Main Session 2 this morning was Andy Stanley titled "Liberating Your Organization" but really focused on the systems in our church. The content was stout, challenging, and I believe the opportunity to be revolutionary if you have never processed or implemented these principles.
Here are just some of the many notes:
1. Some of our organizational systems (I bet many) in the church impede ministry and obstruct leaders.
2. Systems Create Behaviors. Not preaching or teaching, but the systems in our organization create behaviors in people. Our systems determine the direction of our church.
**God works through systems – the human body, the universe. Doesn’t make God small or things unspiritual. God works through systems.
3. The best way to think of systems is to think about your family.
4. Book: The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge.
5. The systems you inherit, adopt, or create will eventually impact what staff and volunteers do. It is not what you say & teach…it is the systems.
6. Answers to the questions we ask: How do you _______. The answer always is something about a system that has been created.
7. Anytime you hear, "Well, our people just won’t…" you are listening to someone who doesn’t understand the influence of systems.
8. Components of a System
- Expectations/Rules
- Rewards (or lack of)…in every systems something is rewarded, so we need to ask, what are we rewarding
- Consequences (or lack of)
- Communication (content & style)…preaching & teaching is very important for shaping a system but it is only one component
- Behavior (of those in charge)
9. Systems have a great impact on organizational culture than do mission statements.
- This principle explains why it is so difficult to transition a church.
- If a new leader casts a new vision and never addresses old systems, nothing changes.
- Don’t jump in and change style or programs, need to change systems.
- Whey there are system problems, we always blame the players instead of the system.
10. The New Testament does not present us with a comprehensive system or model. In the NT we discover what the early church did. The NT does not lay out a comprehensive plan instructing church leaders what to do.
11. Always differentiate between what is prescriptive and what is descriptive.
12. The NT and OT do offer some principles that should be integrated into our systems: Delegation, Accountability, Authority, Interdependence, Point Leadership, Seek Counsel.
13. Not in there = Congregational Rule…bad system. Examples of Congregational rule in the Bible: Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers; Aaron and Israelites voting for an idol; the nation of Israel wanting a King.
14. Your system should allow you to involve and hire the best person for the job. The people we use is more important that the system we choose.
15. Your system should provide you with the flexibility to get the right people to the table. Never give people a seat at the table based upon organizational chart alone, best & brightest around table making important decisions. Financial decision, get the best & brightest financial minds.
16. Your system should allow you to make complex decisions within the context of a small group of empowered individuals. Cannot effectively communicate complicated information to a large group of people.
17. Your system should ensure that only one person answers to "they". Example: Senior Leader to Board
18. Romans 12:6-8…Leadership should govern diligently = systems
19. Senior Leaders: responsible for system in the church…thus, the behavior
20. Systems trump mission statements = need to design and implement systems to get people live out the mission statements
21. Questions when making decisions: What are the systems that are driving this decision?
22. When we have bad systems: we are wasting people’s time, creating obstacles to people inviting the lost, adding rungs on the ladder (from session 1)
23. Pushback that we bring secular or corporate practices in the church. Yet, if we can find principles from successful organizations that help us develop effective systems, we should do it to help us accomplish our mission…all principles are God’s principles. If we find them in the secular world, they simply confirm truths from God’s design of a systematic world.
You can tell…it is all about SYSTEMS. Powerful principle for life and leadership: Systems Create Behavior. Want to read more, read Tony Morgan, Tim Stevens, & Jay Hardwick.
pretty interesting stuff. looks like you are learning a lot! i’m sure your brain will be full when you get back. i start my conference today in dallas. wfx should be a good time.