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Hey Michiana, January 13th, 2012 is the Day of Prayer for our Michiana cities, our region, our neighborhoods, our families, our leaders, our businesses, and our churches.  Yes, Friday the 13th- a perfect day to kick the gates of hell. 

We’ll be meeting Friday, 6:30 AM on the 13th in Mishawaka, IN:  Here

You won’t be put on the spot or asked to do anything but simply pray in your way.

Some wonder, does prayer even work?  Does it even matter?  Well you won’t know if you don’t take a step of faith and see what God does over the next several months and years.  We have a part to play, but we need to get out of God’s way first.  We need to join Him in what He’s planning, not run in circles with our mindless activities.

If you can’t join us in Mishawaka, be part of this day wherever you’re at- connect at your churches, your work, your front yard, a flag pole, or your downstairs sofa…. I don’t care… just pray that God Almighty will bring a great vision and Hope to Michiana.  Here is what we’ll be focusing on:

• That God would draw the people of Michiana to Him and change the hearts in our community
• That the “church” would be re-energized and unify to bring Hope to our community- to feed the hungry, educate our kids, love the outcasts, restore relationships, and proactively engage the needs our our community
• For the businesses in Michiana- that they would prosper, innovate, employ, run with integrity, be a force for fueling our community, bring purpose to the workplace, and make an impact for positive change in our backyard
• For our leaders, our Congressmen, our mayors, and representatives that they would lead with courage, honesty, Truth, and have God-given wisdom for the challenges we face
• That our families, marriages, and children would be strong, united, and full of love

Look, if we believe what we believe- God hears our prayers, He changes us in the process, we get to be part of His story, part of His plan for our city, and we will live our days with greater Purpose.  If we believe what we believe, it’s not about us, it’s not about our short time here on this Earth, and it’s not about what we “do”.  It’s about Christ, living with an eternal beginning in mind, and what we can “do” to be obedient in the part He’s called you and I to play.

We’ll be doing this as a kick-off and launch to our regular Maximizers Friday AM meeting, you can do this in any flavor and place you like- when do we ever pray as a city for our city?  How about Friday the 13th.

In an organization with 100 people:

• 20 people are doers.
• With a leader.
• 80 are hanging around watching, experimenting, consuming, or complaining.
• When the 20 expand to 40, chances are there’s 200 now in the organization (or will be).
• The 20 tend to get frustrated with the 80 for not doing anything and at times will tell them. (They should avoid that.)
• The 80 will ride the coattails of the 20 and feel like they did it and even take credit for it.
• This sometimes frustrates the 20. They should not be frustrated. They should just do.
• Great leaders pour vision into the 20 while casting the net out to the 100.
• Frustrated leaders spend a lot of time trying to get the 80 be part of the 20.
• Of the 80, some will become doers as the organization grows.
• The doers that simply do will some day realize there are people following them.
• Some of the 80 will become part of the 20 with a simple personal invite.
• A leader will be turned down 4 times for every yes. This does not bother great leaders. It frustrates others.
• Frustrated leaders have the opportunity to be great leaders.

I want to be a great leader.

(Repost from July 4, 2008)

• Here’s John
• Humilitas- Book
• To talk about the humility and claim to be the expert is certainly a paradox.
• Humility is not humiliation or low-self esteem.  It’s the noble choice to give up your status for others, hold your power for the good of others
• Humility makes the great, greater
• 5 reasons for humility:
• #1 Humility is common sense.  None of us is an expert at everything.  There is far more we don’t know than know.
• Expertise’ in one area counts very little in another
• A true expert knows how much there is to know about a subject helps remind them how much they must not know about other subjects (for that very reason)
• Competency extrapolation:  It’s common to have pastor’s try to extrapolate the Bible to other fields…. business, science, etc which often is a huge mistake- especially when those experts may sit in their churches
• #2  Humility is beautiful
• We are more attracted to the great who are humble, than those who know they’re great and express it too
• Humility among an equal is a virtue
• A humility revolution came in Christ-  To willingling sacrifice, to withhold power, and humbled himself in death.
• Our culture has been massively influenced by the Crucifixion
• Greatest and humility are now one
• #3 Humility is generative
• It generates new abilities, new knowledge…. the proud go away with less at conferences than the humble
• Confronting mistakes is often missed for arrogant leaders that have experienced success
• We’re willing to try new things while we may look foolish in our early steps but leads to new experiences
• #4  Humility is persuasive
• Character/Ethos is the foundation of persuasion
• We come biased to those who are humble- we trust what they say and learn from what they write
• The most believable person in the world is the person you know has the most interest in helping you in their heart- the one I think cares the most
• #5  Humility is Inspiring
• Maximize others.  When we stop inspiring others to great hearts, our organization is limited to only our technical ability to build our organization- not the duplication and multiplication of people.
• You can have great impact with character and persuasion- it comes with authentic humility
• Humility can inspire- people want to be like you- you’re approachable

