Will Mancini

Could you draw a simple picture to explain how you accomplish the mission of your church? We always emphasize the practice of communicating vision visually at Auxano. This is particularly true when it comes to your strategy or what we call the “missional map:” a picture or process that shows how your church will accomplish its mission on the broadest level. This kind of clarity is a missing element in our most effective churches. Unclear strategy keeps guests from knowing next steps, hinders leaders from having a contagious influence on others, and keeps staff working in silos.

This month’s Fast Company (this post was originally published in 2008) has a great article that magnifies the practice of developing a missional map with our clients. Its called the Napkin Sketch: How Wal-Mart, Microsoft, and others are using the power of images to digest complex ideas.

“You ought to be in pictures. No, really. Companies are increasingly using simple pictures to distill complicated concepts into easily shared, easily remembered nuggets. “Graphic expression and visual thinking are a central part of human cognition,” says Neil Cohn. Read article

EverythingSpeaks.com is a new blog by Cheryl Marting, chief connections officer at Auxano. 

Cheryl Marting is a great  friend and colleague. I am particularly grateful for her role on the team as a multi-faceted leader. From the beginning, she has helped to shape our approach at Auxano and has excelled in helping our church clients build better teams and helping Auxano build better tools. Most importantly she leads Auxano Creative which is a niche design shop for clients who “Walk the Vision Pathway” with us.

For the last six years, most people have not thought of Auxano as a branding group because we have NOT wanted to be pigeon holed as one of the dozens of national ministry marketing firms. We don’t just “do” branding and marketing for a client and if that is all they want, we politely decline.  Instead, we want to help the few who really understand their vision communicate their vision visually.  

Enter EverythingSpeaks.com. This year, now that Auxano’s six year track record and Church Unique’s awareness has clearly anchored us as a clarity and vision firm, we want to be more intentional about sharing what we have done in brand design. As Cheryl Marting leads Auxano Creative, she will share tidbits and insights from our clients and from the branding world in general. The hope of course, is that ministries across the globe will be more intentional with everything they communicate and every way they communicate because, after all,  everything does speak.

Please stop by Cheryl’s blog and let her know you stopped in with a quick comment. She just posted a great story branding story fro one of our client churches.

A friend of mine and visionary leader, Jeff Meyer of The Church, just passed on this video with a note that said, “What an example of great vision casting – Oh, that we might learn to communicate our life-saving message with such CREATIVITY!”  

In Church Unique, I cover the integration principle, “Grab attention or hold nothing.” According to studies as reported in the book, The Attention Economy, there are four primary factors for getting attention. I immediate thought of these four things as I watched this video.

Four Keys to Really Get Attention

1. Is the communication personalized?
2. Is the communication coming from a trustworthy source?
3. Is the communication brief?
4. Is the communication emotional?

In the case of this video, it is not necessarily personalized, but it does feel very personal. The trustworthiness of the source is carried by the quality production and the “embrace life” message and logo. The brevity and emotion of the piece are stunning.

Try using these four criteria for your ministry communication initiatives. 

I just finished a great day with the Faithbridge team and the folks at Granger Community Church in South Bend, IN. The team is made up of humble and leadership-savvy folks who serve the broader church through great coaching and content. The list includes, Tim Stevens, Kem Meyer, Mark Beeson, Mark Waltz and a ministry called WiredChurches.com

On the plane out, I reread Kem Meyer’s book, Less Noise. Less Clutter. It’s a unique book on church communication with practical insights, illustrations, humor and lots of juicy bullet lists. Here are some thoughts on “Nobody’s Listening:”

1. People aren’t open to your change prescription
   
2. People aren’t motivated by your need
3. People don’t know who you are
4. People multi-task and can’t remember squat
5. People are turned off by lack of preparation
6. People relate when you talk about them or people like them
7. People feel left out and frustrated when you use insider language
8. People are not impressed with your technical language or holy dialect

At the Exponential Conference last week I made a new friend- Scott Williams, a campus pastor at LifeChurch.tv. I knew of Scott from his blog, BigisTheNewSmall.com, which is ranked on Kent Schaffer’s Top 100 Church Blogs. We had a great time talking about church consulting, the culture at LifeChurch, his new role at Vanderbloemen Search Group, and finally blogging. So I asked, “What are your secrets?” 

He shared three things:

#1 Find your voice.  This insight is huge, but many bloggers don’t intentionally cultivate their voice.  I find that voice comes from one of three places: 1) your content specialization, 2) your unique perspective from life experience,  or 3) your raw personality. There is always a blend of these three ingredients, but one defines the others; one is the top of the triangle. Scott blogs about a lot of stuff and can cover lots of angles from family, to church, to social media, to leadership in general. So his voice is really determined by his personality. You see why very quickly when you spend time with Scott and catch it immediately from his blog title. What does BigisTheNewSmall mean- read it here. Scott is energetic, fun, and very insightful and it shines through his blog.

#2 Contribute consistently.  Okay, you’ve heard that before. What struck me was a simple illustration he used. He said,  “What would you read more- a good newspaper that came every day, or a great newspaper that you were never sure was coming?” That sold me more on the consistency argument. The most helpful thing I have ever heard on consistency was when Seth Godin wrote, “I blog regularly not because I have to, but because I get to.” Boom! Is you blog a calling or a chore? 

#3 Drip in Content on Social Media.  If you haven’t heard this yet, it really is a secret. Scott makes a connection of his voice with social media once every 5-6 posts. They key here is not jumping out of your voice but finding the overlap, the sweet spot. For example, my voice is defined first by content expertise around clarity and vision. My number one post in the last 6 months is one on the clarity overlap with blogging, The Christian Blogger’s Dilemma and What to Do About It. Think about that for a minute, and consider the implications for yourself.