Why Your Church Needs Clarity of Purpose

by: Jeanne Bliss

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Organizations beloved by their customers, those that are true and authentic, work hard every day to resist the pull of “normal” business practices to create a powerful human connection with their customers.

They are able to do this because they have something that binds everyone together, moving them toward a common goal: clarity of purpose.

Beloved companies take the time to be clear about what their unique promise is for their customers’ lives. They use this clarity when they make decisions so they align to this purpose, to this promise.

Clarity of purpose guides choices and unites the organization. It elevates people’s work from executing tasks to delivering experiences customers will want to repeat and tell others about.

• Apple’s clarity for creating its in-store experience has built a cult following. Apple stores wouldn’t have become the gathering place they are today without the time, angst, and thought that went into deciding what those stores would and would not be.
• Trader Joe’s, a grocery store so clearly focused on personal interaction with customers, obsessed over the decision to buy scanning equipment. They worried that the scanning equipment’s “pinging” sound would get in the way of their employees’ chatty conversations with customers.
• Newegg.com, banned pop-up ads after checkout. They won’t abdicate their well-orchestrated customer experience and final memory to a third-party partner’s pop-up ad, even though pop-up ads bring in extra revenue.
• For Genentech (one of the world’s fastest-growing and admired bio-tech companies), clarity of purpose fuels their growth. The personal knowledge of patients, and the details of the lives they are saving, motivates employees to make the right decisions for the customers they serve. It elevates their decisions from science . . . to saving lives.

Each beloved company makes key decisions to mark its place in the universe with customers. Beloved companies begin with a notion, an idea fueled by passion about their greater purpose for improving customers’ lives. It doesn’t matter if they are selling electronics or food, or saving lives; conviction helps them stay the course. Even in the face of sacrifice and, yes, sometimes pain, beloved companies press on for customers. They persevere until they get it right.

Read more from Jeanne here.

Tags: Jeanne Bliss, Purpose, Vision Clarity

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Is Your Church in the Wrong Business?

by: Geoff Surratt

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What is the core mission of the local church? I think we can learn something by looking at Peter Drucker’s two pivotal questions for business leaders:

• What is your business?
• How’s business?

These have always been difficult questions for the church to answer. In the middle ages through the Renaissance the church was in the Architecture Business. Cardinals and Popes built larger and more ornate cathedrals culminating in the massive St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. The church was measured by the beauty of the art produced.

The question continued into the Sunday School years when we thought we were in the Education Business. We created classrooms and curriculum and attempted to teach the masses. The measure was knowledge.

Eventually we left the Education Business and moved into the Warehouse Business. The goal shifted from educating the masses to accumulating the masses. We built larger and larger facilities to store more and more members. The answer to question one was, “More!” and the answer to question two was, “Really good (for an ever growing number of mega-churches).

The Warehouse Business morphed into the Entertainment Business. To maximize our storage facilities we had to draw larger crowds with a better product. We created a cottage industry of professional videographers, graphic artists, sound engineers, musicians and lighting technicians around the need for an ever improving show. The artists guilds of the Renascence were reborn as worship schools. Business was now measured by both quantity and quality.

Recently another shift has begun as leaders discover their warehoused and entertained members live lives tragically similar to those outside the church. They are shackled by divorce, addiction and materialism just like their non-church attending neighbors. Architecture, Education, Warehousing and Entertainment have all fallen short of the goal of making biblical disciples, little Christs.

I think all of the past phases have a place in the overall purpose of the church. I believe in education, and artist development, and reaching as many people as possible with the Gospel. I believe that most leaders are sincere in their efforts to make disciples even if the outcome isn’t what they had hoped. I think the fundamental challenge is that we still haven’t answered Drucker’s questions.

• I think we are in the Moving Business.
• I think business is poor but improving.

I think our fundamental call as church leaders is to assist people in moving from where they are to where God is calling them. Every building, every program, every paid staff member engaged in the Moving Business. “How will this activity, this ministry, this sound system move people from where they are to where God is calling them?”