• Len Schlesinger:  President Babson College, Harvard Business School
• Simple service: Find out who your customers are, find out what they want, and give it to them- keep it simple
• Simple leadership:  Take your organization from here to there
• Martin Luther King spent 3-4 years knocking “here”- the status quo…. then later, gave the Vision of what “there” looks like
• The Here:  6 billion people make less than $2 a day, we create more food than we can deliver to the people that need it, the millenials look forward to a less attractive future, where the absence of education and employment opportunities is leading violence across the globe, the polital process seems completely inadequate to deal with the issues and more…. This is unacceptable…. Now what am I going to do about it?
• Entrepreneurship:  We’re going to believe in a future by creating it first
• The typical story of the entrepreneur:  “We leveraged everything, sold our assets, were hanging by a shoe-string…”  The fable-ish story of the entrepreneur puts barriers to the normal person in thinking they could do anything of significance.
• Most entrepreneurs are not risk- oriented, they happen to be great at spreading risk and most don’t start out with a clear vision of what they’re going to do…
• Most don’t start “new” businesses, they more often are doing things that have been or are already being done…
• Don’t let the image of what people make an entrepreneur to be and what it takes distract you from the person and purpose you want to be…. It’s hype.
• The majority of the wealth being created globally is coming from family enterprise
• The fortune 25 over a 30 year timeframe- only 6 still remain
• Typically the half-life of the Fortune 25 is only 10 years- they’re constantly disrupted by entrepreneurs
• You need to re-organize and re-energize your organization every 3-5 years
• We need to be able to economic, sustainability, and social issues simultaneously, not in a sequential order
• We’re all entrepreneurs, too few of us get to practice it…
• There is a strong consistancy among entrepreneurs we’re all capable of- much of what we’ve learned in our schooling growing up has wired us a certain way. 
• We tend to invest based on historical results
• If you can’t predict the future, create it.  Act.
• Serial entrepreneurs demonstrate this trait 89% of the time.  Acting to create the future rather than trying to predict it.
• When it’s completely dark and you’re in a hole, what do you do?  You start to feel around, try some things out… this is the similar action of entrepreneurship
• You can only act your way into an unknowable future, you can’t think your way there
• Limit risks by continuing to take small steps with what you have in hand
• Entrepreneurs start with what they care about.  That’s your first question:  What do you really care about it?
• Second question:  What step do I want to take first?
• Act quickly with what you have in hand, what can you afford?
• How badly do you want to do something?  That’s how much you may want to risk, then you act!
• 45 of 50 entrepreneurs started with a relationship first, someone they liked, then they came up with an idea
• What keeps people from doing this?  They get distracted with what they’re trying to do vs. simply worry about what you want to do next
• Focus on your next step, you can hurt yourself worrying about future steps
• We worry about taking a step because we fear failure. 
• The failure rate in venture capital firms is around 60%, up from 35% in the 1980′s
• Failure doesn’t mean game over, it means take a different step
• In your failure, quite likely, you’ve learned something that no one else knows
• #1  Know What you Want
• #2  Stop Obsessing about the things you need to do something
• #3  Make reality your friend and work with it
• #4  Takes steps to use the means of what you’re willing to spend and start from there
• Little bets, baby steps, small wins-  what solves big problems
• #5  Bring other people with you, be flexible on what you want and how you want to do it
• Action gives you “more at bats” which increases the liklihood you’ll find success…

