Will Mancini » CHURCH UNIQUE

Shape Your Church Culture with 7 Powerful Practices

Will Mancini — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 20:40:27 +0000

Right now, everything you do or don’t do is guided by a set of underlying values. The same is true for your church. Culture-savvy leaders understand how to mold the invisible stuff of values to shape, like clay, the atmosphere, attitudes, actions and automated responses of their teams.

What if we were to x-ray the intuitive movements of great values-based leaders? What would we see?

What if we were to make even more conscious our intentions towards culture-shaping leadership? What core practices would come to the surface?

Here are seven:

#1 Articulation: The first step of culture-shaping is to identify, name and define. That’s what it means to be human- bringing meaning through how we label and distinguish within the created world and within the world we want to create. You can’t mold in the real world what you don’t hold in the mental world. So, what are you holding? What are your top 3 or 4 culture-shaping aspirations?

#2 Imitation: You teach what you know, but you reproduce what you are. Your life is broadcasting and multiplying a values set. How is that values set being consciously transferred by you, even though the receiver may not know it?

#3 Mechanism: If you lead a team or an organization, you have the authority to create a shared experience or a roll-out a new process. Think of a mechanism as an event or process that clarifies, restores, aligns or attunes your people with an existing shared value. Think of this as a wake-up call that shakes up business as usual.

#4 Collision: Oftentimes values get clear and concrete at the very moment they are violated. Or it may be a time of testing or crisis that brings a “near violation.” Look for collisions in the past and potential ones in the future to rehearse and strengthen values. As a leader don’t be afraid to name when you missed a values-based decision or needed a realignment yourself. That may be the most important impression you ever leave.

#5 Decision: Consciously run your decisions, big and small, through the filter or your values. Most importantly combine this with “imitation” and walk through a conscious decision-making process with your team using your values. What decisions are you facing today? What are your biggest decisions in 2012?

#6 Question: Dialogue is one of the leader’s greatest tools. And dialogue works best with questions, not answers. Ask questions to clarify, to meddle, and to rethink. Pose questions for your team to answer. Specifically bring bold questions that force new thinking around the same values.

#7 Celebration: The most often cited culture-shaping activity is celebration. People repeat what’s rewarded. Make sure you take time for this. If this is one of your perpetual weaknesses, assign someone on the team to plan the moments that mark your church’s progress. Life is too short not to celebrate!

The First Step of Recovering Movement in Denominational Life

Will Mancini — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:04:01 +0000

Effective movements know who they are.

There’s something missing in the leadership atmosphere of denominational life these days. Name your faith tribe—it’s true in every corner of North America. That “something” is an overwhelmingly clear, unquestionably compelling, big idea of why the “collective” exists. It’s the esprit de corps of “what makes us unique.”

In Steven Addison’s book, Movements That Change the World, he identified this uniqueness as a movement’s “founding charism”:

Christianity is a movement of movements—monasticism, evangelicalism, and Pentecostalism, to name a few. These movements can find expression in movement organizations such as mission agencies and denominations. . . . . Each new movement has a unique contribution to make to the kingdom—its “founding charism” or gift of grace.

The beauty of the founding charism is often best seen at a movement’s start—when it’s in the air and you can’t help but breathe it in.

If you could have asked one of Jesus’ 72 disciples, “What are you doing?” how clear do you think their answer would have been? If you could have talked to someone who experienced the early 1900s revival at Azuza Street, how magnetic would you have found their response to be?

Now it’s your turn. Why do you belong to what you belong to? What is your denomination about in 10 words or less? Go ahead—grab a dinner napkin and write something down.

As you think about your response, allow me to share a few guidelines to shape your “napkin sketch” answers.

Guideline one: Don’t answer with glittering generalities. If you tell me that your denomination exists to glorify God and make disciples, that’s great. But so does every other denomination, association and church-planting network. Go deeper and get more specific. Don’t be a restaurant whose only vision is to “serve food.”

Guideline two: Don’t let personal passion be your only criteria. The thing you write down—as passionate as you may feel about it—may or may not be what makes the movement unique. The “uniqueness of us” comes before and informs the “passion of me.”

