Will Mancini

I have enjoyed some moments getting to know Ben Arment. He is authentic as a Christ follower and a strategic, dream-oriented leader. One of his posts this week struck me immediately as one of the best posts I have read in 2010.

What follows is the intro to the post, The Advantage of Princes.  I encourage you to read the entire article and consider the reflection points below.

You may have thought you were dreaming big, but you’re only dreaming as big as your experience will let you. The past has conditioned you for the size of your idea. Everything you’ve experienced in life has amounted to the scope and the scale of your dream.

If you’re intimidated, scared or frightened, it’s because you’ve never done anything like this before.

You haven’t been exposed to it.

Let me be frank with you. There are people out there doing exactly what you want to do who are not challenged by it at all. They’re not intimidated or overwhelmed, stressed out or worried. Your dream comes naturally to them because their background is vaster than yours. Or perhaps they have more exposure than you.

This is the advantage of princes.

They grew up in the castle. They understood how the kingdom was run. Leading an empire is no big deal to them because they grew up watching it being done. It has nothing to do with their capabilities. It has everything to do with their conditioning… read more

Questions for consideration:

• Have you considered how your life and dreams will affect your kids’ perspective and opportunities?
• Do you agree that “The past has conditioned the size of your ideas and dreams?”
• Where are you on the pursuit of your own dreams? 
• Are tired of what you are doing for a living right now? 
• Are you excited about and already pursuing new directions?
• How does Ben’s model of carnivorous learning about film making inspire you?
• What new knowledge do you need to pursue your life dream?
• Who do you know or where could you go, that could help you dream? 
• What’s keeping you from taking a first step?
• Have you talked to your children about their dreams for life recently?
• What could you read together to stoke their imaginations?
• What trip could you take to expand your children’s view of what they can accomplish?

RELATED POSTS

Birth of a Vision, Death of a Vision, Birth of a Vision

Get a Dream, Do a Dream, Tell a Dream

How I Created My Dream Job

As a vision guy, I get asked lots of questions about long-term this and short-term that. Here is the thinking that I believe you can really hang your hat on as a leader: Engage five horizons but spend most of your time with three.

To understand the basic three, you will want to think like a landscape oil painter. Every landscape painting contains three planes that create the visual interest and ultimately the beauty of the painting. Painters call these, foreground, middleground and background. Here is a drawing that shows how the “picture plane” works to create depth. All that painters are doing is capturing how we  see reality all of the time. While you eyes are open your brain is processing visually, “the here, the near and the far.”

The three basic horizons of leadership are the same three planes for your organization’s future. Vision is the ability to paint a picture that illustrates and anticipates where God is taking your ministry, on all three planes. Now, let’s get practical with timing.

The basic three horizons are:

• Foreground – The 90-day horizon
• Middleground – The 1-year horizon
• Background – The 3-year horizon

Here is the most important consideration for each horizon with thoughts on two additional ones.

#1 The 90 Day Horizon

Leaders should  use it with an execution focus. I also refer to this as the 90-day season of success. The beauty of this horizon is that it provides enough time to make changes and shift priorities yet it’s not to far for sustained emotional engagement. In other words, there is enough time for real progress that you can really feel.   It’s also particularly useful for church planning which follows a semester flow.

#2 The 1-Year Horizon

This is the most fundamental horizon and leaders use with a visioning focus. It is the most useful viewpoint for creating a sense of alignment, enthusiasm,  and success for a group of people. God hardwired the annual cycle into creation. We plan our budgets by it and measure our lives by it. The starting point in my coaching for articulating vision is having a singular, one-year priority. Could every leader in your church respond to the question, “Where is God taking us?” with a one-year viewpoint?

#3 The 3-Year Horizon

It has been said that its easy to overestimate what you can do in one year, and underestimate what you can do in three years. Effective leaders see beyond the annual outlook and use this horizon with a planning focus.

