Opportunity Creep: It May be Your Biggest Ministry Challenge

by: Will Mancini

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The term “scope creep” is a term consultants use when their clients expect more than what the project originally outlined. The idea is that the scope of the project is slowing getting bigger, usually in imperceptible increments. Of course, no consultant wants scope creep to happen, but in an effort to please the client, its hard to prevent sometimes.

The same dynamic is ever present in ministry. It’s called “opportunity creep.”

What is “opportunity creep?” Its roughly the same idea, just applied to all of the positive ministry opportunities a pastor may face in the days and weeks of church life. By calling it “creep” we are acknowledging that it’s all too easy to say yes too much. By positioning this as a problem, we are highlighting that a lack of “opportunity management” can distract and dilute our ministry efforts.

Think about how many kinds of opportunities cross a pastor’s path:

• We serve a congregation that’s a bottomless well of  members’ needs.
• We are captured by the buzz of new ideas, new people, and new initiatives happening in church space.
• We live in  communities riddled with issues that we would love to “missionally” engage.
• We are digitally connect to an ocean of information and “friends.”

The bottom line: church leadership is rich soil for opportunity creep.

I will address opportunity creep with two follow-up posts:

1) The Five Primary Sources of Distraction in Ministry- this is about spotting the creep.

2) Applying Five Filters to Ministry Decision Making– this is about beating the creep.

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Recapturing Vision, Vision Clarity, Will Mancini

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4 Disciplines for Leading with Clarity

by: Will Mancini

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Tags: Clarity, Patrick Lencioni, The Advantage, Will Mancini

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4 Mega Lessons on Keeping Vision Clear with Dramatic Ministry Success

by: Will Mancini

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A few weeks ago I enjoyed a back-to-back connections with three very different and very fruitful ministries. On Monday, I was in Chicago with Dave and John Ferguson on the Community Christian Church team. On Tuesday I was with Mountain Lake  Church in Atlanta, and on Wednesday  I was with Upward Sports in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

These ministries demonstrate dramatic success. Dave and Jon have built a city-reaching, multi-site church as well as a church planting network (New Thing) around the defining value of “reproducing at every level”. Shawn Lovejoy has lead a unique and effective church in the shadow of Andy Stanley’s North Point Community Church. (In addition, he has encouraged a tribe of church planters through the ministry of churchplanters.com.) Both churches gather thousands of people weekly. Upward, as a sports ministry, has impacted millions and continues to cast mind-stretching vision to reach millions more.

My time in reflection on these ministries brought these observations:

#1 The unexamined vision is not worth casting.

When these leaders talk about what God is doing in their ministries, you can feel the ownership and passion that comes through the constant seeking, wrestling, deciding and articulating work of clarity. When they cast vision its real and its worth something not only because they sought God for it, but because they work for it.

#2 The more fruitful your ministry, the more time will be required—not less—to cultivate further clarity.

Great leaders know a simple fact: You can always be more clear. Most pastors treat a clarity exercise or vision retreat like its a one-time gig. But when you are around leaders who see crazy fruitful results, you’ll notice a certain and constant preoccupation with clarity. Ironically they are spending disproportionately more time doing things like:

• keeping the mission real and felt
• making the values active and visible
• insisting that strategy is sharp and aligned

At Upward the team always jokes about re-entering “the tunnel of chaos” as part of the constant clarity pursuit. At CCC, Jon Ferguson, on moment’s notice, can unpack the nuances of applying the 5-step process of reproducing at every level (pictured below.)

#3 Strategic assumptions and the strategy itself (that brought success) must be reinterpreted, reevaluated and reformulated every step of the way.

You don’t convert and develop people the same way at each phase in your ministry. Why not? First, because there is always room for improvement. Second, because times and people change. Third, because with success, your organization must adapt and expand how it does what it does. If you want to keep things both sophisticated and simple, you must dedicate serious time to dialogue and rethinking as a leadership team. At Community Christian I enjoy watching Dave Ferguson redraw the map of how they planned to reach Chicago. As the picture changed, so did the strategy. Currently they are reconsidering how to decrease the number of campus constants as they expand beyond their current twelve locations.