If we are in the Moving Business, then we probably need to stop simply measuring the beauty of our buildings, the education of our members, the number of people in our warehouses, or the awesomeness of our product. If we are in the Moving Business then our primary measure is movement; are our people moving from where they are to where God is calling them?

How would you answer Drucker’s questions? What business are you in? How’s business?

Tags: Geoff Surratt, Vision Clarity, Vision Pathway

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The Missing Element in Your Organizational Strategy

by: Randy Ottinger

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In a cover story for a recent issue of Harvard Business Review, Professor John Kotter described a new type of organization that combines speed of execution with agility to seize new opportunities quickly. “Speed plus agility” is the holy grail that leaders of organizations seek to achieve. Many don’t. There are two big missing pieces that are overlooked by a majority of leaders. This blog describes one of them.

Recently, I was presenting to a group of senior executives from 40 different companies. They represented many different industries and were from different parts of the world. I asked them to work collectively to design the perfect, high-speed, fast-executing organization. What would it look like? What would it feel like? What processes would it have in place? I kept gathering ideas until they had exhausted all of their thoughts and insights.

What they came up with was an organization with a clear strategy, where everyone is urgent and aligned toward a common goal, and where execution of those strategies flowed smoothly with all of the management processes you would expect in place. They had designed the typical process most people think successful companies use to implement new strategies.

“So what is missing,” I asked? “Nothing,” they responded. “Let me ask you all a question,” I continued, “Tell me how well this model works at seizing new opportunities or going after new strategies that require a lot of change?” They scratched their heads as they thought about this, but they came up with an answer that is confirmed by research, that only about 30 percent of organizations are good at seizing new, strategic opportunities. Put another way, 70 percent fail trying to do so. So I asked again, “What is missing?” Silence.

One answer that we have uncovered in our work — and it’s something John Kotter learned a long time ago — is that a missing piece required for speed and agility is an “urgency process.” When I say an “urgency process,” I mean including an actual process — as essential as your strategic planning and execution processes — that is dedicated to creating urgency.

When I mention an “urgency process” to groups of executives, I’ll often hear things like, “What is an urgency process?” and “We did not learn this in business school.” Well, here’s one way of defining it: An urgency process is a quantifiable and repeatable way to generate alignment, urgency, and engagement in a majority of employees in a company, division, functional area, or large team. Some of the elements it contains are:

• Senior leadership team alignment around a market opportunity
• An urgency team
• Urgency initiatives to create alignment, urgency, and engagement
• A way to capture names of urgent employees that want to volunteer to help
• A means of measuring urgency to ensure at least 50 percent of the organization is urgent

To be clear, an urgency process is not a communications plan. A communications plan is typically a one-way set of activities designed to inform and create awareness. It is not typically designed to align and engage employees as volunteers to take action.

So what do you do when you have 50 percent of your employees in your team, division, or organization urgent and raising their hand to help? How do you put them productively to use?

Read more from Kotter International here.

Tags: Alignment, John Kotter, Randy Ottinger, Strategy, Vision Clarity

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The Danger in a “Mostly Aligned” Team

by: Ken Perlman

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My two worlds collided one recent weekend. I introduced my young daughters to the classic film, The Princess Bride. I also had just completed a number of interviews with executives and stakeholders of a client I’m working with on Leading Change in these remarkable times. These things may seem unrelated, but watch how this comes together.

My girls loved Billy Crystal as Miracle Max. The minute the credits ended, they began quoting him. “Girls, come down to dinner,” was met with, “Why don’t you give me a paper cut and rub some lemon juice in it?” My youngest daughter punctuated her kiss goodnight with, “Bye bye boys, have fun storming the castle!” When I asked the girls to retrieve a book for me, they responded with, “It will take a miracle!”

“It will take a miracle” — this is how many business leaders feel as they try to rally their organizations around a big opportunity. After the girls went to sleep, I started reviewing my interview notes from earlier in the week. During these interviews, we always ask about strategy, opportunities and challenges. We also ask how aligned the leadership team is around where they are going, how they want to get there and how quickly and boldly they are planning to move. As I read their responses, I kept hearing Miracle Max. The most common response for this client, as with many of our clients, was “mostly aligned.” Miracle Max had a great line about “mostly”: “Mostly dead is slightly alive.”

