You Cannot Fight Uncertainty with Certainty, It Takes Clarity

by: Bryan Rose

0

Tweet

“To lead by rallying people around a better future, albeit unknown, requires clarity first.”

 – Will Mancini, Auxano co-founder, in Church Unique

Welcome to a world devoid of best practices, proven strategies, and models to follow. We are all in some ways pastors, parents, or people leading from a playbook being written after each successive play. The second week of March 2020 pulled back the curtain on our leadership confidence, and we now stand in a moment of naked uncertainty.

Here’s the thing though, the opposing force of uncertainty is not certainty: it is clarity.

The clarity to lead toward God’s better future will not come from confidence in a tactic or plan, as those are changing hour-by-hour. Clarity will only emerge from faith in the One who placed your unique church, in your unique place, with your unique people, with your unique passion for accomplishing something that no other church can accomplish. Tactics, strategic plans, coaching…those are all great leadership tools—when you have some sense of what’s next.

On Thursday, March 19, 2020, the Auxano team will launch the Better Future Web Series. As of today (no explanation necessary on that disclaimer LOL), we are planning to bring 20-25 minutes of helpful, practical content and conversation for church teams every weekday morning at 11:00 a.m. EDT/10:00 a.m. CDT.

In this no-cost, daily leadership moment, our team of Navigators will deliver timely content designed to bring breakthrough clarity in a season of unprecedented uncertainty. Will Mancini is kicking us off on Thursday by unpacking Four Paths to the Future from his book Innovating Discipleship (here’s a limited-time free PDF download to read more).

There is no charge or sign up necessary for the Better Future Web Series. Jump on right here when and if you can. Bring a team if it works. Bandwidth is limited, but we plan to offer replays and follow-up tools…whatever it takes.

Right now we do not know what may be next, but what we DO know is that we are more committed than ever to creating breakthrough clarity with your church team to realize God’s better future!

Tags: Better Future Web Series, Clarity, Fighting Uncertainty

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Vision >

These Three Attitudes Undermine Clarity

by: Eric Geiger

0

Tweet

Wise leaders long for their teams to be filled with people who assume the posture and attitude of servant, steward, equipper, and executor. As a result, the whole team benefits and the whole organization/ministry is healthier. But what postures do leaders not want and not need on their teams? Surely there are a plethora of answers but here are three of the most common postures on a leadership team that hamper the effectiveness of the team.

1. Consultant

I am grateful for consultants. I have even served as a consultant. I believe consultants can provide incredible value to an organization. There are times when outside eyes are beneficial, when someone who can diagnose problems without being too close to the work is very helpful. Consultants are there to give wisdom, but they are not there to own the execution and implementation. Thus, when someone on a leadership team takes the posture of a consultant, the person delves out advice without being connected to the execution. When people want to advise without owning, they give the perception that are not fully committed. People on a leadership team who assume the posture of an internal consultant often have great ideas for everyone else’s area of responsibility and don’t dive deeply into their own.

2. Senator

I am grateful for senators. I have voted for senators and have even enjoyed a friendship with one. But I don’t want someone on a leadership team assuming the role of “senator.” Someone who assumes the posture of “senator” represents “their constituency” to the leadership team. The worst-case scenario is a team of senators representing departments or divisions that are moving in different directions. Instead of the team being aligned, the team acts often against one another. When a leadership team fails to commit to a shared vision and shared values, departments often have conflicting goals and plans.

3. Critic

I am grateful for critics. Ahhh, actually that is not true; I am most often not. I am deeply thankful for feedback from people I trust and respect who love me and the mission. Leaders should never be above feedback. But criticism and feedback are deeply different from one another. While the goal of feedback is to build up, the goal of criticism is often to tear down. Leaders are going to face criticism, but no wise leader wants to spend money on salaries to get it.

The best way for leaders to not foster a posture of consultant, senator, or critic on their teams is to not be those themselves. Leaders who are critical of others will attract critical people. Leaders who philosophize without executing will attract those who are allergic to getting things done. Leaders who fail to lead with overarching vision and direction will create an environment that lacks clarity.

> Read more from Eric.

Let’s talk! Connect with an Auxano Navigator.