Now, why are these questions so critical?

A denomination’s founding charism is like a new car or a new pair of shoes. Through rugged use and unintentional neglect, the vivid awareness of our reason for being fades away. Eventually, leaders engage in things like strategic-planning processes that add layers of objectives and goals to the equation. Then we add more denominational structure and programs. Then this, then that.

As the organization matures, complexity eclipses clarity. Before long, the half-buried treasure of our movement’s identity is completely lost beneath the surface of our conscious focus and energy.

The safeguarding of the movement’s primal impulse is key to the movement’s ongoing existence. Without it, activity is amoeba-like. A movement without a crystal-clear DNA would be better called a mush-ment.

Ultimately, the decision to move with clarity or to mush around “doing denominational stuff” comes down to a choice: Do we live, work and play with the large calling of God guiding our way? Does the church universal need a faith expression like ours anymore? Should we call it a day and disband?

These are bold questions. And our day demands a courageous response. It’s courageous to move ahead with bold vision. It’s likewise courageous to acknowledge that an association or denomination has fulfilled its purpose in its time.

(This post is an excerpt from an article I wrote for EFCA Today, the magazine of the Evangelical Free Church of America)

Top 77 Church Logos of 2011… A Response to Kent Shaffer and Church Relevance

Will Mancini — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 17:35:39 +0000

Kent Shaffer at Church Relevance shares some good stuff. I appreciate the fact that they do what they do to serve the Church. And he has learned the “big official list” gets lots of attention in the church leader space. When it comes to his blog ranking lists and conference lists I am usually one of the first to read and share.

With that as background, I have to say that I’m a little confused by Kent’s recent post that shows, in his opinion, the “Top 77 Church Logos of 2011” and I thought I’d respond with a few thoughts.

Let’s start with this—the statement I like most in Kent’s post is this one: “…a good logo communicates the unique qualities of its brand.” The way we say this at Auxano Design is that your logo should communicate vision visually. Of course, it can’t communicate everything about your church, but it can serve as a visual front door that matches what people will experience once they step through that door.

Now, I’ll move on to my questions.

1. 77 top logos? Really?
I’m not sure that a list of 77 anything is all that helpful, other than as a gallery that we can all peruse and say, “Those are nice.” Especially within the context of communicating vision visually, certainly there are some among that 77 (or beyond that 77) that are more effective at communicating vision and deserve to be examined more closely. I’ll single out a few from Kent’s list below for this reason.

2. Where are the stories?
When the list has this many entries and there is very little context of how these 77 were chosen, I want to hear the stories of these churches. Why did that church choose this specific logo? What about their vision or unique calling is communicated through this specific design? There are some great looking logos on this list that could possibly be communicating things that aren’t connected to vision and mission, but there’s no way to know that without the background story.

3. Why do unused concepts make the top 77?
If the true essence of a great logo is that it communicates vision visually or, in Kent’s words, that it “communicates the unique qualities” of a brand, how can we include unused logo concepts in the list? That serves as a signal to me that the list is more about what looks nice rather than what communicates the uniqueness of a specific congregation. Therefore we have reinforced the classic problem of church design: slapping together pretty pictures without meaning. (Read Picasso’s Missing Subject, my contribution to the Outspoken book on church communications.)

Those are probably my initial three questions about Kent’s list. From his list, however, I’ll pull out a few to examine more closely…because I think they are more effective.

Christ Church (Fort Lauderdale, FL)

From a brief look at their website, Christ Church seems to have done a good job of choosing a logo that connects with their unique way of communicating their vision. They talk about being a “gathering of people coming together to leave a personal and eternal ‘fingerprint’ on the world around us.” This type of language can form the foundation of a unique way of interacting with the world, inviting people into this kind of life. I love it. And their logo, which is a cross made of fingerprints, communicates the personal nature of this invitation and how each person can make a contribution to it. Great stuff.