I believe executive alignment—really, any alignment—is binary: you either are or you are not. I think about the wheels on my car being “mostly aligned” and what that would feel like. Yet most leadership teams stop at “mostly aligned” and accept it as sufficient. They tend to forget that “mostly aligned” is amplified exponentially further down in the organization, creating more and more distance among an organization’s members. By the time you’ve reached the rank-and-file, the organization is only slightly alive.

One interview answer particularly caught my eye: “ We are aligned on the things we need to be aligned on. The other stuff … we don’t play in each others’ sandboxes.” We talked to the people who worked for this interviewee. They too, recognized this leaders’ attitude, which they translated as, “They do their best to not work together with others or have us coordinate our efforts.”

This may seem trivial, but here are the downstream and long-term effects of this lack of alignment:

1. Inconsistent instructions based on different interpretations of a new strategy;
2. Conflicting priorities across silos and departments;
3. Performance metrics and expectations that reward silo performance and individual achievement over organization-wide results and customer satisfaction;
4. Vastly different content, focus and messages from meetings.

So, what will it take for these executives to get from “mostly aligned” to aligned? It won’t take a miracle, or even a really big (though chocolate-covered) pill. It will demand the courage to create the time and space to have a conversation about what needs to change so they can accelerate their strategies toward success. Often executives will say they are too busy to make that kind of space. Later, they recognize the turbulence, lost opportunities and wasted energy they’ve caused, and how it has crippled their strategic efforts.

But with a little effort—no magic required—an organization can go from “slightly alive” to thriving.

Read more from Kotter International here.

Tags: Alignment, John Kotter, Ken Perlman, Vision Clarity

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How (Not) to Inspire a Shared Vision

by: Chad Hall

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Like millions of other Americans, I tuned in to hear President Obama’s second inaugural address.  The President is rightly admired for his strong oratory skills and ability to use communication as an effective leadership skill.  That’s why I was so disappointed in the speech.  While there were parts of the speech that resonated with me, overall I thought it landed flat.  As I reflected on my disappointment, I realized that the President had not inspired a shared vision.

If you lead within a church, a ministry, a non-profit, a business or a community, you must be able to communicate in order to lead.  As part of the communication responsibility, every leader must be able to inspire a shared vision.  An inspired vision pulls people forward.  It projects a clear image of a possible future and generates energy to strive toward the destination.

I think the President’s address can help us better understand how to inspire a shared vision.  Here are five components of an inspiring vision (adapted from Kouzes and Posner’s The Leadership Challenge) along with my two cents on how the President performed on each:

1. An inspiring vision shares an IDEAL.  An ideal is a high standard to aspire to, an ennobling purpose and greater good we are seeking.    What followers need from our leaders is not a laundry list of ideals, but a single high standard to which we want to aspire.
2. An inspiring vision is UNIQUE, it creates healthy pride in being different by creating an identity that is extraordinary.  An inspired vision helps followers know how we are collectively unique, singular, and unequaled.
3. An inspiring vision uses IMAGE to make concepts tangible through descriptive language.   Word pictures, stories and symbols help make the vision more memorable and compelling. When a vision lacks true focus, the use of many images prevents the vision from being memorable.
4. An inspiring vision is FUTURE-ORIENTED, looking toward a destination.  Visions describe an exciting possibility for the future and stretch our minds out into the future and asks us to dream.
5. An inspiring vision is built around a COMMON GOOD, a way people can come together.  Visions are about developing a shared sense of destiny.  Followers must be able to see themselves and their interests served in the vision; they must see how they are a part of the vision in order to enlist others in it.

So how well do you think the President inspired a shared vision?  What worked and what missed the mark?  And what are some examples of leaders who did a masterful job of inspiring a shared vision?

Read the full article here.