Tags: Clarity, Leadership Effectiveness, team clarity, team dynamics

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Leadership >

The Clarity of Our Founding Fathers

by: VRcurator

0

Tweet

How was it that within a short span of time on the east coast of the North American continent there should have sprung up such a rare array of genius – men who seemed in virtual command of historical experience and who combined moral imagination with a flair for leadership?

We know those men as the Founding Fathers.

Part of the answer is that these men knew how to invest their combined strength in a great idea:

• A young man like James Madison had urgent thoughts about what people had to do to become free and remain free. Not content to just set these thoughts down in print, he joined those concerns to those of other men in a position to exert leadership.

• The intellectual exchange – in person and in letters – between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams spanned over 50 years, beginning when independence was just a dream and continuing long after the United States of America had become an established government. This exchange knows few equals for depth, range of subject matter, literary style and general intellectual achievement in recorded correspondence.

• George Washington and Benjamin Franklin registered their main impact on their contemporaries through the force of their personalities rather than through any detailed exposition of their political ideas and philosophy.

It was from men like these that the idea of a new nation was born. Their thoughts were expressed in The Declaration of Independence.

Drafted by Thomas Jefferson between June 11 and June 28, 1776, the Declaration of Independence is at once the nation’s most cherished symbol of liberty and Jefferson’s most enduring monument. Here, in exalted and unforgettable phrases, Jefferson expressed the convictions in the minds and hearts of the American people.

The political philosophy of the Declaration was not new. John Locke and the Continental philosophers had already expressed its ideals of individual liberty. What Jefferson did was to summarize this philosophy in “self-evident truths” and set forth a list of grievances against the King in order to justify before the world the breaking of ties between the colonies and the mother country.

On July 1, 1776, Congress reconvened. The following day, the Lee Resolution for independence was adopted by 12 of the 13 colonies, New York not voting. Immediately afterward, the Congress began to consider the Declaration. Adams and Franklin had made only a few changes before the committee submitted the document. The discussion in Congress resulted in some alterations and deletions, but the basic document remained Jefferson’s. The process of revision continued through all of July 3 and into the late morning of July 4. Then, at last, church bells rang out over Philadelphia; the Declaration had been officially adopted.

A letter from John Hancock to General Washington in New York, as well as the complete text of the Declaration, followed two days later:

That our affairs might take a more favorable turn, the Congress have judged it necessary to dissolve the connection between great Britain and the American colonies, and to declare them free and independent states; as you will perceive by the enclosed Declaration, which I am directed to transmit to you, and to request you  will have it proclaimed at the head of the army in the way you shall think most proper.

Many saw at once that with the enemy massing for battle so close at hand and independence at last declared by Congress, the war had entered an entirely new stage. The lines were drawn now as never before, the stakes higher. “The eyes of all America are upon us,” John Knox wrote. “As we play our part posterity will bless or curse us.”

“We are in the midst of a revolution,” wrote John Adams, “the most complete, unexpected, and remarkable of any in the history of the nations.”

In a ringing preamble, drafted by Thomas Jefferson, the document declared it “self-evident” that “all men are created equal,” and were endowed with the ‘unalienable” rights of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” And to this noble end the delegates had pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

From this point on, the citizen-soldiers of George Washington’s army were no longer fighting only for the defense of their country, or for their rightful liberties as free born Englishmen, as they had at Lexington and Concord, Bunker Hill, and through the long siege at Boston. It was now a proudly proclaimed, all-out war for an independent America, a new America, and thus a new day of freedom and equality.

At a stroke the Continental Congress had made the Glorious Cause of America more glorious still, for all the world to know, and also to give every citizen soldier at this critical juncture something still larger and more compelling for which to fight.

Clarity isn’t everything, but it changes everything.

material adapted from 1776 by David McCullough

Tags: 1776, Clarity, Founding Fathers, Independence Day, Vision Clarity

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Vision >

Communicate Bible Truth with Life Changing Clarity

by: Michael Kelley

1

Tweet

Christians are communicators. And while some Christians may be more or less gifted at the skill of communication, all Christians are “witnesses.” That is, we are, by the very fact that we have been born again into Christ and therefore witness personally the power of the gospel, to bear witness of what we have seen and heard:

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

It is inevitable. Jesus did not say “you might be” or “from time to time you could be,” but instead “you will.” We have been issued a divine summons, and our appearance to testify is not optional. So all of us, whether we be plumber or preacher, poet or pastor, are communicators of the gospel. We communicate about God, His Word, and the gospel in our homes, in our jobs, with our friends, and in our churches, so the question of how we communicate should be very important to us.

