or if they fit into the project budget. You will care about all that later. This is true for all the ideas that flash through your mind during Creative Thinking.

  • Don’t deliberate, divulge.
  • Don’t analyze, add.
  • Don’t decide, confide.
  • Don’t edit, say it.

You cannot possibly know when a tiny, fleeting thought will be just the spark to ignite a bonfire of creativity in other team members.

C. McNair Wilson, Hatch

A NEXT STEP

Auxano developed a team collaboration tool that we use with every church team. The Collaboration Cube specifically addresses this need for separation between creative and critical thinking.

The Cube is built around the three modes of good collaboration: Blue Sky, Discuss/Challenge, and Decide/ Commit. Each mode represents the ground rules for how the team is interacting at any given time. A facilitator, team leader, or team member can use the Cube to signal a shift or recommend a change of the team’s mode.

Blue Sky mode is the classic brainstorming time where it is critical to generate a great volume of ideas while delaying judgment or critique. The basic principle of creativity is that great ideas are generated through many ideas. While many teams are familiar with the general idea of brainstorming, few practice it, because of the discipline required to suspend judgment, or Critical Thinking. Use the Cube to strengthen this mode of Creative Thinking.

Discuss/Challenge is the default mode where four Critical Thinking roles are put into play and where feedback and pushback are openly discussed. Discuss/ Challenge is the dominant mode that occurs during collaboration. Remember, each role is a default style that each team member tends to play, but during collaboration, each person can pass in and out of each role as collaboration progresses to Decide/Commit.

Decide/Commit is the mode signaled by the facilitator when moving toward a consensus decision or clarifying final action steps. In this mode a leader is able to “land the plane” on the meeting or session. This is the time when the facilitator or leader senses that enough dialogue and “ah-ha moments” have occurred to move toward a meaningful conclusion. When it comes time to Decide/Commit and you poll your team, use this definition of consensus: “Consensus is not when 80% of people feel 100% good about an idea; consensus is when 100% of the team feels 80% good about an idea.”

Visit collaborationcube.com to learn more and to purchase Cubes for your team.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 50-3, issued September 2016.

 

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

Does Your Organization’s Home Page Welcome Everyone?

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“If you’re not found in a Google search for churches in your area, you don’t exist to people moving into town.” That quote, by church planter and pastors.com editor Brandon Cox may be a painful truth to you, but it is a truth nevertheless.

The importance of a well thought out and designed website cannot be overstated. Today’s rapidly changing patterns of communication are founded within the digital world, and are only increasing in importance. Last year, the number of networked devices in the world DOUBLED the global population.

It is vitally important that you understand the way your viewers are viewing and using your website – not just your members and regular attenders.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – Everybody Writes, by Ann Handley

Everybody Writes is a go-to guide to attracting and retaining customers through stellar online communication, because in our content-driven world, every one of us is, in fact, a writer.

If you have a website, you are a publisher. If you are on social media, you are in marketing. And that means that we are all relying on our words to carry our marketing messages. We are all writers.

In Everybody Writes, top marketing veteran Ann Handley gives expert guidance and insight into the process and strategy of content creation, production and publishing, with actionable how-to advice designed to get results.

These lessons and rules apply across all of your online assets — like web pages, home pages, landing pages, blogs, email, marketing offers, and on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media. Ann deconstructs the strategy and delivers a practical approach to create ridiculously compelling and competent content. It’s designed to be the go-to guide for anyone creating or publishing any kind of online content — whether you’re a big brand or you’re small and solo. 

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

At Auxano, we believe that every church is unmistakably unique and incomparably different. God doesn’t mass-produce His church. Your church has hundreds of current stories, represented by its current participants, and thousands of past stories, represented by those who have come before you.

How are you telling those stories?

This is not just true of your church in general, but it applies to your church’s home page as well. As noted above, your website is the digital doorway to your church.

Is it a welcoming doorway for all, or only a few?

