The Week In Brief(s) (8/9/09)

I’ve decided to do something different this week. I spent about half my week at the Leadership Summit – a conference for church and business leaders – and I thought I’d share some great insights from the speakers. Next week I’ll get back to giving updates on the church plant…

1. Bill Hybles

• Talked about how for awhile he let his God Time get pushed out by his work, and how he had to change his morning schedule. Instead of getting into the office early (6 a.m.) and doing his God Time there, where there were all kinds of temptations to short change God and start working, he started doing his God Time at home and getting to work closer to 9 a.m.
• Asked, “What do your followers and co-workers see when they look at you? Someone with a full bucket, full of life and peace? Or an empty bucket; someone who knows God used to do great things, but not today.”
  

2. Session on Hiring Staff

• Interviews are easily manipulated by the interviewee. Spend time with the person out the interview.
• Know the specific competencies you’re looking for.
• Have such a strong culture that it repulses people who you wouldn’t want to hire anyway.

3. Session on Meetings

• At end of each meeting ask, “How did we do?” with the meeting.
• Need to do retreats because it gives you the amount of time together necessary to build trust, so you can have good meetings the rest of the year.
  

4. Session on Firing

• No one should ever be surprised that they’re being fired. There should be lots of “This isn’t working. What can we do to make this work?”
• Jack Welch, “The kindest form of management is the truth.”

5. Gary Hamel

• Future of management: No hierarchy, you can say no to any request, at end of year a group of your co-workers tell you if and how much value you added.

6. Tim Kellar

• There are two ways to try and be your own Savior and Lord: By being very bad, or being very good.
• A lot of Christians today are the older brother in the Prodigal Son story. Leads to spiritual deadness.
• We don’t really want God, He’s a means to an end. We just want what He can give us.
• The reason we should obey God is to get more of God.
• We need to repent of our good works; for trying to control God and people through our good works.

7. Dave Gibbons

• We need to “target” the fringe, the misfits – not the mainstream. That’s who Jesus was, and what He did.
• Obedience is more important than passion.
  

8. David Gergen

• A lot of leaders confuse activity with progress.
• Need to practice reflective leadership. Take time to inspect how you’re leading and figure out how you can continue to grow as a leader.

9. Chip & Dan Heath

• Need to focus on the “bright spots” – the areas where things are working. So instead of focusing on what’s not working in our churches, focus on what is, and what we can learn from those areas, then take those lessons and apply them to what’s not working.
• Had a great phrase, “T.B.U.” – True But Useless.
• When trying to get people to change, and want them to keep the change, need to prepare them for adversity. A predictable cycle will occur: Start with hope, then go down into the “valley of insight,” then come out to a place of confidence. So prepare people for the valley. Let them know it’s not a bad place, but a place to learn and grow.
  

TO PRAY ABOUT THIS WEEK:

1. We have someone coming in this week to look at all the possible venues we currently have as possibilities, to help us know how much it would cost to make each what we need to do our services in it. One or two are rental spaces, then three are leasing spaces. Please pray the day goes great.

2. Keep praying for the people of Vegas, especially those who live and work around the Strip. Pray that God will open their hearts to Him, and to respond to us reaching out to them so we can introduce them to Jesus.