Read more from Chad here.

Tags: Chad Hall, Recasting Vision, Vision, Vision Clarity

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What is Your Vision Worth to You?

by: Steven Furtick

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The king said to me, “What is it you want?” Then I prayed to the God of heaven, and I answered the king, “If it pleases the king and if your servant has found favor in his sight, let him send me to the city in Judah where my fathers are buried so that I can rebuild it.”
Nehemiah 2:4-5

Nehemiah left a comfortable job with the Persian government and risked his life in the presence of the king for the opportunity to rebuild the walls.

God’s vision for his life was worth everything to him.
His job security.
His status of living.
Even his life.

What is your vision for your life worth to you?
Honestly. What would you give up for it?

Your time?
Your pay grade?
Your comfortable lifestyle?
Your current career to start a new one?
Your current home to move to a new one in a new city?
Your relationships that are holding you back or bringing you down?
Even your life?

If not, the problem probably isn’t that you’re just not passionate enough about what your vision for your life is. It could be. Maybe you’ve just been lured into apathy and complacency for a vision that’s truly worth everything. But probably not.

The problem might be that your vision simply isn’t worth being passionate about. The problem might be that you’ve got the wrong vision. Or at least a vision that’s too small.

People who are living in God’s vision for them generally don’t have to get psyched up for it. They have down days. Days where it’s hard to keep chasing after it. Yet their passion sustains them because their vision compels them. Passion is what you’re willing to give up for what you love. And the assumption is that what you love is worth giving something up for.

If your vision for your life isn’t worth giving yourself up for, it’s not worth giving yourself to. Stop wasting time spinning your wheels on something that can’t stir passion within you.

Go back to the drawing board. Pray. Seek. Dream.
And acquire a vision worthy of your life.

Read more from Steven here.

Tags: Steven Furtick, Vision Clarity, Vision Frame

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The Four Stages of Visionary Leadership

by: Will Mancini

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I have reflected over a decade on the question of how visionaries develop. These are some initial thoughts that I want to share with blog readers as I think out loud a bit. I would really appreciate your comments and input toward the development of these ideas.

Stage One: VISION CATCHING

Every visionary leaders starts by following someone else’s vision. Here, the fundamental practice of following well precedes and develops the ability to lead well. During this time, a future visionary learns to submit to godly authority. In this stage the future visionary’s style is shaped by the strengths and limitation of the lead visionary. Strengths provide a foundational modeling opportunity. Limitations and weakness forge convictions that will eventually shape the values of the future leader.

Stage Two VISION CASTING

Eventually the visionary leader starts casting vision themselves. There are three nuances of how this vision relates to the the prior vision-catching content. In other words, most of early vision casting is found “underneath” the vision of a leader and/or organization of the developing visionary. The visionary casts vision: a) in support of, b) in relation to, and finally c) in contrast with.

• In Support Of: The first practice is recasting the vision that already exists. The visionary is articulating and communicating what was given to them. The art of communication is matured as commitment, passion and ownership of the vision progresses. For example, a student pastor shares the greater vision of the church he has been serving for the last two years with his seminary buddies.

• In Relation To: Eventually the emerging visionary will create and develop their own initiatives or ministry models within the larger vision. This mini-step takes the art of visionary leadership to a new level. As a visionary leader “builds” within their “domain” of the larger ministry they are responsible to relate what they are doing to the bigger picture. That is, they are advancing and enhancing the vision that they “caught” by casting new vision for their team, event, group, area or department. Our student pastor, for example, is recruiting two dozen new volunteer leaders for a high-school, gospel saturation strategy he developed. This strategy and mini-vision is developed in concert with the broader church vision.

