3 Things That Will Happen Naturally to Your Team This Week

Peter Drucker said, “Only three things happen naturally in an organization: friction, confusion, and underperforming. Everything else takes leadership.” Like a lot of his pithy statement, Drucker effectively captured the natural drift that occurs in organizations (and ministries) and the importance of leaders to rally people against the natural drifts. Just as a person does […]

5 Differences to Value on Your Team

“How important is diversity on a team?” It is a common question I receive from leaders. “Very important” is my default response, and then I add an encouragement that “you should work towards being diverse as your context.” The caveat is important because I recognize that it has been easier for me to build ethnically […]

10 Ways Leaders Shape Their Teams

The popular and often-quoted leadership axiom “speed of the leader, speed of the team” captures the reality that the leader of a group of people sets the tone and pace for the group. Of course, there are exceptions. There are times that gifted people with high integrity give themselves fully to their work despite their […]

The 4 Biggest Mistake Church Leaders Make with their Values

In 1992 the Dream Team played together in the Olympics and basketball fans went wild as Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Patrick Ewing, and others were on the SAME team! Previously only college players played on the Olympic teams, so when these players formed the Dream Team, it was complete domination. Twelve years later, […]

5 Characteristics of Meetings That Develop (Not Deteriorate) the Team

Meetings can be used to develop the culture of the team, or they can be used to deteriorate the culture of the team. Meetings can be used to develop people, or they can be used to demoralize people. There really is no such thing as neutral meetings. They either develop or deteriorate. Here are five […]

Ministry Leaders: When Values Collide, Make the Right Choice

Values don’t have to collide, but when they do, leaders must decide and declare which value wins. For example, a ministry can value excellence and leadership development. But beneath the surface the values can be at odds with one another. A children’s teacher struggles to hand responsibility to another because “it won’t be excellent enough.” […]

College Food, Colliding Values, and Ministry

Malcolm Gladwell started an educational firestorm when he compared two universities in his popular Revisionist History podcast. Gladwell compared the food offered in the cafeteria at Bowdoin College with the food offered at Vassar College, along with which school is able to help lower-income students attend their college. Both are liberal arts colleges, and Bowdoin, […]

4 Wins of a Consistent Mission Lens

It is one thing to have a mission and quite another to have a mission lens, where all activity is viewed through the lens of that mission, where all decision-making is filtered through the lens of the mission. It is one thing to have a mission hanging on the wall and another to work hard […]

5 Practical Ways to Drive Values Deeper

I recently met with all the managers and directors of the Resources Division at LifeWay, the division I am responsible to lead. We have nearly 650 employees in the division, and they all report to the leaders who were in that room. At the beginning of each calendar year, I remind our team of our […]

The Pain of the Game of Telephone in Leadership

When we have a lot of people around a table for a meal, my daughters often like to play a game of telephone. They find it very funny to start a message and see how it is distorted and changed by the time it makes its way around the circle through multiple people. While a […]