#4  A big vision is the natural byproduct of consistent passion for a simple mission over a long time.

These three  ministries didn’t start with a big vision. The started with passionate mission. Over time, the stick-to-it-ness of humble tenacity and mission clarity gives way to bigger and bigger dreams that become apparent as the mission moves forward. Caz McCaslin recalls the dream to extend his gymnasium to reach another 100 kids. Why? His mission was to introduce children to Jesus through sports. Eventually that mission would bring the dream of 1,000 church gyms with evangelistic basketball leagues across the country. He accomplished that years ago. What next? The same mission is generating a plan to win 4 million kids. These “upsized visions” could never be seen or achieved without a fanatical focus on the same mission over time. The same is true with CCC. After becoming a multisite with twelve campuses Dave and Jon are now talking about “the how” of 200. They just wouldn’t have see that fifteen years ago.

Which one of these lessons intrigues you the most?

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Community Christian Church, Mountain Lake Church, Upward Sports, Vision Clarity, Will Mancini

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The Power of Clarity in Your Church’s Vision

by: Matt Steen

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Tears were streaming down his face as he silently wept:

“I can see it so clearly… I just haven’t had the ability to put it into words… which makes people think I don’t know where we are going.”

Clarity is powerful.

One of my most favorite things to do through my work with Church Simple is to help church leaders clearly communicate what it is that they are called to… and then helping them do it.  In this case, the process was incredibly moving.

I am becoming convinced that the church in this country is not lacking of vision… it is the rare church leader that does not have a vision for where God is taking them.  What I think is missing in many churches is a sense of clarity when it comes to that vision: a way to express it clearly, concisely, and with authority.

Vision statements can be incredibly powerful tools to rally your congregation around your calling… or they can be incredibly obtuse statements that make people yawn in powerful new ways.  The difference is how you approach crafting your vision statement, and whether you are making a statement, or calling to action.  I fully believe that we have been called to action by the great commission and great commandment… and should be calling our people to action as well.  With this in mind, here are four qualities of a great vision statement:

• Vivid.  Paint a picture.  Be clear about where you are going and what it will look like.  If your people do not fully understand what your vision statement is calling them to, you will never achieve it.
• Inspiring.  I am sick of boring vision statements.  If you want me to fully invest myself in the vision and mission of your church you need to call me to something bigger than myself, something worthy of the time, talents, and treasure that I will be sacrificing in order to make it happen.  Don’t tell me what we are, tell me where we are going… and make it a big deal.
• Memorable.  The school that I worked with in Baltimore had a vision statement that took up a full sheet of paper (actually they had two, posted on opposite walls… but that is a bigger problem for another time).  If you were to ask teachers, administrators, or anyone involved in the school to recite, or paraphrase, either of those statements you would have gotten a blank stare.  Your vision statement needs to be clear and concise in order for it to be memorable.  Vision statements that aren’t memorable are worse than having no vision statement at all.
• Preachable.  If you can not point back to your church’s vision statement during your sermon on a regular basis it is useless.  The power of a vision statement is its ability to clearly define who you are as a church and where you are going.  If you are not referring back to it regularly, it may be time to ask yourself whether you, and your vision, are headed in the same direction.

What makes YOUR church’s vision statement great?

If you are looking for more thoughts on church vision, you need to check out what Will Mancini is up to, or buy his book.  Either way, this is too important to not do well.

Read more from Matt here.

Tags: Matt Steen, Recapturing Vision, Vision Clarity, Vision Frame, Will Mancini

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Epic Quotes on Discipleship from Prof Howard Hendricks

by: Will Mancini

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Howard G. Hendricks, known affectionately as “Prof” to more than 10,000 graduates of Dallas Theological Seminary, leaves behind an incalculable legacy which he would call “the work of Christ in me.” Auxano Founder and CEO Will Mancini was a student of Prof, and recently wrote the following upon hearing of his death.