• In Contrast With: This is the positive step of beginning to sense a shift in calling or being attracted to a new ministry vehicle. While this is not an eventual reality for all visionary leaders it will happen for many of them. And by the way, it’s difficult for many senior leaders to watch this happen without sensing betrayal or hurt. This is normal. Yet from God’s perspective, isn’t it natural that a strong emerging visionary will develop completely a new “holy discontent?” Won’t he see new problems and want to find new solutions? The term “in contrast with” is helpful because oftentimes in the mind of the developing visionary, the language of the new is contrasted with and compared to the existing vision. (Hence we talk about missional vs. attractional approaches  or going to unreached people groups vs. growing an existing flock.) For example the student pastor starts dreaming of planting a different kind of church in contrast with the vision he has been serving in.

Stage Three: VISION CARRYING

At this pivotal place, the vision casting stage has matured to a point of full ownership, most often embodied by the senior position or lead role. Hence, not every visionary leaders reaches this point. And it is wrong, in my opinion, to expect that all visionary leaders should aspire to. (Or we would have not visionary second-chair leaders or visionary teams.)

The greatest experiential difference for the vision carrier is the increasing awareness that the vision came from God not himself. Over time, a greater convergence of spiritual maturity, life circumstances, and divine relationships unveil how little the vision truly emerged from within. Eventually he sees how God was orchestrating the events of life to the point that he knows that God himself gave him a vision to carry. Of course his practice of vision-casting hits full-bloom as the vision grows and expands from an ever-strengthening identity and awareness of God calling.

Stage Four: DESTINY STEWARDING

The final stage is one that fewer leaders reach because it is found only with unusual favor AND demonstrated success as a vision carrier over a long time. The success builds a platform of extraordinary influence beyond what was ever imagined. Hence, I believe this stage is experience by leaders in or after their fifties. The feeling of “carrying” a vision for a time, which is in itself a stewardship, moves to an even greater awareness of unplanned, yet God-ordained impact. For the best leaders, this enables them to guard a humble spirit and embrace a broader influence. For example the student pastor plants a church that becomes a church planting movement, or or transforms a city or adopts an unreached people group. At this stage, decades of vision carrying are seen from a different and more enlightened perspective.

At this stage it’s easy for current names to come to mind like Rick Warren or Bill Hybels or T.D. Jakes or Mark Driscoll or Andy Stanley. But I believe there are thousands and thousands of leaders who reach this point, that we will never read about. Despite tremendous impact, they steward a more silent destiny.

So how do you react to this initial framing of these stages? Specifically how does this match up to your personal experience? What would you add or tweak or take away?  Thanks for considering a response.

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Recasting Vision, Vision Clarity, Will Mancini

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A Picture of Vision

by: Mike Bonem

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The other day, as I was boarding an early morning flight out of Hobby Airport in Houston, I looked out the window and had a great view of the early morning sun shimmering on the downtown skyline. It was beautiful. Here’s the picture.

Now I’m guessing that you’re not rushing to book a trip to Houston based on this picture. You’re probably even wondering why I posted it. The reason is that it tells us a lot about vision.

1. The vision is often much more clear to the visionary than to others. My picture doesn’t convey what I witnessed. In the same way, many visionary leaders get very excited about the vision that God has given them, but others don’t grasp it. People need to have a meaningful, tangible experience with the vision, not just hear you talk about it. What are you doing to help others to see, taste, and touch the vision that God has for your congregation?
2. Visionaries often don’t see the obstacles. When I first glanced out the window at Hobby, I didn’t even notice all the clutter in the foreground. Once I took the picture, it was much more obvious. Some visionary leaders never have that experience – they see the ultimate goal very clearly, but they completely overlook the more immediate things that stand in the way. Who in your life lovingly helps you identify the barriers to the vision?
3. Those who see the obstacles can kill a vision. It’s obvious that I can’t cut across the tarmac to get to the distant skyline, but that doesn’t mean that getting there is impossible. We’ve all known people who immediately list all the reasons that something can’t be done. It’s important to think about the “how” questions, because these help translate the vision into meaningful steps and identify issues to be addressed. If you are that detail-oriented person, do you use your strengths in positive, helpful ways?

What does your vision picture look like? Which of these three areas do you need to work on?