Harvest Church (Mobile, AL)

Here’s a great example of communicating vision visually. While I don’t necessarily think that this is the most beautiful logo on the list, it communicates well. Their tagline, which is almost directly pulled from their mission statement, is “discover your destiny.” Their logo communicates that this is a journey (with the roadway image) and the sun-like shape at the top (illustrating the destiny piece). Not only that, but the roadway has a subtle “H” in it, in case you missed it. Again, not my favorite from a pure aesthetic point of view, but it connects directly to their mission and communicates it well without a ton of effort to explain it, which makes it stand out to me.

The Foundry (Houston, TX)

Of course I’m going to mention one of the logos we designed at Auxano, right? I won’t repeat it here, but I already shared a short case study on this church and their logo here.

New City Church (Phoenix, AZ)

I love the way this logo connects with the way New City talks about their mission. Listen to this, pulled from their website:

“Cities are the intersection of art, politics, and business. New City exists to engage culture where it’s created, weaving the story of God into the story of Phoenix. The desire of the church is not simply to gather on Sundays, but to meet you where you live, work, study and play. The green section in the New City logo represents an oasis among urban streets. Likewise, New City believes that following God breathes new life into our culture. We believe we can actively change our world by shifting the priority set from money, success, and fame to worship, community and mission.”

I couldn’t have articulated it that clearly, but their logo certainly communicates intersection and city, and the colored section makes you want to ask, “What’s different about that block?” The answer they offer: it’s an oasis among urban streets. That’s a great logo and a great mission.

What about you?

The real question that I want to raise is this: what does your logo communicate? Does it say something unique about your church, inviting people to find out more? Then, whether it made Kent’s list of 77 or not, it’s a top logo.

Thanks, Kent, for your time in searching out great logos and keeping the conversation going about how we can, as the Church, use design to effectively communicate vision visually to our congregations and to the world.

Reiterate Your Vision with Faith and Force by John Piper

Will Mancini — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 15:04:51 +0000

John Piper has a lot to say to church leaders. But he often doesn’t address vision casting directly. This video doesn’t necessarily present new ideas, but it is nice to hear the fundamentals of vision expressed from different Christian leaders. It’s also a great snapshot of a “church unique” mission statement.

I received the heads up on this video by Bill Mancini (my Dad) on the Auxano team and some of staff at Concord Baptist in Knoxville who are working through Church Unique.

Right Now 2011 Speaking Resources

Will Mancini — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 04:45:13 +0000

It was great to be at the Right Now conference in Dallas today. Here are the resources I referenced during my speaking:

6 Elements of Compelling Vision

Here is the Vision Casting Spider Diagram: Articulating Vision Proper
Recommended Exercise: Listen to Dr. MLKs “I Have a Dream Speech” with this tool

The Future of Church Strategy

If you have an iPhone or iPad download the free Leadia App from Leadership Network
You can purchase FLUX: Four Paths to the Future. There is a chapter on 3 K
Here is the Vision Frame Overview and other related Vision Frame links.
Check out the Vision Frame of RIGHT NOW

The FREE Church Unique Visual Summary

Go here to download this 52-page graphical summary.
It can be read in 10 minutes!

If you joined me at Right Now today:

Consider subscribing via e-mail to my blog.
Use the search box to hunt for relevant stuff.

FREE Clarity and Vision Casting Tools from The NINES Content

Will Mancini — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 15:56:55 +0000

If you watched my talk at the NINES online conference today, below are the free tools I referenced.

The Vision Frame Summary

The Vision Casting Spider Diagram

Download the Church Unique Visual Summary

On the Heartbeat of Time: A Church Unique Snapshot of ICF Zurich

Will Mancini — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 11:49:23 +0000

Yesterday, I conducted a Church Unique workshop for 10 churches connected to ICF- International Christian Fellowship, headquartered in Zurich. ICF Zurich started in 1990 and now runs almost 3000 in worship at renovated factory in downtown Zurich. ICF Zurich is a one-of-a-kind church, especially in Europe, as it boldly presents the gospel with energy, creativity and culture-savvy leadership.

My favorite part of their Vision Frame is their six style statements. ND Strupler, who leads the movements church planting network shares them below as I put in on the spot outside of the church.