Prof died today but his ministry continues to expand through the lives of over 13,000 students that were impacted over his 60 years of teaching at Dallas Theological Seminary. While working on a tribute, I first reflected on the sticky ideas that he planted in my mind through teaching and embedded in my heart through modeling. All but one quote below is straight from memory. There are literally hundreds more…

DISCIPLESHIP

• You cannot impart what you do not possess.
• You can impress from a distance, but you can only impact up close.
• If you cannot be accused of exclusivity, you are not discipling.
• You teach what you know, but you reproduce what you are.
• You never graduate from the school of discipleship.
• When God measures a man he puts the tape around the heart, not the head.
• Jesus never discipled one-on-one.

INFLUENCE

There are many things in life you “can do” for God. And the more success you have, the more opportunities will come. (You will know more people, you will have more resources, etc.) But most opportunities are distractions in disguise. Therefore find the one thing you “must do” for God.

• You focus on the depth of your relationship [with God]; let Him determine the scope of your ministry
• A good leader has a compass in their head and a magnet in their heart.
• Spend the rest of your life doing what God prepared you to do.
• The secret to concentration is elimination.
• Nothing is more common that unfulfilled potential.

SCRIPTURE

Many of us want a word from God, but we don’t want the Word of God. We know enough to own a Bible but not enough for the Bible to own us. We pay the Bible lip service, but we fail to give it “life service.” In a world where the only absolute is that there are no absolutes, there is little room left for the authoritative Word of God as revealed in the Bible.

• The Bible was written not to satisfy your curiosity but to help you conform to Christ’s image.
• The goal is not to make you a smarter sinner but to make you like the Saviour.
• Put the cookies on the bottom shelf (talking about making teaching accessible to everyone).
• Dusty Bibles lead to dirty lives.
• It’s a sin to bore people with the Bible.
• Christian education is a bomb with a long fuse— it takes a while to go off.
• Our problem is that we are in the Word but not under the Word.

PROCESS

• Most people don’t think, they just rearrange their prejudices.
• Your strengths develop your confidence; your weaknesses develop your faith.
• My greatest fear is not your failure, but your success.
• If you want to use your testosterone to grow hair, that’s up to you.

Attending Prof’s memorial service yesterday, Will said “Incredible memorial service for Prof Howard Hendricks today. It was an eternal perspective workout for mind & heart.”

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Discipleship, Howard Hendricks, Will Mancini

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10 Commandments for Creating a Culture of Mission in Your Church

by: Will Mancini

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1. Thou shalt have a clear statement of mission and no agenda above that mission

2. Thou shalt  have a clear definition of what mission success looks like

3. Thou shalt NEVER rely on attendance and giving alone for validation of the mission

4. Thou shalt have a clear picture of how every church activity relates to the mission

5. Thous shalt eliminate any activity that does not contribute toward the mission

6. Thou shalt structure leadership team roles around commandments 1, 2 and 4

7.  Thou shalt create understanding of the mission through preaching

8. Thou shalt tell stories so that people feel the mission whenever possible

9. Thou shalt give to every person someone who will personally model the mission

10. Thou shalt recruit and train leaders who will follow the first nine commandments

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Mission, Will Mancini

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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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Favorite New Year’s Planning Posts for Church Leaders

by: Will Mancini

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Your favorite posts on my blog have often come during the New Year window. And I always enjoy creating new content at this time year just for you.

Here are some top posts from my last five years blogging. All of these were created from a New Year planning perspective:

Clarity 101: Goals, Vision, Planning…Blah, Blah, Blah

I wrote this post because people often misunderstand the importance of 30,000 foot, bigger picture clarity before jumping into the daily stuff. AND so much content focuses on the daily stuff.

Church Vision and Strategy Trends

In 2011, I wrote a post that is just as relevant two years later. This post was subsequently picked up by most leadership magazines and online blog aggregators including ChurchLeaders.com and Pastors.com

11 High-Impact Planning Ideas for Senior Pastors

I wrote this post to give some practical ideas to lead pastors. Have you seen it? What are you planning to do new in 2013?