#4 The Far-far-away Horizon

I name this horizon as such to help re-calibrate how leaders think about long-range planning. Basically, most of what was taught in strategic planning is not useful today because the speed of change has accelerated. Therefore, we can embrace the notion that planning in the 5-20 year range is more about fantasizing that planning. (See Craig Groeshel’s little post entitled, Death of the Five-year Plan.) Nevertheless, the far-far-away horizon may impact decisions related to life-stage decisions, major directional shifts or planning related to facilities and land.  Leaders should not presume on this horizon or disregard it completely.

#5 The Infinite Horizon

 This dimension should be used for vision-casting on a very high level. Some cultures have phrases, metaphors and stories  that transcend and unify time. In Church Unique, I make fun of the overuse of what I call the “lofty one-liner” as the total model for a vision statement. But used correctly, a beautiful and ideal phrase may be a permanent part of the organization’s vision vocabulary. For example, I met with a pastor today, who uses the dominant metaphor of “every thirst quenched” when describing the vision of his church. By itself, it doesn’t do much as vision. But placed on the infinite horizon, it can capture culture and create movement as long as it is tied to inspiring, achievable milestones in shorter term horizons.

Here is my take, as a consultant, on the five areas to look for with a comment on “being wary.”

• Domain expertise - Has the consultant effectively focused their calling and craft? Be wary of consultants who offer too many services. Be listening for the ability to recommend people from related but different fields. 

• Experience breadth – Does their portfolio of experiences create the value you are seeking? Be wary of consultants with limited experience: part time? years of experience? working with only declining churches? working in a denominational bubble? leveraging experience from one church? 

• Inquisitive disposition – Are they willing to really understand your unique culture situation? Be wary of big brief cases and power point presentations. Don’t even listen to solutions before questions. In the first two hours, if they talked more than they listened DO NOT hire them. 

• Compelling approach – Is there a systematic process for defining problems and communicating solutions? Be wary of consultants that CAN’T articulate a defined approach that makes sense. Listen for the story behind how the approach was developed. 

• Willing spirit – Do they really want to work with you or are they just making a buck?  Be wary of consultants that leverage themselves across too many clients or with junior team members. Listen for energy level and eagerness despite their credentials. 

This is the season of “Vision Sunday” or “Vision Night” or other events dedicated to church priorities for the upcoming year.

As I watch the landscape of vision casting in the North America church, the most important tip is the 11/16 principle. What exactly is it?

For the last 10 years I have played over and over again Martin Luther King’s famous, “I Have a Dream” speech for church leaders. It is the best vision casting moment I know of, as an American shared experience for the 20th century.

So here’s the principle: In MLK’s famous speech, which lasts 16 minutes, he doesn’t get to “I Have a Dream” until the 11th minute. What that means is that he spends 11 minutes on ‘burning platform” before he talks about “golden tomorrow.” He spends more time telling us what’s wrong with “here,” before he tells us about going “there.”

This highlights the single most important principle of vision casting:

People could care less about your vision until they are emotionally connected to the prior problem.

Vision at the end of the day, is only a solution to a prior problem. And if I don’t feel the problem, I don’t get the vision. Your problem as a pastor is that you think I feel the problem. Well I don’t. So pleeeaassseeee remind me.  The world, my flesh and Satan have worked very hard to shield me from the real spiritual problems around me and inside of me. 

Give me 11 minutes of problem and see how much 5 minutes of solution really goes. That’s the 11/16 principle.

• What about your vision night to come?
• What about the vision night you just had?

Try 11/16 and let me know how it worked for you.

If you would like the most condensed and enjoyable learning experience on understanding the missional church (a repost from my prior blog), then take 15 minutes and watch these 6 videos from:

• Ed Stetzer
• Mark Driscoll
• Michael Frost
• Tim Keller
• Rich Kannwischer (PGF, St Andrews Pres)

If you want to learn more,  here is a video and other stuff from one of my favorite missional thinkers Alan Hirsch.