Your home page is a metaphorical threshold to your organization.

It’s apt that we use the very human word “home” to refer to the main page of a website, because that word evokes warmth and belonging.

That’s exactly the mindset to get into when you create content for your own organization’s home page – the Web page that is rendered when your organization’s domain name is typed into a Web-enabled device.

Just as in your own actual home, you want visitors to feel welcomed as soon as they step in – to feel comfortable, to sense that you’re happy to see them. And because this is our organization, you want them to get a sense of their surrounding in the blink of an eye: an idea of who you are and what you do – and this is critical – why it matters to them.

Here are seven guidelines for creating home page content:

Speak to your audience. All good content is rooted in a clear understanding of your audience.

Communicate a focus on them. Part of understanding your readers is know what motivates them. When you know what that is, you’re able to communicate how you can help them.

Keep it simple. Don’t be tempted to fill space with lots of copy and graphics – especially above the part of the Web page that first appears in browsers when it’s opened.

Use words you audience uses. You don’t need to embellish who you are and what you do. Use familiar words.

Use you promiscuously. On your home page, use you more than you use us or we.

Now what? What do you want the reader to do next?

Convey trust. Your home page should include elements that suggest others trust you.

Ann Handley, Everybody Writes

A NEXT STEP

Brandon Cox, church planter and editor of pastors.com, has developed a very helpful “audit” for your church website. Using this audit at your next leadership team meeting will be a helpful start to conversations about your website’s home page.

To prepare, set up a large screen with Internet access. Also, make sure your team members have their mobile phones or pad devices. Do not tell them of the specific purpose of this session.

At the beginning, ask the following questions, recording answers on a chart tablet. Ask the team NOT to look on their devices for the answers.

  • Is our website responsive and mobile-friendly?
  • Is our most basic information easy to find on our main homepage (location, service times, etc.)?
  • Do we use imagery that tells people that we’re human, we’re alive, and we’re welcoming?
  • Can people easily know what we believe? What we value? And how we function?
  • Do we have links to our Facebook page and other social media profiles on our website?
  • Is there a way for people to reach out and get in touch with us without leaving our website?
  • Can people easily know how to pursue next steps such as baptism, joining a small group, or volunteering in an area of ministry?
  • Do we have a page dedicated to our staff and/or key leaders so that potential visitors can know who we are?

Now, ask one half of the group to pull up the church website on their mobile device, and the other half to look at the website on the large screen. Display a chart tablet sheet with the seven guidelines suggested above.

Go back through each of the nine audit questions again, this time answering them as they really are. Note any differences between initial perception and reality, making sure both screen and mobile platforms are covered.

At the completion of this exercise, create a top five action list of the most critical website revisions you need to make, along with assigned target completion dates and individuals responsible.

Excerpted from SUMS Remix 40-3, May 2016.

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

Actions Always Follow Beliefs

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How can you help your church transition from passive worship-service attenders to active Jesus-serving disciplers?

The failure to follow the Lord’s command to make disciples in Matthew 28:18-20 stands as possibly the single most glaring act of negligence by the Church today.

This neglect has lead to many well-intentioned families to think of themselves as an audience to be entertained at the church, rather than an army to be deployed from church.

Discipleship must function as the heartbeat of church ministry inside of every Sunday gathering and ministry program.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – The Great Omission, by Dallas Willard

The last command Jesus gave the church before he ascended to heaven was the Great Commission, the call for Christians to “make disciples of all the nations.” But Christians have responded by making “Christians,” not “disciples.” This, according to brilliant scholar and renowned Christian thinker Dallas Willard, has been the church’s Great Omission.

According to Willard, the word disciple occurs 269 times in the New Testament, but the word “Christian” is found three times. The disciple of Jesus stands on the pages of the New Testament as the first level of basic transportation in the Kingdom of God.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

A look across the church landscape today reveals an almost insidious assumption: that people can be “Christians” forever and never become disciples. People in many churches in Western culture look at the Great Commission as something to be carried out somewhere else, particularly other countries. The assumption is that we don’t need “it” because we are basically right to begin with.