It hasn’t always been to me. Once upon a time, a lot of years ago, I was pretty impressed with my own rhetorical skill, and I put together a sermon I was super proud of. I started with a lengthy and elaborate illustration using Gilligan’s Island as the premise. I wrote out the sermon which detailed how all of us, from time to time, get stuck on a spiritual island. And we might use all kinds of things to get off that island – we might use our intelligence, our money, our talent, our charm. See what I did there with each of the characters on the TV show?

Yep. I did that. And then, after it was written out, I remember thinking to myself, I should find some Bible verses to stick into this talk.

By God’s grace, I’ve gotten older. And as I continue to get older, there are some things, I think, that are becoming more important to me about communicating God’s Word. Hopefully these will be helpful to you, too:

1. Clarity over cleverness.

It’s so easy to get enamored with our own cleverness. And in so doing, we can come up with all kinds of clever ways to try and explain things in the Bible through use of illustration. But the danger of doing so is that we might end up obscuring what the Bible says with our own cleverness. In the end, as we think through illustrations, it’s a wise thing to ask whether we are trusting, through the use of our clever rhetoric, if we are trusting in our own ability to communicate more than the power of God’s Word.

2. Faithful over funny.

Humor is a powerful thing. I think Jesus used humor from time to time in His own teaching. I mean, it’s funny to think about a person walking around with a plank sticking out of his head all the while he’s looking for splinters in someone else’s. So humor is a gift, and a tool that we can use to help communicate. But we should also be careful here, because we can easily keep a bag of our “go to” stories that we know will solicit a laugh, and then look for a way to bend the true content of the message in order to work them in.

3. Adoration over admiration.

Everyone likes to be liked. I certainly do. But the danger when we communicate and communicate effectively is that people might leave a conversation or a class or a church service with us dazzled at our rhetoric and yet never brought humbly to the God we represent. If that happens, then we have garnered admiration from another, but we haven’t led that other to adoration of Jesus Christ.

Christian, you are a witness. I am too. The call for us in that witness is faithfulness and clarity that points people to Jesus. Let’s make sure together that in our cleverness and humor we aren’t leading others to admire us but miss the Son of God.

Connect with an Auxano Navigator to learn more about communicating with clarity.

> Read more from Michael.

Tags: Clarity, Communicate, Communicate with Clarity, Michael Kelley

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

Communicate with Intentionality: Clarify Your Message

by: VRcurator

0

Tweet

“Scrambling to keep up and looking for ways to get their message heard, churches are creating more videos, designing more logos, printing more inserts, sending more emails, launching new apps and websites, posting more social media updates, and trying to write lots of captivating content.”

“Here’s what happens. The people they are trying to reach move further away just to survive the onslaught.”

The above paragraphs resonate from the introductory pages of Kem Meyer’s book “Less Chaos. Less Noise.” These words become a powerful reminder that today’s church faces a culture in which the difficulty of connecting with people has become an ever-changing proposition.

Every day, your church stewards thousands of moments of truth. Every time a member talks to a neighbor, someone drives by the church facility, a ministry e-mail goes out, a pastor’s business card is left on a desk, some interaction on behalf of the church has transpired. Every time these events happen, the church’s vision glows brighter or dims in the tiniest little increments.

The visionary leader cares too much about the message to let it just blow in the wind, unattended. Church leaders must be bold and relevant as they integrate vision into the all aspects of church communication. This can happen only with a tremendous amount of intentionality in the complex discipline of church communications.

THE QUICK SUMMARY – Building a StoryBrand by Donald Miller

Donald Miller’s StoryBrand process is a proven solution to the struggle business leaders face when talking about their businesses. This revolutionary method for connecting with customers provides readers with the ultimate competitive advantage, revealing the secret for helping their customers understand the compelling benefits of using their products, ideas, or services.

Building a StoryBrand does this by teaching readers the seven universal story points all humans respond to; the real reason customers make purchases; how to simplify a brand message so people understand it; and how to create the most effective messaging for websites, brochures, and social media.

Whether you are the marketing director of a multibillion dollar company, the owner of a small business, a politician running for office, or the lead singer of a rock band, Building a StoryBrand will forever transform the way you talk about who you are, what you do, and the unique value you bring to your customers.

