Will Mancini

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. 

Rather than adopting the latest program, churches that walk the  vision pathway with Auxano  find their own practices and nuanced approaches to engage people who are far from God.

Through the years of helping design missional initiatives and evangelism training, I have found  five essentials that any strategy MUST have in order to work in your local culture. 

#1 TOUCH – Evangelism starts with proximity, and genuine interest expressed through conversation and organic relationship building. Oftentimes churches start evangelism training with how to articulate the gospel. But when your church folks no longer have connection with people far from God, it doesn’t matter how eloquent your gospel presentation rolls.

#2 TALK - When you develop your own strategy, you can’t help but develop unique language for the process of evangelism. This distinct terminology flows out of your church culture for your surrounding community culture. In a sense, new language is a part of incarnating the the truth of the gospel in your time and place. For example, one church in the bible belt, uses the language of “hope” as a door opener in conversation. Another, in the deeply unchurched Pacific Northwest uses the terminology of  ”self-reliance” to clarify the problem of a life disconnected from God.

#3 TOOLS – Peter Drucker said that the greatest problem with non-profits (he definitely had churches in mind) is a lack of focus and a lack of “tool competency.” As a pastor, you want your people engaged in sharing their faith. The single most important question you can ask yourself is, “What tools have I provided for my people to evangelize?” Studies show that people are more inherently motivated than we think. More times than not, their primary motivational question is NOT, “What’s in it for me?” BUT “What tools are you providing for me to do what you want me to do?” Recently Gloria Dei Lutheran created a simple tool that resembles the oil change sticker  you put on your windshield. On the sticker is the name of someone to consistently pray. This simple tool undergirds their mission for membership: Helping one another live life with Jesus everyday.

#4 TRAINING – Obviously, training is an important part of equipping the saints for the work of ministry. Your church does not need another pre-packaged or denominationally based program like you think. God has already provided everything you need to get training done. How, you ask? He has given gifts to men and women and gifted men and women to your church. Some of them have the gift of evangelism. We tend to think that the gift of evangelism is for a few people to do the work of evangelism. That’s not accurate. Remember that spiritual gifts are given with one purpose: the edification of the body. (Eph 4:11-16) Therefore, your job is to release the inherent gifts of evangelism in your church to train and lead the entire body in the process of evangelism and missional service. 

#5 TINGLE - In the end the work of evangelism is the first thing that suffers with the temptations and distractions of the world around us and the flesh within us. Motivation is a critical element. Vision casting and storytelling must consistently invigorate and refuel the people of God. In the end, the greatest tingle factor for the people of your church is your own life model. Remember pastors, that we teach what we know, but we reproduce what we are. As you motivate yourself for the work of evangelism, tell your own stories of success and failure. Always celebrate each precious step that each precious saint makes toward intentional living with redemptive passion. 

I am currently spending “time away” to work and write on a Church Unique follow-up piece.  In pursuit of time filled with intense personal production and high creativity, I have found these four ingredients to be essential:

#1 Create or find your ideal environment. My greatest productivity happens in context. For me it’s a place in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Everything from the climate and the landscape to the food and the art, come together to help me be my best. I like Santa Fe because of the latent spirituality that is far from Christ. I love cultivating spiritual conversations as I write about leadership and the mission of Jesus in the world.

#2 Fine tune your “fuel mix.” When I produce, I like what I call side-ways inspiration. I like reading stuff that may not directly pertain to what I’m writing, but models thoughtful expression and creativity. I like art and conversation with people as fuel too. On this trip I hand picked about 6 books that I will scan or deep dive into as I feel inspired. I do this concurrently with my own writing. If you have never thought of how to fine-tune your fuel mix, give it a try. Experiment and see what happens! 

#3 Know your rhythms and work them over and over. There are several rhythms that are important to me. One is the macro rhythm of getting away at least 3 times per year. Second, is the rhythm that works in and around intense bursts of productivity. They happen best in a 3-6 day period, with a punctuated intensity. For example, I may enjoy a slow lunch then work for 2 hours, then go on a mountain bike ride and work for 2 hours, and so on. For me, the staggering effect is highly productive. The key is to study yourself and know your rhythm. An important aspect of this is knowing how your physical body works best when you are producing. Think like an athlete in terms of “creative productivity fitness.” 

# Ruthlessly eliminate distractions. After you have done the first three things you have to gut everything else. A thousand things will pull you away from the most important thing. Find your laser-focused state of being. Keep in mind that your context, fuel and rhythm may have some built in positive “distractions” based on your personality. And that’s fine. Remember that most people don’t accomplish great things, not because greatness is not in them, but because they have never learned to focus.

“Consultant” is such a bad word these days it’s amazing. That’s why we use the term “navigator” at Auxano. The idea of navigation comes from the reality that our best expertise is not the answers we bring to the table in a suitcase, but in something else. If a consultant is any good, it’s obvious to him that  the answers are already in the room. The answers are in the Spirit and in the gathered leadership.  The problem is that the answers have not been sufficiently “navigated” to the surface. They have not been mined, cooked, and refined.  Our expertise is not the answers we bring, but in the process that enables conversation, prayer and world-class questions to help YOU fundamentally LIVE and COMMUNICATE your vision. Our process brings you unprecedented clarity. 

When I come in to work with you, I will have dialogued with you or your team for at least 90 minutes. Prescription without diagnoses is malpractice. After a decade of having 5 or 6 of these 90 minute conversations every week, I get pretty comfortable with the common patterns and challenges that you are facing. So after the initial conversation I will draft a process, completely unique to you, that we can review together. If you are serious about your vision and about taking your leadership to the next level, you may be interested. If you are not serious about vision or organizational leadership,  the cost will filter you out. Churches that work with us will invest significant time and resources for a process will last 4 to 12 months and  might involve a team approach.

Because I am sending out many “consulting service agreements” this week, I thought I would share with you how I think. Basically, the core of the initial interview is identifying the key questions that, if answered well, will impact the scope of the ministry’s impact for decades to come. 

For example, one fast-growth church called with staffing challenges they are hitting. This is typical when a church encounters the “glass ceilings” of 1200, 2000 or 3000  in weekend attendance. Below you will find the questions that I articulated for them that I can help them answer:

• How do we create a vision for new structures rather than make changes as a “knee-jerk” response?
  
• How can the staff feel excited about changes in light of a shared vision and strategy?
  
• How can we keep the best of a “small church feel” while working more strategically and decisively at all levels of leadership?
  
• How can training in vision, clarity and communication strengthen the boldness of senior leadership without it feeling “personality based?”
  
• What does it look like to create new ministry ideas and maintain a simple church strategy?
  
• How can the staff not only embrace change, but learn important perspectives and disciplines to drive and manage growth to another level? 

So what are the take-aways for you? Consider the following:

1. If you don’t ask the right questions you could be working for the rest of you life under faulty or fuzzy assumptions.
2. If you think you can “do it yourself,” ask several honest, smart people if you are correct in your assessment or if could you could be myopic or arrogant in thinking that a strategic outsider is not needed.   It’s truly sad to me how many gifted people get stuck at Jim Collins’ “level four.” If you are a “genius with a 1000 helpers” you will probably never use a consultant. 
3. Know that a consultant doesn’t work by the hour, but by a value proposition.  What is the value to a church that is getting stuck at 1200 in attendance, to really break free from a certain perspective or habits that are holding them back? 
4. If you are considering using a consultant, pay attention to their assessment work. Do they presume they have answers or do they have great approach to discover the answers?
5. If you would like to get  a list of questions based on your growth challenges today, don’t hesitate giving me a shout. I would be glad to spend 90 minutes with you.