That assumption leads down a dead-end path of totally misunderstanding what it means to be a disciple of Christ, and how to become one.

However we may understand the details, there can be no doubt, on the biblical picture of human life, that we were meant to be inhabited by God and to live a power beyond ourselves.

First, there is absolutely nothing in what Jesus himself or his early followers taught that suggests you can decide to just to enjoy forgiveness at Jesus’ expense and have nothing more to do with him. How could one actually trust him for forgiveness of sins while not trusting him for much more than that?

Second, if we do not become His apprentices in Kingdom living, we remain locked in defeat so far as our moral intentions are concerned. That is where most professing Christians find themselves today. People, generally, choose to sin. But, even so, no one wants to be a sinner.

Third, only avid discipleship to Christ through the Spirit brings the inward transformation of thought, feeling, and character that “cleans the inside of the cup (Matthew 23:25) and “makes the tree good” (Matthew 12:33). As we study with Jesus we increasingly become on the inside exactly what we are on the outside, where actions and moods and attitudes visibly play over our body, alive in its social context. An amazing simplicity will take over our lives – a simplicity that is really just transparency.

Finally, for the one who makes sure to walk as close to Jesus as possible there comes the reliable exercise of a power that is beyond them in dealing with the problems and evils that afflict earthly existence. Jesus is actually looking for people he can trust with his power.

Dallas Willard, The Great Omission

A NEXT STEP

A mind obscured by excuses may see discipleship as a mystery, or even something to be dreaded. But becoming a disciple – desiring and intending to be like someone – is a very common thing. If we really intend to be like Christ, it should be obvious to everyone around us.

Evaluate the health and effectiveness of your church’s current discipleship ministry.

  • What percentage of people who are active in your church are currently involved in discipleship ministry?
  • What percentage of those are experiencing spiritual transformation?
  • Is discipleship contained within the large group of our church or does it permeate into small groups?
  • In what ways are people experiencing true relationships, a sense of community, because of your current discipleship ministry?
  • In what ways are you and others in your church becoming more like Jesus because of your current discipleship ministry? Which areas are lacking?
  • How effectively is your church’s discipleship ministry training believers to meet the needs of a hurting society?
  • How are new leaders being raised up through your current discipleship ministry?

Discuss the implications of these questions with your leadership team. Outline 1-2 strategic actions to take in the next 4-6 weeks that increase health in areas of discipleship.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 51-1, published October, 2016.

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

Great Presenters Connect with the Audience by Getting Personal

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There is really no situation much worse than finding yourself caught in a presentation or conference where the person speaking has something important to share, but remains clearly unable to share it. Those moments are a great reminder that, in order to reach someone with the message of the gospel, we first must be able to capture his or her attention.

As a church leader, you may be confident and used to speaking in front of audiences of all sizes. However, truly connecting with people requires more than confidence and experience. Great communicators have a plan for developing their message to present it in a compelling and engaging way.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – TED Talks by Chris Anderson

For anyone who has ever been inspired by a TED talk…

…this is an insider’s guide to creating talks that are unforgettable.

Since taking over TED in the early 2000s, Chris Anderson has shown how carefully crafted short talks can be the key to unlocking empathy, stirring excitement, spreading knowledge, and promoting a shared dream. Done right, a talk can electrify a room and transform an audience’s worldview. Done right, a talk is more powerful than anything in written form.

This book explains how the miracle of powerful public speaking is achieved, and equips you to give it your best shot. There is no set formula; no two talks should be the same. The goal is for you to give the talk that only you can give. But don’t be intimidated. You may find it more natural than you think.