A SIMPLE SOLUTION

What is clarity really about? A synthesis of definitions brings clarity to the concept of clarity: it means being free from anything that obscures, blocks, pollutes, or darkens.

Being clear as a leader means being simple, understandable, and exact.

The leader helps others see and understand reality better. Leaders constantly bring the most important things to light: current reality and future possibility, what God says about it, and what we need to do about it.

Unfortunately, there is often a gap between the leader’s words and how followers receive the leader’s words. Like a dropped cell call, this is caused by various sources of disconnection and static between people, even if the leader is communicating clearly.

Like the bars that indicate signal strength on a cell phone, every leader has signal strength levels that distinguish perceiving, thinking, and communicating with others.

The effective leader must spend extra time bridging the gaps by practicing clarity with words.

Words sell things. And if we haven’t clarified our message, our customers won’t listen.

Nobody will listen to you if your message isn’t clear, no matter how expensive your marketing material may be.

Your customers have questions burning inside them, and if we aren’t answering those questions, they’ll move on to another brand. If we haven’t identified what our customer wants, what problem we are helping them solve, and what life will look like after they engage our products and services, we can forget about thriving.

What we think we are saying to our customers and what our customers actually hear are two different things. And customers make buying decisions not based on what we say but on what they hear.

We need a filter to minimize the noise. The essence of branding is to create simple, relevant messages we can repeat over and over so that we “brand” ourselves into the public consciousness.

Donald Miller, Building a StoryBrand

A NEXT STEP

Stories move us. The engage us. They inspire us. Stories give us examples of how to act – and how not to act. The best ones stay with us forever.

To clarify your message using stories, it will be helpful to follow the formula that author Donald Miller uses in his book Building a StoryBrand. Purchasers of the book will receive free access to an online tool, the StoryBrand BrandScript.

While you will not be able to use the powerful techniques in this brief overview, you can at least get an idea of how those techniques might be used in your setting.

Here is an overview:

Nearly every story you see or hear can be outlined as: A CHARACTER who wants something encounters a PROBLEM before they can get it. At the peak of their despair, a GUIDE steps into their lives, gives them a PLAN, and CALLS THEM TO ACTION. That action helps them avoid FAILURE and ends in SUCCESS.

In a team discussion, write the key words from the above statement down the left side of a chart tablet.

• Character
• Problem
• Guide
• Plan
• Calls them to action
• Failure
• Success

Brainstorm the successful transformation you’re helping the average church member achieve by writing out ideas for each of the categories listed.

Discuss among your team how you can use the StoryBrand principles to clarify your church’s message through the telling of stories.

Every human being is already speaking the language of story, so when you begin using a story framework, you’ll finally be speaking their language.

Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 81-1, issued December 2017.

This is part of a weekly series posting excerpts from one of the most innovative content sources in the church world: SUMS Remix book excerpts for church leaders.

SUMS Remix takes a practical problem in the church and looks at it with three solutions; each solution is taken from a different book. Additionally, a practical action step is included with each solution.

As a church leader you get to scan relevant books based on practical tools and solutions to real ministry problems, not just by the cover of the book. Each post will have the edition number which shows the year and what number it is in the overall sequence. (SUMS Remix provides 26 issues per year, delivered every other week to your inbox). 

> > Subscribe to SUMS Remix <<

Tags: Building a StoryBrand, Clarify, Clarity, Donald Miller, SUMS Remix, message

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

6 Places Where Vision Communication Must Be Clear

by: Rich Birch

0

Tweet

Clarity is the highest goal of all church communications. Our role is to cut through the clutter and deliver the message we are giving with as much precision as possible. In order to do that we employ a wide variety of tactics to persuade people towards the goals that we’ve set. In an effort to persuade our communications can slip to a place where they stop being clear and become just clever. We can become too self-impressed with how we’re communicating the message that the content of the message is lost.