• Everybody wins when a leader gets better
• #1 Big Question:  What is your current leadership challenge level at work?  (Underchallenged?  Appropriately challenged?  Dangerously overchallenged?)  Where in this spectrum are you?
• Where do you think you do your best work in that spectrum?  Where do you come up with your innovation?  Research says it’s just over the line of appropriately challenged and creeping into overchallenged.
• Think about building muscle, you need to stress it a bit to grow but overstress it and you can tear your muscle- but you need some stress.
• If you’re underchallenged and stay there, your leadership strengths will atrophy and diminish
• If you’re dangerously overchallenged, you will break down physically and mentally.  If you stay there too long, you’ll break down in ways you don’t want to break down.
• If you’re modeling being dangerously overchallenged- you risk your team doing the same thing and burning them out.
• Stress improves productivity in short spurts, it flattens out in town, but continued stress will cause you to crash.  What is the pace you’re running in?
• How do you refuel your leadership bucket?  How and when do you take your foot off the pedal?
• Underchallenged people leave your organization.  Are you challenging your team appropriately?
• #2 Big Question:  What is your plan for dealing with challenging people in your organization?
• If you lost 50% of your revenue, how would you decide who would have to go?  If you have a team of 10, who are the five that would have to go?  They can be great people but as an exercise, it gives you clarity on your “challenging people” list
• The future of your organization is critically tied to the quality of your team moving into the future.  How is your ability in keeping and attracting the best people?
• How much time are you going to give those who have an attitude issue roaming in your organization?  A day?  A year?  Leaders have to have a point of view on this.
• Have a conversation quickly, “Fred, why are you walking around the organization with a pitch fork?  What can we do to help?  But you need to know, this is going to need to be resolved in the next 30 days.”
• The damage someone with a bad attitude can do in your organization can be breathtaking if left alone
• What is your plan for underperformers?  You need to have a plan.  Willow addresses immediately but gives them 90 days to get it resolved.
• The hardest is when the organization outgrows a team member’s capacity or talent.  They’re a great person but they become a lid to your organization.  Willow works to give them 6-12 months to transition, move to another seat, or make sure they treat them well in their exit/severance.
• If you don’t deal with the worst attitudes, you demotivate the best people and you risk losing them.
• Challenging people deep down are typically not happy people.
• #3 Big Question:  Are you naming, facing, and resolving the problems that exist in your organization?
• You’ve seen it…. organizations that push issues under the rug and eventually die.
• Every idea you have has a life cycle:  Accelerating, Booming, Decelerating, Tanking
• “Nothing rocks forever- there is a season for everything and every new idea….”
• Part of your job as a leader is to look problems straight in the eye and not be intimidated by them.  Work to move tired ideas back to a refreshed accelerating mode before they deplete or “tank”
• #4 Big Question;  When is the last time you examined the “core” of what your organization is all about?
• Reevaluate…. what business are we in?  Are we clear about our core?
• Re-thinking your core can help bring new messaging to your market
• The Church is about the people transformation business- real life change through the Gospel
• With a circle, in 5 words, explain or summarize the central message of Christianity….  do the same for your organization or business.  5 words.
• Christianity 5 words:  Love, Evil, Rescue, Choice, Restore   When you identify that, we bring clarity to our message, we’ve simplified a message.
• #5 Big Question:  Have you had your leadership bell rung recently?
• When is the last time we’ve cast a bold vision to our team…. Do you need your boldness back?
• If you’re sick enough of being stuck, you would do whatever it took to create action…. Are you sick enough?  Are you willing to do whatever it takes to be “un-stuck” or are you making excuses?
• Your God-given job as a leader is to move an organization from here to “there”.  Whatever it takes, wherever it takes.  If you’ve lost this vision, step aside and let someone push the vision.
• There’s too much at stake in this world not to take action and lead.
• Why not challenge yourself and your team to make the next five years the best five years of your leadership?  The people following you deserve to have your next 5 years be your best.

  Phil Cooke spoke at the Create 2011 Conference in St. Catherines, Ontario, here are my notes from his session… great stuff!

“Do what you do so well that people will want to see it experience it again and bring their friends.”- Walt Disney

• The way we say something and the way people perceive things matters
• Context to your message matters
• New book:  Jolt:  Get the jump on a world that’s constantly changing
• More content is created in 48 hours today than was created from the beginning of time to 2000
• “If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less”
• We’re bombarded with messages= Clutter
• The Cultural Context of Competing Messages
• Your audience is bombarded with 5000 media messages per day
• Average TV is on 8:18 while we average 6:40 sleep in the typical day
• A church only gets 1-2 hours a week of time/attention
• A powerful message with no audience= fail
• Millenials will soon outnumber the Boomers
• 83% of people in companies have been passed over for a promotion because they were unable to navigate change needed to go the to next level
• We are in a two-way conversation
• The Millenials have grown up thinking “they’re special”, trophy generation for just showing up, and are incredibly native to computers…. You want a voice.
• The show Lost changed some of their storylines by reading blogs, websites, and other means people were chatting about their show- are you listening to your audience? 
• What do people think when they think of you or your organization?
• Big brands (Nike, Starbucks) focus on the experience in their branding
• Efficiency and decisions purely based on profit can be catastrophic to the customer experience
• #1 EVERYTHING communicates…. everything.  What are you or your organization communicating?
• The jerk behind your counter can destroy your brand
• In a media driven culture,  # 2 Visibility is just as important as ability
• If you don’t step out there and get in the game you’re never going to get noticed
• #3 You cannot brand a lie.
• The internet makes everything easy.  Would you want your texts, emails, videos, or comments read in a court room?
• #4  Understand the Power of a Name
• Grand Rapids Bible College changed name to Cornerstone University- enrollment doubled
• url’s matter:  Experts Exchange looks like expertsexchange.com
• #5 Speak the Language of Design  Does your style and media choices reflect the group you’re trying to reach?
• 4 images to get rid of in the church:  flags, doves, flames, and globes 
• When everybody uses the same image is becomes devalued
• #6 Lose the Lingo
• Don’t speak in a lingo that your audience doesn’t get.
• #7  It’s About the Niche’
• There are 17 different magazines just for Classic Mustangs
• Identify our gifts and unique abilities and reach that niche’…. if every church did that we WOULD reach the world
• Your ability to see change coming and navigate that change may be the single greatest key to your future