Chris Anderson has worked behind the scenes with all the TED speakers who have inspired us the most, and here he shares insights from such favorites as Sir Ken Robinson, Amy Cuddy, Bill Gates, Elizabeth Gilbert, Salman Khan, Dan Gilbert, Mary Roach, Matt Ridley, and dozens more — everything from how to craft your talk’s content to how you can be most effective on stage. This is the 21st-century’s new manual for truly effective communication and it is a must-read for anyone who is ready to create impact with their ideas.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

It’s one thing to give a good presentation that your audience seems to enjoy. It’s quite another thing to create a unique, exciting, and memorable experience that has your listeners on the edge of their seats, and more importantly, ready to act.

Would you like to make a lasting impression on your listeners? What if you could design an experience that leaves them in deep thought, changes their worldview, or best of all, changes their lives?

In order to do something like that, you have to connect with your audience.

Knowledge can’t be pushed into a brain. It has to be pulled in.

Before you can build an idea in someone else’s mind, you need their permission. People are naturally cautious about opening up their minds – the most precious thing they own – to complete strangers. You need to find a way to overcome that caution. And the way you do that is to make visible the human being cowering inside you.

Hearing a talk is a completely different thing from reading an essay. It’s not just the words. Not at all. It’s the person delivering the words. To make an impact, there has to be a human connection. You can give the most brilliant talk, with crystal-clear explanations and laser-sharp logic, but if you don’t first connect with the audience, it just won’t land. Even if the content is, as some level, understood, it won’t be activated but simply filed away in some soon-to-be-forgotten mental archive.

Five suggestions to make that vial early connection:

Make eye contact, right from the start. Scientists have shown that just the act of two people staring at each other will trigger mirror neuron activity that literally adopts the emotional state of the other person.

 

Show vulnerability. Willing to be vulnerable is one of the most powerful tools a speaker can wield.

 

Make ’em laugh – but not squirm. Audiences who laugh with you quickly come to like you.

 

Park your ego. The purpose of your talk is to gift an idea, not to self-promote.

 

Tell a story. We’re born to love stories. They are instant generators of interest, empathy, emotion, and intrigue.

Chris Anderson, TED Talks

A NEXT STEP

To help you develop the concept of connecting with your audience, practice the following exercise the next time you are speaking.

A few moments before you prepare to step up to the podium or center stage to speak, pick one person in the room to focus on – for example, a young man in the middle of the room about halfway back.

Think about that man. What does he know and need to know in order to respond favorably to your message?

As you begin to speak, make eye contact with the man, and as you do, reach out toward him with an appropriate hand gesture. As you hand extends, your body will naturally follow. As you lean forward, your head will dip into a head nod, which will cause the man to nod back to you involuntarily. In order to maintain your eye connection with him, you will have to look up through your eyebrows, causing them to rise, making your features expressive.

When you practice the actions above while speaking, you are setting the tone for the rest of your presentation by making a connection to your audience.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 52-1, published October, 2016.

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

What Happens When Your Vision is Too Rigid and Can’t Account for Change in the Environment?

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Most pastors will invest more time on preaching preparation for the next month than they will on vision communication for the next five years. How about you?

That quick experiment is a great way to introduce a special two-part SUMS Remix devoted to the visionary planning problems you must solve.

Will Mancini, founder of Auxano and author of God Dreams, has never had a pastor disagree with him about the simple time analysis above. Most quickly nod with agreement, and understand that something is not quite right about it.

Of the many reasons (let’s be honest… excuses) given, one of the most important is that no one has shown the pastor how to spend time on vision planning. That’s what God Dreams is designed to do. Central to the book’s process is the Horizon Storyline, a tool leaders can use to connect short-term action steps with the long-range dream, while leveraging the power of storytelling to make the plan stick.

Vision Planning Problem #8: The plan is too rigid and can’t account for changes in the ministry environment.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – What Matters Now, Gary Hamel

This is not a book about one thing. It’s not a 250-page dissertation on leadership, teams or motivation. Instead, it’s an agenda for building organizations that can flourish in a world of diminished hopes, relentless change, and ferocious competition.