Here are a handful of times that I’ve seen churches lose clarity when communicating with their community:

• Family Ministry Environment Names // When a first time guest sees the names of your kid’s and student’s ministries do they make sense? If I have an infant do I take them to “WhizBangLand” or “GrowUpGang”? Too many churches employ clever ministry names that don’t make sense to people outside of the church. It’s the ultimate insider focused tactic to use names that are not self-evident to guests. Make sure people can clearly understand the signage and printed materials about your family ministry environments without having to interpret what they mean.
• Campus Location Labeling // Too often churches attempt to be clever by naming campuses using relative locations to the original campus … Crossroads Church North, St. Paul’s East … the problem is that naming convention assumes that the new campus is a small satellite of something larger. Quickly after you launch people will attend the new location that have never been to the original campus … when you use a naming convention that points back to the first location it diminishes the work in the new campus. Pick an approach to labeling the new location that casts vision for the community for want to reach … Crossroad Church Essex County, St. Paul’s Uptown.
• Graphic Design // Can I speak to the graphic designers for a minute? There is a difference between something looking amazing and it communicating clearly. Most of the great art I’ve ever seen is ambiguous and hard to understand what the artist is saying. The fact that I need to wrestle with the meaning of the piece is what makes it art. Your role as a graphic designer is to use elements of design to communicate a message. Communication leads … art follows. It would be prettier to have the super slender font on that flyer … but people wouldn’t understand that it’s talking about. This isn’t a tension to be managed … communication comes before beauty … function before form.
• Next Steps // Once people start attending your church for a while they will be looking for their next steps to getting connected. Often I’ve seen churches call their first steps for new people some fancy name that just doesn’t make sense on the surface … Discovery Class, Engage, Connection. By definition, people who are new to your church don’t have any sense of your “integration process” and are just wondering what they should do first. At our church we call this environment First Step because we want it to be the first thing people who when they come to our church. This is also the case when you ask people to take any sort of “next step” in their spiritual journey. Make the right next step obvious and clear.
• Financial Reporting // Report your finances in a way that can be easily understood by “non-financial” people. Use plain language, simple charts and clear commentary when talking about the financial state of the church. Financials are not self-evident to most people. We need to provide simple commentary that helps people benchmark what is happening in the life of the church. Bold clarity in this area will build trust with your donors and ultimately encourage them to give more to your ministry. If people don’t understand this part of what happens at your church they will be less likely to give. Active obfuscation of the truth is the shortest route to financial ruin of a church.
• Online Calls to Action // Your church’s website probably has too many options on it. When people arrive at your site what do you want them to “do”? Are you focusing their attention on just a few next steps rather than a wide variety of options? Every ministry wants to be “featured” on your site … but if you “feature” them all you will just generate clutter and noise for your guests. Often we use our websites to move people to action in our church … asking them to donate, join a small group, volunteer for a team, connect with our team, etc … but when we pile on the “calls to action” each new ask erodes the impact of the last.

> Read more from Rich.

Want help keeping your communication clear? Find out more about Auxano’s Communication service.

Tags: Clarity, Clear Communication, Communication, Rich Birch

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

How Vision, Alignment, and Generosity Became One Church’s Future

by: Todd McMichen

0

Tweet

About two years ago we received contact from Church at The Mall in Lakeland, FL. They had just launched an initiative with seven missional components. These action items were big, really big. The intent was to propel an already active church with a miraculous story into a bold new future. Of course, these seven missional objectives needed to be funded. Naturally, a three-year capital campaign would be the solution. HOLD ON! What if vision, alignment, and generosity could be the solution for their new future?

Here are the seven missional objectives, our approach, and some of the results we’ve seen less than two years into the work.

Missional Objectives:

1. Raise $1million each year for missional causes while reducing church debt
2. Maximize their outreach and efforts
3. Advance and expand their media ministry
4. Needs assessment for staff, space, finances, and times
5. Launch a multi-site campus approach
6. Develop a Center for Discipleship and Education
7. Develop methodical and comprehensive life stage discipleship from cradle to college

Approach:

1. Create two one-day offerings immediately to take a huge leap forward with debt reduction and missions giving. Palm Sunday was utilized to catalyze those who were passionate about debt reduction. The entire offering that Sunday was deposited toward their debt. Then on Easter Sunday, Church at the Mall built bridge relationships with multiple non-profits in the community that aligned with the church vision. The entire offering was given away to impact the city. It was a bold step on many fronts. The staff and church leaders needed to decide how committed they were to the missional objectives. What would happen if they gave two complete offerings away at the beginning of the year? How would that impact ministry, even their jobs? Their unified faith would be more than rewarded.