Tags: Mike Bonem, Vision Clarity

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What I Wish Someone Had Told Me: Leading Pastors Share Thoughts on Vision and Alignment

by: Will Mancini

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Every year, Outreach Magazine provides a profile of the 100 Fastest-growing churches in the country. This year, they had a few interview spots entitled, “What I wish someone told me.”

What really struck me are the common threads on vision and alignment. Look for how these pastors discuss clarity and unique calling. The big themes are as follows:

• Radical emphasis on mission and vision (including values and strategy)
• Willingness to “let people go” who don’t align with the vision
• Commitment to stop programs and cut ministry not aligned with the vision

Now, listen to their own words form the 2012 special issue.

Luke Barnett (@LWBarnett),  Phoenix First Assembly of God (12th Fastest-growing)

At first you think the mobilizing leadership happens naturally, like leaders and volunteers and magically appear because you have a great idea, but that’s not so. Over time you learn that you have to be intentional in mobilizing and recruiting leaders and you have to develop the leaders that have bought into the vision and feel appreciated.

John  Beukema (@John Beukema), King Street Church (39th Fastest-growing)

Some people will never leave no matter what happens and some people will leave no matter what happens. Since that has been true, I wish I had been told how pitiful and unproductive it is to worry over who you retain and who you don’t. Just do the right things, be clear on your mission, and don’t get emotionally invested in who stays or goes.

David Brown (@DavidBrown_Ave), The Avenue Church (44th Fast-growing)

People do not have trouble committing to something. Look around at the ball fields and cheerleading meets. The church has been slow at giving them something worth committing to be in. When leaders are passionate about the vision God has given the local church and begin to share that vision people will follow.

Jim Burgen, Flatirons Community Church (2nd Fastest-growing)

At least once a year we carve out six weeks to work through our primary six values that drive everything we do, why we do it, how we do it, and why we don’t do that other thing.  Regularly working through our values in creative parables allows people that have never been to church to know what kind of place they have landed in.

Jeff Clark, First Hattiesburg (20th Fastest-growing)

We killed Sunday School, and it saved our church We killed men’s and women’s ministry and it saved our church. We found that you can’t have competing ministries and build intimacy. Simple, clear and focused opportunities for connection build intimacy. Small groups are driving a stake in the heart of feeling disconnected and left out.

Mark Connelly (@missionmark), Mission Community Church (8th Fastest-growing)

The bigger you get the better your Sunday morning experience is. That draws spectators. We constantly fight against that by boldly calling people to sacrificially live their faith, and don’t worry about the fallout. In a recent sermon, I called spectators parasites on the body of Christ. I am sure we lost some people as a result. And they’re probably parasites on some other church now.

Jack Graham (@Jackngraham), Prestonwood Baptist Church (75th Fastest growing)

The most important lesson I have learned is to ensure we planning and preparing or growth. It’s more than a cliché: Vision produces provision.

Too often we ride dead horses into the sunset. We always ask, “Is this program fulfilling the church’s mission?” Is it vibrant and life-changing?” “Is it good stewardship?”  We must be willing at times to make tough decisions and cut programs that are no longer productive.

Stuart Hodges (@stuhodges), Waters Edge Church (36th Fastest-growing)

From the verbiage we use in an e-mail communication to things we do on Facebook, we’re connecting people to mission. We utilize weekly team huddles to keep our volunteers connected to the mission, We emphasize the mission regularly in our community group curriculum. And throughout the year, I constantly tie the mission of our church into sermons.

We limit our programs. By saying “now” to additional church programs we can say “yes” to resourcing outreach. If we said yes to every great idea for “the church” there would be no time, energy or dollars for outreach.

Jonathon Howes (@Johnny Howes), Graystone Church (40th Fastest-growing)

One of things we have done to retain more people is to lower our requirement of membership. We still want every member to live out our values, but we realized that it’s a process, and we need to let them grow spiritually as the Holy Spirit moves in their lives and they learn from the Word of God.

Some people will always be spectators, but our goal is challenging people to move from the crowd to the core. We have built into the Graystone culture: Everyone comes, everyone serves and everyone gives.