This is not a book about doing better. It’s not a manual for people who want to tinker at the margins. Instead, it’s an impassioned plea to reinvent management as we know it—to rethink the fundamental assumptions we have about capitalism, organizational life, and the meaning of work.

Obviously, there are lots of things that matter now. But in a world of fractured certainties and battered trust, some things matter more than others. While the challenges facing organizations are limitless; leadership bandwidth isn’t. That’s why you have to be clear about what really matters now. What are the fundamental, make-or-break issues that will determine whether your organization thrives or dives in the years ahead.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

Many classic strategic plans assume that the immediate future will resemble the recent past. Anyone alive in the 21st century knows that this assumption is no longer valid. We simply must be ready to adapt to major changes in our world from culture and politics to communication and technology.

I’ve never met a leader who swears allegiance to the status quo, and yet few organizations seem capable of proactive change.

The Christian church in its various forms, and the great universities it spawned, have proven to be some of humanity’s most durable institutions. From the beginning, they have been missional at their core – but as change accelerates, they will have to become even more so.

As institutions mature, the positive thrust of mission diminishes and the pull of habit strengthens – until one day, the organization can no longer escape the gravitational field of its own legacy.

What’s true of churches is true for other institutions: the more “organized” and tightly “managed” they are, the less adaptable they are. Not surprisingly, the most resilient thing on the planet, the Web, is loosely organized and lightly managed, and so was the first century Christian church. The lesson here? To thrive in turbulent times, organizations must become a bit more disorganized and unmanaged – less structured, less hierarchical, and less routinized.

Gary Hamel, What Matters Now

A NEXT STEP

On a chart tablet, make three columns:

  • Things we are presently doing, but should stop
  • Things the church should be doing
  • Things we are doing well

Take 15 minutes for the team to individually consider these categories. Have each person select his or her top two in each category and write their initials by them on the chart tablet. Do not allow comments until everyone is done and the list is complied.

Talk through each item and rank the list. Be sure to include the “whys” and “why nots” in your discussions. After the exercise, discuss what action steps, if any, should be taken.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 48-3, published July 2016.

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

How Do Great Leaders Keep Their Team Focused and Execute Decisions Well?

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What’s at stake if teams don’t make better team decisions? From a long list of potential answers, four stand out:

  • Lost time: Poor team decision-making simply burns more time. It may be more time in the meeting itself, because there were no collaboration guidelines. Perhaps it’s lost time outside of the meeting in hallway conversations, because ideas weren’t fully explored or vetted.
  • Dissipated energy: Poor team decision-making leaves questions unanswered and half-baked solutions in the atmosphere. We don’t know exactly where we stand or what we’ve decided. The thought of revisiting an unfinished conversation itself is an unwelcome burden.
  • Mediocre ideas: Poor team decision-making fortifies our weakest thinking. Innovation is something we read about but never experience. We cut-n-past the ideas of others, because we don’t know how to generate our own. We traffic in good ideas and miss great ones.
  • Competing visions: Poor team decision-making invites an unhealthy drift toward independence. No one has the conscious thought that they have a competing vision. But in reality, there are differences to each person’s picture of their future. It’s impossible for this divergence not to happen if there is no dialogue.

So, how do you start to create a dynamic of collaborative decision-making?

Utilizing cognitive diversity.

THE QUICK SUMMARY
A groundbreaking book that sheds new light on the vital importance of teams as the fundamental unit of organization and competition in the global economy.

Offering vivid reports of the latest scientific research, compelling case studies, and great storytelling, Team Genius shows managers and executives that the planning, design, and management of great teams no longer have to be a black art. It explores solutions to essential questions that could spell the difference between success and obsolescence.