Taking Vision Public: Six Steps to Vision Soaked Communication

This is actually a robust series that I wrote for New Years last year. It is useful for any pastor, but especially those have any responsibility for church communications.  Be sure to read through each post in the series. And, why not send to a friend who is specifically involved in church communications!

Happy New Year my ministry friends!!!  As always, thank you for taking time to swing by the blog.

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Planning, Recasting Vision, Will Mancini

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One Lesson of Zig Ziglar’s Legacy that will Change Your Life

by: Will Mancini

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Zig Ziglar died November 28 2012 at the age of 86. He was motivational maven with millions of followers. His twenty-plus books, uber-positive style, and Christian influence are manifested clearly through his ubiquitously sticky quotes. Dave Ramsey tweeted yesterday, “What’s your favorite Zig Ziglar quote?” Here are my favorites with regard to vision and clarity.

As the rest-in-peace tweets and favorite quotes filled the social air waves, I found myself asking, “Was there a special secret to Ziglar’s success?” I believe so.

If you trace Ziglar’s career in sales, one thing is abundantly clear: He was a great salesman because he was a great student; a student of people, a student of life and a student of other salespeople. In fact his success at its core was driven by his continual intake and carnivorous digestion.  Think about it for a minute. Does someone as prolific and successful as Ziglar just sit around thinking of quotes to write? Of course not. Rather, the accelerated learning-living-learning cycle just keeps snowballing. The wisdom, combined with the opportunity to teach others over decades and decades gets remixed and refined into powerful, unforgettable nuggets.

Remember, most very successful people can conveniently stop learning because of the fruits of their success. But a few successful people keep pouring the jet fuel of continued learning to really take them to the top.

One thumbprint of Ziglar’s appetite for learning is the preface of his 2003 updated edition of Secrets of Closing the Sale:

Over the past fifty years it has been my privilege to be in as many actual sales situations, selling goods, products, services or job opportunities as virtually anyone who ever carried the tile of salesperson. Additionally it has been my privilege to share the platform with and learn from some of the greatest speakers and sales trainers our country has produced.

He goes on to name twenty-six individuals. And continues…

Over these fifty years I have been a pack rat. I have taken copious notes from many great trainers. In addition I have clipped innumerable sales articles from newspapers and magazines and have learned much by watching salespeople in action. My library includes books and manuals from the greatest writers and trainers of the last fifty years, and I have over a thousand hours of recordings from these and other speakers.

The lesson that Ziglar’s life inspires me with is simple. Never stop learning. Once you master a category, the real master keeps learning even more. What’s keeping you from reaching the top of what God is calling you to do? Look first to what stops your learning. When was the last time you took copious notes at something that you considered yourself to be really, really good at?

You will find a lot of Ziglar quotes if you look, but his greatest secret is not the most citied quote:

“Life is a classroom — only those who are willing to be lifelong learners will move to the head of the class.”  – Zig Ziglar

Tags: Leadership Development, Learning, Will Mancini, Zig Ziglar

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4 Stellar Declarations of a Gospel-Centered Church

by: Will Mancini

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I recently heard Tim Keller speak on his new book Center Church (more on this in the blog later). The image above is his outline on gospel theology which is about one-eighth of the book. I am halfway through the book and I believe it is the most important book on church leadership written in my lifetime.

Here are a few quotes, including four stellar declarations of a church that is true to the Gospel:

#1 We are a church not just for ourselves but for those who don’t believe

#2 We are a church not just for ourselves but for the poor

#3 We are a church not just for ourselves but for the whole body of Christ

#4 We are a church not just for ourselves but for our church community

Two other quotes:

“In some ways we need to shape the church to be more engaged with the culture and in other ways we need to shape the church to be more confrontational with the culture.” – Tim Keller

“In the church members should say,  ’I give up the right to live my life the way I want, and I submit myself to a covenant community.’” – Tim Keller

Read more from Will here.

Tags: Center Church, Scripture, Tim Keller, Will Mancini

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