ICF Zurich – Our Style

At the heartbeat of time: We constantly ask ourselves how church needs to be to attract people today.
Excited about life: We are excited about life with God and have a positive attitude towards life.
Experiencing fellowship: We treat one another with love and enjoy life in fellowship.
Developing potential: We support people and help them to flourish and develop their full potential.
Giving the very best: We give our very best for God. For we value quality.
Nothing is impossible: We believe for God nothing is impossible.

If you are interested in learning more about effective church planting in Europe, please leave a comment and I will pass it on to ND.

How to Have Stunningly Clear Vision for your Church

Will Mancini — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 04:37:42 +0000

I believe that every gospel-centered church should have a stunningly unique vision. Now it’s possible for church teams everywhere to have access to a guided process to discover, develop and deliver a clear vision. The Church Unique Vision Kit is available and I am enjoying the stories from across the country. Here is a new promo video and a few friends who have been through the process.

Where are you on the journey? How can I help you?

10 Ways to Use Your Mission Statement Today

Will Mancini — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 04:44:35 +0000

No, you don’t need a cooler mission statement so you can call it a mantra. No you don’t need a better sounding slogan. You need to know what the heck your church or ministry is ultimately supposed to be doing and you need to state in a clear, concise and compelling way. This is a leadership statement to direct and integrate all of your thinking, speaking and acting. Let me repeat- this is a leadership statement, not a marketing statement.

Start leading today by doing one or more of these activities.

#1 Rewrite your mission on a sheet of paper as many times as there are words in it. Each time write a different word in ALL CAPS. Reflect on each word of the mission. (Note: If your mission has more than 20 words in it, its too long. Proceed to idea #7)

#2 Look at your worship guide from last Sunday. List all of the ministry opportunity categories that were promoted and force rank them with regard to how effective each is at fulfilling the mission. (Great to do as a team.)

#3 Write the mission real big on a white board or white pad in your office and see how people interact with it.

#4 Ask the next ten people you meet in your church office or church service if they know the mission of the church. (Make it fun and tell them you are doing research for blogger friend.) Pay attention to their response. (And let me know what happened.)

#5 Do this exercise with a person you are eating lunch with: Write the mission on a napkin and ask them, “What does this mission mean to you?” Listen. Then ask them, “When, if at all, did this mission come into your conscious thought?” Listen again.

#6 Create a five minute devotional using your mission, finding an appropriate biblical text to share. Use the devotional with the different groups you lead this week.

#7 Read this FREE chapter from Church Unique on mission. It’s called Carry the Holy Orders. If you need to re-articulate your mission statement, spend 30 minutes planning time and decision-making steps to get it done.

#8 Make a list of five people that you believe model the mission of your ministry. Send all five of them a quick note to say something like, “Thanks for living the mission. You inspire me!”

#9 Write your personal “shadow mission.” What tends to drive you practically? What tends to drive your church practically? Go ahead and really write it out. (For example, a shadow mission might be, “We want to draw bigger crowds every Sunday with great teaching and worship.” Compare and contrast the shadow mission with the real mission. Repent. Share this with other leaders.

#10 Spend time in prayer with you leadership team using your mission. Create time and space to pray through the mission and each word of the mission.

Clarity Comes By Working Not Waiting

Will Mancini — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 23:26:40 +0000

Dennis Easter is a friend of mine who is deeply rooted and widely connected as a catalytic leader in the Foursquare Church. As a Church Unique Certified denominational leader, he appreciates all things vision and passed along this great quote from Steve Pavlina:

“If you aren’t yet at the point of clarity, then make that your first goal. It’s a big waste of time to go through life being unclear about what you want. Most people wallow way too long in the state of “I don’t know what to do.” They wait for some external force to provide them with clarity, never realizing that clarity is self-created. The universe is waiting on you, not the other way around, and it’s going to keep waiting until you finally make up your mind. Waiting for clarity is like being a sculptor staring at a piece of marble, waiting for the statue within to cast off the unneeded pieces. Do not wait for clarity to spontaneously materialize—grab a chisel and get busy!”

My favorite line is, the universe is waiting on you. What phrase struck you the most?