For the past year, I can’t shake this concept in my head… I’ve had several conversations with key leaders in our community and I think we simply need to get this done.  I’m guessing there are sites out there that are close, or some of you have a similar vision and/or the skills to get it done.

The Problem:  There are scores of non-profit organizations in our community doing lots of great things that no one knows about.  Generally most are doing there own thing in entrepreneureal fashion but a not connected to others or a unified strategy to maximize impact in our cities.  We end up with fragmented efforts doing pockets of phenominal service with limited results.  People don’t know how to connect, volunteer, and sometimes can’t even “give” to these missions.

I dream of:

• One aggregate web experience mapping out all the great efforts happening in a community from feeding the hungry, shelters, after-school learning programs, options for juveniles, financial counseling, marriage counseling, and more
• People could filter by location, by mission focus, by needs both financially and for volunteering
• At any given time, people could find real-time and upcoming volunteer opportunities via computer or phone
• The site would error on the side of being “too open”- open to government, churches, other non-profits, and anyone else genuinely providing care for a community
• Businesses would engage to assist with strategy, funding, and doing only what it can do
• Churches would engage from all denominations and creeds bringing Hope to their neighborhood or city and “being the church”
• Non-profits would not compete over grant-funding but create a healthy coopetition to bring excellence to what they do
• Ego’s would have to be checked in at the door
• It’s about helping and taking ownership of what is needed in our backyards

Think of a clutter-less view of opportunities… this happens to be our area but the same concept applies across the world:

• The goal of every organization would be to get “mapped” and to push volunteer opportunities “up” to be viewed by the world
• Each organization could have it’s own, simple portal and/or links to it’s site for a deeper dive into what it’s about, raise funds, and an opportunity to share it’s story

I could go on and on… again, I’ve been thinking about this for over a year.  The great news is conversations are already happening.  I believe we are taking steps to where we could be positioned to “pilot” the site in our area if we can get it built.  I’m in.  My gut tells me there are many others who have a similar vision- who are you?  Let’s connect.  I know there are several sites that exist that are doing “pieces” of it like here, here, or here… If I’m missing others, I’d love to hear about it…  I’m in, let’s make this happen… share it to the globe. 

Yesterday I had the opportunity to sit in a room with two pastors from two different churches….neither of which have spent much time in the “other world” of business, demanding customers, and what is often a different set of rules we work with.  What experiences and perspectives could a church learn from the business community?  Here are some that come to mind:

• Quality and excellence matters.  There are scores of mediocre businesses and churches.  What people experience when they pull in your parking lot, walk through your doors, encounter people, and experience your service is often the same filter they would use in going to a restaurant, a retail store, or the BMV.  Far too many churches settle for a “that’s good enough” mentality when it comes to the first and lasting impressions at their facility.  Do you have people regularly walking through your weekend experience giving you feedback on how someone coming for the first time may see your church with new eyes?
• Hire the best.  Churches are called on to be great managers of the money they are given.  With limited resources, it’s more important than ever to hire phenominal people that are sold out and aligned with your vision.  Do you have someone in your church that knows how to interview people well?  Is this outside your skill set?
• A big vision that inspires.  Seriously, you have the greatest Hope for mankind on your side yet one of the greatest overall impressions people have of “church” is that it’s boring and irrelevant.  What are you doing that would make me excited to be part of it and help fund it?  Are you really making an impact on your community?  In what ways are you “wowing” the people that engage with your church.  I agree with the masses, most churches seem to be yawners.  You should do better.  If your vision doesn’t scare you it’s too small.
• Be worthy of an investment.  I have thousands of options to give money to… If I invest in a business I hope for a profitable return.  If I give to a church, it’s because I think they are going to “maximize” the return on ministry, make the biggest impact in our world, and have a vision worth giving to…  Why would someone want to give you your church?
• Leverage Technology.  Businesses are always looking for an edge and many are able to invest in technology that will give them a real return on that investment.  Churches can do the same.  Members have needs, prayer requests, giving records, contact management, accessing church events, and more.  To run a church, you have accounting systems, web sites, social media, workstations, employees and volunteers trying to collaborate, and more.  Do you have a go-to resource to help you with technology and the means to implement it?
• Know who you are and communicate it simply.  Your church can’t be all things to all people.  You should clearly know who you are and just as important, who you aren’t.  Do you have a clear strategy to communicate your mission clearly and simply?
• Reinvent Yourself.  Our culture is constantly shifting and adjusting.  Businesses face new competition, new discoveries, and shifts in buying trends that create needs to adjust strategies and methodologies.  Most churches seem to want to keep doing the same thing they’ve always done and blame the changing culture.  You can do that but will continue to be more irrelevant to the people around you.  In the business world, I can wish we still did business on a notepad but the reality is that computers are here and the clients demand online access to orders.  We change because we care about our clients.  A church should change because it cares about its community.  Be relevant.  What are you doing at your church that is so 1990?