Throughout, Rich Karlgaard and Michael S. Malone share insights and real-life examples gleaned from their careers as journalists, analysts, investors, and globetrotting entrepreneurs, meeting successful teams and team leaders to reveal some “new truths”:

  • The right team size is usually one fewer person than what managers think they need.
  • The greatest question facing good teams is not how to succeed, but how to die.
  • Good “chemistry” often makes for the least effective teams.
  • Cognitive diversity yields the highest performance gains—but only if you understand what it is.
  • How to find the “bliss point” in team intimacy—and become three times more productive.
  • How to identify destructive team members before they do harm.
  • Why small teams are 40 percent more likely to create a successful breakthrough than a solo genius is.
  • Why groups of 7 (± 2), 150, and 1,500 are magic sizes for teams.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

Teams—we depend on them for both our professional success and our personal happiness. But isn’t it odd how little scrutiny we give them? The teams that make up our lives are created mostly by luck, happenstance, or circumstance—but rarely by design. In trivial matters—say, a bowling team, the leadership of a neighborhood group, or a holiday party committee—success by serendipity is already risky enough. But when it comes to actions by fast-moving start-ups, major corporations, nonprofit institutions, and governments, leaving things to chance can be downright dangerous.

Research has concluded that people think differently from one another. But even when we accept that fact, few leaders give it much consideration when teams are formed. As a result, everything looks good on paper, the team members’ talents dovetail neatly, everyone gets along well and yet in action, the team just doesn’t work.

When it comes to teams, traditional definitions of “diversity” are meaningless. Cognitive diversity – how people think – is all that matters.

“Dream teams” don’t always perform as well as teams composed of lesser players who exhibit great chemistry do. All effective teams include individuals who can function together as the “brain systems” required to achieve the group’s task.

It’s not enough for resumes and personalities to match. In fact, doing so may be the worst thing you can do. Given the choice of a team that is a rainbow of races and cultures but whose members all went to the same or similar universities, and a team entirely composed of African American women (or Asian men) of different ages, classes, educations, and personality types, you are far more likely to have success with the latter.

To help foster this concept, leaders need to:

  • Know their own preferences, weaknesses, strengths, and understand how their own style can stifle creativity.

  • Help team members learn and acknowledge their intellectual preferences and differences.

  • Keep project goals front and center, and schedule time for divergent thinking (generating multiple options) and convergent thinking (focusing on a single option and its implementation).

  • Devise guidelines in advance for working together. For example, establish a rule (and get team members’ agreement) up front that any conflicts will not get personal and that any reasons for disagreements will always be stated.

Rich Karlgaard and Michael S. Malone, Team Genius

A NEXT STEP

When your team is stuck and can’t decide on moving forward, try the following exercise to evaluate ideas according to their level of innovation, their desirability, and feasibility.

  1. Write the idea or decision to be made on a chart tablet, and divide your team into three groups. Here’s the kicker: As leader of the team, try your best to place members of your team into groups that would not be their first choice. Give them 30 minutes to do their group work.
  2. The first group evaluates innovation – is the idea new? The group should evaluate the idea as:
    1. Disruptively new (might cause major consequences)
    2. Totally new (people might become familiar without major consequences)
    3. Improvement (improves something in a way people haven’t noticed before)
  3. The second group evaluates the desirability. Do people want this idea? What kind of needs are fulfilled? Evaluate the ideas as:
    1. Proof of need and desire – there is evidence of need and desire
    2. Assumed need and desire – there are high chances of need and desire
    3. Unknown need and desire.
  4. The third group will evaluate the feasibility. How will the idea be developed? Evaluate the idea as:
    1. Highly feasible
    2. Moderately feasible
    3. Not feasible
  5. At the conclusion of the group discussion period, bring everyone together and have each group report the highlights of their discussion, listing them on the chart tablet in the three areas of innovation, desirability, and feasibility.
  6. Utilize the newly discovered information to move forward with your idea or action.

The above exercise was adapted from 75 Tools for Creative Thinking, Booreiland

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 49-3, published September 2016.

Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader

Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “summary” for church leaders. Each Wednesday I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt here.

Photo by Climate KIC on Unsplash