Benji Kelly (@BenjiKelley) Newhope Church (5th Fastest-growing)

I truly believe that the same vision that attacts some also repels others. In the larger scheme of things, I think we pastors would do well to become OK with people leaving our church. For the sake of those that God still wants to reach with love and forgiveness, we have unfortunately have to sometimes let believers exit out the back door!

John McKinzie, Hope Fellowship (48th Fastest-growing)

One thing I don’t know if I realized in my early years is that retention in the body of Christ is more important that retention in my church. If people are unhappy, I would rather help them find a church that “fits” them than have them stay unhappy and possibly quit going to church altogether.

Scott Ridout (@scottridout) Sun Valley Community Church (4th Fastest-growing)

I wish I would have know that the natural drift of every church is inward. The more time Christians spend in church, it seems the farther they move away from God’s original intention­­– to reach the lost.  Momentum is easily lost when it comes ot evangelistic fervor, and we have to constantly champion an outward-focused lifestyle among our people.

Kerry Shook (@kerryshook), The Woodlands Church (9th Largest)

I had no idea how intentional I would have to be to stay true to my purpose and the vision God had put in my heart for what the church should be and do. It is so easy to please everyone and compromise your calling of the vision God has given you and how he desires to you and your ministry uniquely in His Kingdom to reach people for Christ…No one every told me that if you lead well people will still leave the church.

Once a year we have an alignment campaign where all of our small groups are expected to take the same small group challenge. This provides a sense of shared mission and we all do the same study together, and it gets everyone on the same page with the vision God has given us.

Tags: Alignment, Vision, Vision Clarity, Will Mancini

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My Love-Hate Relationship with Church Vision

by: Mike Bonem

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For over 20 years, I have been a big advocate of the need for churches and ministries to get clear about the vision that God is leading them to. I still think that a clear, shared, compelling vision is important and powerful, and yet …

I have seen many churches with wonderful vision statements and no forward momentum. I have talked to pastors and laypeople who are jaded about visions and visioning processes. What’s the problem? Isn’t a vision supposed to supply the direction and energy that lead to positive results? Here are four common vision-related diseases that afflict many churches and ministries:

• It’s not their vision. Vision statements may not seem unique, but the meaning behind them should be specific to the church and its context. If a congregation decides to copy someone else’s vision, they are unlikely to see much impact. Likewise, if the core leadership team doesn’t have a high level of ownership in the vision, it will lack traction. There are a variety of ways to achieve this, but there are no shortcuts to creating a meaningful vision with high commitment.
• It’s not God’s vision. The church belongs to God, not us, so we should be seeking the owner’s guidance as we make decisions. Asking where God is leading is essential. This is much more than a perfunctory prayer at the start of each meeting. It’s a process that is done by spiritually mature leaders who will commit substantial time to listen for God’s voice with the outcome being that, “It seemed right to the Holy Spirit and us …” (Acts 15:28).
• No hard choices are made. The power of a real vision is that it declares a church’s priorities. By implication, it also declares those things that are NOT priorities. Unfortunately, many visions (and the processes by which they are developed) suffer from a bad case of peacekeeping and accommodation. When leaders approach the point of making hard trade-offs that will disappoint or alienate someone, they often pull back. The result is a lack of focus and clarity that robs the ministry of the anticipated benefits.
• The next steps are missing. Visionary leaders are generally not known for their execution ability. Even if the visioning process has avoided the previous three ailments, someone needs to make the transition from a high-level, inspirational vision to concrete plans. Without this, people will wait and wonder what they are supposed to do.

I’m not the only person who has these mixed feelings about visions. I will close with one of my favorite quotes from one of America’s truly visionary pastors. “Visions excite people. They inspire people. They compel people into action. But unless people eventually see progress toward the fulfillment of the vision they will conclude that the vision caster is just a dreamer blowing smoke, and their morale will plummet” (Bill Hybels, Courageous Leadership). What’s the health of your vision?

Read more from Mike here.

Tags: Mike Bonem, Vision Clarity, Vision Frame

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