2. Clarify their Vision, create culture, and discipleship Measures. TheVision Framing process of Auxano was utilized to create the organizational engine and culture needed to accomplish the seven missional objectives. A repeated priority on prayer, fasting, and the anointed life would provide the fuel. This focus led to a clear articulation of a three-pronged Strategy. The Strategy would align ministries to work best together delivering the results of their Vision. This would require big conversations related to aligning programming, staff, calendar, facility, and resources. Good activity would not compete with visionary accomplishment.

3. Develop a Generous Culture. When Vision is clear, resources are aligned, and results are measurable, it releases people. They knew where the church was headed, how they could grow, where they could live a big life, and confidence that their generosity was making a difference beyond themselves. We identified the different types of givers in their church from those who gave nothing to those living generously beyond a tithe. Each person was able to identify with a giving hero in the Bible that was relatable to their stage of life and financial situation. Curriculum was developed. A year-long growth path was revealed. Every person and family could find their way to grow a generous life for the sake of long term kingdom investment.

Results:

• Total church indebtedness was reduced by 26% or $1,056,799.
• Total church missions giving increased by 35% or $216,953.
• Yearly undesignated giving increased 6% and this is not counting the special offerings taken on two consecutive Sundays.
• General offerings increased by 12% prior to summer months, and this is not including the special offerings received.
• Average gift per family increased 21% year to date. (Measured the first several months of three consecutive years)
• Families or individuals giving digitally increased 19%.
• The church was given a church facility in a neighboring town worth $1,700,000. A new campus was launched with hundreds in attendance.
• Media is being maximized via new brand development, website, and app.
• Discipleship Measures were created for all ages along with custom written curriculum.
• Outreach is on a path to being maximized via new outreach Bible studies, online services, and a new television program.

Not too bad for less than two years of focused activity. Dream big, get focused, pray boldly, and enjoy the clarity.

To learn how this process could help your church, connect with an Auxano Navigator today.

> Read more from Todd.

Tags: Alignment, Church at the Mall, Clarity, Todd McMichen, Vision

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Resourcing >

Commanding Clarity

by: Will Mancini

0

Tweet

I was honored to attend my friend’s change of command ceremony near Seattle. I marveled at the connection between the highly disciplined environment of the military and the practice of clarity. Think about it for a moment-in the military clarity is everywhere:

• The mission is always crystal clear
• There is a ton of communication before and after any initiative (after action review)
• Lines of authority are unmistakable
• A person’s accomplishments, time and experience are worn on their sleeve, literally
• Lots of attention goes into training and technology for communication
• Maintaining clarity requires a whole new world of vocabulary
• Expectations and role descriptions for each individual are always reviewed
• There is never a moment without total accountability to what is made clear

At one point I almost began weeping. As I immersed myself in a day of military culture, I couldn’t believe the sheer discipline of clarity that we exercise on behalf of our great country, in contrast to how little we achieve as leaders within God’s eternal kingdom.

Here is the mission of the squadron I was with: To provide combatant commanders with a fully combat ready strike group, capable of prompt and sustained operations across the full spectrum of naval operations anywhere in the world.

During the ceremony the three core values of the Navy were not only passionately conveyed by the four leading officers, they were demonstrated throughout the ceremony. For example, one aspect of the core value of “honor” is articulated as “We also honor the sacrifices our families and loved ones make to support us in our call of duty.” During the ceremony, Hunter’s wife, mother and two daughters were lavishly honored with generous bouquets from the Navy. The moment reflected the value wonderfully. The other two values are courage and commitment.

Read more from Will here.

Would you like to learn more about the vision clarity process? Connect with an Auxano Navigator and start a conversation with our team.

Tags: Clarity, Vision Frame, Will Mancini

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Vision >

Do More of What You Do Best with 6 Powerful Secrets

by: Will Mancini

0

Tweet

Tags: Clarity, Communication, Storytelling, Will Mancini

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Vision >

Your Best Brand Asset is Understanding Yourself

by: Phil Cooke

0

Tweet

The world isn’t looking for a copy of an existing writer, musician, politician, CEO, or leader; they’re looking for someone new, innovative, and original.

Your job is to discover how your unique gifts and talents can differentiate you from everyone else.

