{"id":698,"date":"2013-09-18T22:36:31","date_gmt":"2013-09-18T22:36:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/?p=698"},"modified":"2014-10-28T17:21:00","modified_gmt":"2014-10-28T17:21:00","slug":"collins-spinning-flywheel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/collins-spinning-flywheel\/","title":{"rendered":"Collins’ Spinning Flywheel"},"content":{"rendered":"

After 8 years in the private sector I had returned to full-time ministry.\u00a0 One of the reasons I was excited about the church where I was going to serve was because of its professionalism \u2013 in other words, it was run like the business I had recently left.\u00a0 As part of our job descriptions, those on staff were required to go to the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summits.\u00a0 My first GLS experience was highlighted by Jim Collins\u2019 talk \u2013 Good to Great<\/em>.\u00a0 At the end of his comprehensive talk he mentioned the differences that are present in the social sector and recommended the monologue that was just published.<\/p>\n

I lived a dream job for two years.\u00a0 I was in the ministry, but operating under business principles.\u00a0 The end however came as the lead pastor moved on to better and greater churches. Our next pastor failed to understand many of the principles that Jim Collins espoused and soon the church fired him which resulted in a split and eventually, my leaving.\u00a0 Surviving these events, I learned one thing.\u00a0 When a church does not hold itself accountable to outputs and inputs, trouble ensues.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Jim Collins states that \u201cthe critical distinction is not between business and social, but rather between good and great.\u201d\u00a0 The idea is still the same, \u201cseparate inputs from outputs and hold yourself accountable, even if those outputs defy measurement.\u201d<\/p>\n

I had seen this concept flourish first-hand.\u00a0 Before arriving at the aforementioned church, I had spent 8 years working for an international business.\u00a0 And, before my time in business, I had served as a missionary in Brazil with the Southern Baptists \u2013 arguably, the most organized and intentional mission\u2019s agency in America.<\/p>\n

In both transitions, I felt that little had changed.\u00a0 The product was different, but the mechanism and strategies followed the same course of action.\u00a0 In all three cases, measurements were received and evaluations took place.\u00a0 In the business setting, the bottom line was income generated over the previous year, while in the social sector, the product changed (baptisms, attendance, enrollment at seminary etc.), but accountability based upon consistent numbers still mattered for our trajectory.\u00a0 Collins\u2019 challenge of \u201cyou will always be merely good relative to what you can become\u201d rang true in all three instances.<\/p>\n

Differences were present.\u00a0 Executive power held more sway in business than my post as director of a certain ministry area.\u00a0 But understanding when to use your power and when to use powers of motivation and example were still crucial.\u00a0 In both instances, followers know when you are motivated for the greatness of the work and not for yourself.<\/p>\n

Collins focuses on the principle of \u201cgetting the right people on the bus,\u201d which can work in all situations.\u00a0 Getting the right volunteers is just as, or more important than, getting the right employees.\u00a0 Unfortunately I\u2019ve failed in this area more than once without the due-diligence of a selection plan to follow.\u00a0 He also speaks of saying \u201cno\u201d to pressures that push us from our trajectory, the Hedgehog Principle, which I find harder to accomplish in the social sector.\u00a0 With greater numbers of people that have access to us, the discipline to say \u201cno\u201d remains a challenge.<\/p>\n

Collins ends this simple monograph by speaking of the Flywheel \u2013 how once these principles get moving and gain momentum, it just gets better and is hard to stop.\u00a0 During the first two years at the \u201cgreat\u201d church, momentum had been built.\u00a0 It was amazing.\u00a0 It seemed that anything we tried worked, more people came, activities grew stronger and even when we failed or tried something mediocre and had to change directions, the congregation forgave and moved on as if nothing happened.\u00a0 The flywheel was spinning so quickly that it seemed nothing could stop it, sometimes even fortuitously.\u00a0 But as we know, it\u2019s all built on leadership \u2013 even momentum.\u00a0 When the lead pastor left, surprisingly everything continued strong and vibrant \u2013 the flywheel was moving as fast as ever.\u00a0 We continued growing for over a year\u2026.until a new lead pastor came and stopped us in our tracks.\u00a0 Sadly, his lack of leadership eventually broke down all that had been built up.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been privileged to work in companies and social organizations.\u00a0 Although most have been average, I did get to see the Flywheel turn and all of Collin\u2019s principles come true.<\/p>\n

The California gold miners had a phrase.\u00a0 Those that had gone and completed a year in the gold fields, whether successful or not, could say they had seen \u201cthe Elephant,\u201d meaning that they had come, tried and survived. \u00a0In a similar way, I can say that I saw the \u201cFlywheel,\u201d and it was good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 8 years in the private sector I had returned to full-time ministry.\u00a0 One of the reasons I was excited about the church where I was going to serve was because of its professionalism \u2013 in other words, it was run like the business I had recently left.\u00a0 As part of our job descriptions, those […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[253,267,2,282],"class_list":["post-698","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-church","tag-collins","tag-dminlgp","tag-flywheel","cohort-lgp3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2894,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698\/revisions\/2894"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}