Business leaders, what else could churches learn from you?

• Four areas to focus on…
• #1  What do we think about Jesus?  We need to understand our Founder and the place of our Founder. 
• #2  Rediscover the story of Jesus in the Gospels…  Why is Jesus knocking on the door of the church?  Jesus has become Savior but not Lord… 
• “Jesus and religion don’t mix… and there’s a lot of religion going on out there…” 
• #3 We need to rediscover mission…  Mission is part of who God is, not something that He does… 
• #4 Reorganize- we need to reinvent…. The Church needs to think “you build it we can help” rather than “we’ll build it and you help…”
• If you have 16% of the population an idea is inevitable… it’s the tipping point…
• Some need to break from the herd and model what the Church should look like on mission

Tim Stevens

• There have been trends of the “latest and greatest” of styles, focus, what works, what doesn’t work in churches… When you don’t get the results you want, it doesn’t mean you move the target and bash the old… think  ”reinvent” - the culture we live in is always changing…  Yesterday may have been OK but today is a new day…
• “Missional Schmissional”
• “I haven’t met the pastor or church that is only about the weekend and getting a big crowd… I just haven’t met them… there has always been some element of missional in the attractional churches…”
• “Attractional Schmactional”-  sometimes I just get tired of feeling like we’re only as good as our latest series, last year doesn’t matter, the feeling of performing, and the pressure of coming up with the next thing is tiring… sometimes we can get tired of those who take take take but never volunteer, give, or contribute in some way…
• About four years ago we stopped growing- it was very tough on staff, what were we doing wrong?  We blamed each other, our programming, the people, the weather, you name it…  We tried several different methods to make changes…
• More and more people feel like they have a good relationship with God without going to church…  40% may go to church in its current model, 60% will never come to “the box” (church)
• Just about every church in your community is saying “Come to us”…
• “I have shifted to a profound conviction that in our community- 60% will never step foot in our church..”
• It seemed we have two choices, pour all our resources in the shrinking 40%- those who may be open to going to church, OR scrap everything and shift focus to helping the growing 60% that they matter to God
• 3 things we know at Granger:
• We must begin reaching the 60%
• We must reach more of the 40%
• We must help the 40% reach “their” 60%
• The attractional “come to the box” model may be the most/best missional strategy to reach suburban America- that may be the method that best works for the 40%
• Past:  Get the community into the church   Future:  Get the church into the community
• Past:  Church largely defined by the weekend service   Future:  Church defined “where you are”
• Past: Primarily centralized, top-down structure   Future:  Infuse a decentralized, organic structure for quick growth
• Past:  Tracked Attendance and giving     Future:  Tracking community impact and “loving others”
• Past:  No designated giving    Future:  Lots of ways for people to give to your passion
• People more than ever want to see the impact of their giving, less trust in organizations
• Past:  People come to the church building to do their ministry  Future:  Ministry isn’t confined to a building, it happens wherever you are
• Past:  Buildings serve the church, the community is invited to join  Future:  Buildings serve the community- the congregation also meets there
• What if our building is no longer called Granger Community Church, renamed “Harbor Ridge”- the place you go for hope and healing… the moments of your greatest need  (example only- idea of changing the purpose of the building called church to a community focus… help for finances, marriages, classes, etc.)
• This change is going to be “messy”- tension is the new order of the day…
• “What works and is needed in Granger, Indiana will be different than what happens in your community…”