You have no idea the number of people who call our offices each week asking us to “do the same thing for us that you did for your national clients.” They want to copy someone they admire, and they’re asking us to help get that story out there and get noticed by the national media. But they’ve got it backwards. There’s already one of those famous leaders. A new person needs to emphasize his or her unique differences.

Besides, each of our clients were unique and brilliant long before I ever met them. Probably the most powerful gift these leaders had was an understanding of who they were and what their talent and calling were about.

That’s something worth repeating: Probably the most powerful gift these leaders had was an understanding of who they were and what their talent and calling were about.

Having an accurate understanding of what makes you unique and different is absolutely critical. For many, an accurate understanding is obscured or undermined by a lack of professionalism, bad ideas, poor taste, inept leadership, insecurity, lack of people skills, bad assumptions, and more. These sorts of things plague many leaders today and hamper their effectiveness.

What makes you different from all the others competing for your position?

There’s even more competition out there within the greater culture. In today’s world, everybody competes. For media creators, product producers, sales professionals, and more–how can you compete with all the entertainment choices, lifestyle options, or new digital technologies that struggle for the limited time of the average person today? You may not have the resources, finances, or assets the competition has, but you can tell a better story, and the key to finding that story is discovering what makes you unique and different.

What could it be that makes you different? Perhaps it’s your unique communications style, your writing ability, your personality, or an expertise in an unusual area. Being different can mean many things, including perspective, content, skill, and delivery.

If competition from others is making it more difficult to get noticed, then perhaps you should consider a different niche. Some organizations have decided that because of duplication of services by other companies in the area, they should find a different way of doing their work or do it in a different place.

Hollywood is particularly good at this; studios track what other studios are developing so they don’t release a similar film. Corporations spend enormous amounts of money following their competition’s product development.

Even smart employees watch for potential changes in company staffing or structure to ensure they don’t get pushed out of a job because of duplication or competition. It’s not about conniving or cheating behind the scenes–it’s about being aware and sensitive to the future.

Ultimately, it’s all about authenticity. Being unique and different shouldn’t mean fake. In our efforts to relate to the culture or a potential customer or audience, we sometimes go over the top and end up conveying a message that’s obviously dishonest and far from authentic.

I’m told I was born with the gift of saying what everyone else in the room is thinking. Whether it gets me in trouble or not, I often feel compelled to talk about the elephant in the room that everyone else sees but ignores. That’s why this issue of authenticity is so important for me. I was born with a very sensitive BS button, and anytime a client presents an advertisement, website, TV program, or other presentation that smacks of insincerity, I light up.

I regularly meet people who live out others’ dreams and refuse to act on who they were created to be. What about you? Have you watched your boss so closely that you’ve started becoming more like him or her than you? Have you followed a celebrity to the point where his or her style is obscuring your own? Have you followed trends to the point it’s difficult to discover what’s really inside you?

Don’t become something you aren’t; developing a personal brand is about becoming who you truly are. It happens even in the best of ways. One friend got involved in raising money to build medical facilities in Third World countries. It was a great cause and she certainly could have spent her life doing worse. Ultimately, it wasn’t really her passion. But she put off confronting that fact for years because it was such a great cause.

The problem was–it just wasn’t her cause. When she finally had the courage to step out into something she was personally passionate about, she had already wasted years of productivity.

I know others who are trapped working in a company, church, or humanitarian organization who–although they do great work– are settling for second best in their lives. I can see they have so much more potential, but when I bring it up, they rationalize it with the importance of the cause, the need, or the great work they’re doing.

They’ve been sucked into a regular paycheck, or refuse to change because they’re not willing to risk taking a hard look at their lives, their gifts, and their future.

I understand, because I’ve been there.

Finding your honest voice in the middle of the madness is absolutely critical. But being absolutely truthful about what distinguishes you from the pack is a critical step to finding your identity.

Excerpted from One Big Thing: Discovering What You Were Born to Do by Phil Cooke. 

Read more from Phil here.

Phil Cooke, Ph.D. – filmmaker, media consultant, and author of One Big Thing: Discovering What You Were Born to Do; Unique: Telling Your Story in the Age of Brands and Media; and Jolt! Get the Jump on a World That is Constantly Changing.

Would you like to learn more about developing the brand asset called You? Connect with an Auxano Navigator and start a conversation with our team.

Tags: Awareness, Brand, Brand Asset, Brand Awareness, Clarity, One Big Thing, Phil Cooke

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >