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Bird by Bird, Step by Step

One of the great joys of blogging is that the blogosphere is filled with delicious morsels that pop up in unexpected places.  The other day, I was flowing a series of blog links when someone mentioned a book by Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird, which isn't about birds, but writing.  In fact, the subtitle of the book is, "Some Instructions on Writing and Life." A week later, I was in Borders when I came across this little book and, because I had read something positive about it in a blog, picked it up and started to read it.  And have found it to be a delightfully wonderful, thoughtful and inspiring book.

Now, as to the title, it comes from an experience her brother had with their father.

"Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he had three months to write. [It] was due the next day.  We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead of him.  Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder and said, 'Bird by bird, buddy.  Just take it bird by bird."

What a great image and phrase for those of us in ministry.  The hugeness of the task ahead of us can be immobilizing.  Trying to build a life-giving church is a daunting task.  Rarely does a plan ever work out the way we intend it to.  People are people.  Budgets are budgets.  Ministry is ministry.  Expectations are expectations.  Satan is Satan.  Evil is evil.  Conflict is conflict.  And the great commission still lays in front of us every day.

So, how do we overcome the feeling of being immobilized?  Well, one way is to think, "Bird by bird."  Books are not written as books—they're written as words that form paragraphs that form pages that form chapters that form books.  The key to writing a book, says Anne Lamott, is thinking, "Bird by bird."  Don't worry about the whole.  Just do the small task in front of you.  Likewise, successful ministries aren't built overnight.  They're built "bird by bird."  So, whenever you're feeling overwhelmed with having too much to do, maybe you might like to forget thinking about the whole.  And instead think, "Bird by bird I can do this."  Because you can.  Hang in there!  God is faithful!!

Make the List

If you're leading a church, chances are you're overwhelmed—there's simply too much to do. Just think about it for a moment.  In addition to preaching and teaching issues, you've got assimilation issues, board issues, children's ministries issues, care and compassion ministries issues, community involvement issues, computers and IT issues, correspondence and e-mail issues, counseling issues, denominational issues, evangelism issues, facility issues, financial issues, leadership issues, marketing issues, ministry issues, missions issues, planning issues, prayer issues, programming issues, spiritual formation issues, staffing issues, web issues, writing issues, young adult ministry issues and youth ministry issues. It's enough to depress anyone.  And even worse, you'll be held responsible for anything that doesn't go right and have to pass on the credit for anything that does go well (it's a great job, eh?). 

So what should you do?  Well, David Allen, in his classic book Getting Things Done (who also keeps a blog at [link]) suggests that the first step is to do a data dump and put everything that's in your head down in one place and on one list.  Why? Not because you'll get it all done.  But because it'll free you up emotionally.  In other words, when we're overwhelmed and we know we have too much to do, we never feel emotionally free.  We continually have that nagging feeling in the back of our heads, "I know I have more to do, but I can't remember what it is," or "I hope I don't forget this," or "I don't know what to do first." 

Now, the first time you do this, it may be overwhelming to see everything that's in your head on one piece of paper.  But, it'll also be freeing because now you won't be worrying that you might be forgetting something. For example, earlier today, I had to make one of these lists up for the next month.  I'm taking my wife on vacation next week so I wanted to make sure everything that needs to get done over the next few weeks gets done.  I have some other categories (other than those listed in the first paragraph above) but those categories should give you a running start of some of the categories you might want to use to organize your list.  Now, I'll admit, I'm an obsessive list maker, so mine (for just work) came out to three pages, three columns, 10 point type.  Yours may be much shorter (prayerfully).  That's fine (you might actually have a life).  What matters is that you get everything in your head out into one place.  Then once you have everything written down, you can make better choices about what you're going to do and what you're not going to do.  But you won't be worrying any longer if you've forgotten something.  It's a simple technique.  But for leaders of life-giving churches, it just might bring a little life back into your life.

How Leader's Think

In my previous post on applying the simplicity principle to a leadership orientation process, I mentioned how I've been trying to simplify, for our new leaders, what a godly leader looks like.  The metaphor my executive pastor and I decided on (before someone informed us that some other people are using the same image) was that of the Head, Heart and Hands of a Godly Leader.  In this post, I'd like to share with you how I've distilled down the list of statements of how godly leaders think into a list of seven statements.  In other words, even though, as a teacher, I'd prefer to come up with a long list of principles and statements that comprehensively cover how leaders think, the reality is that most people don't want a long list, they prefer a short list.  So, here's my short list.  Godly leaders ...

1.  Think, "What does God have to say about this?
2.  Think, "Simplicity over Complexity."
3.  Think, "Action over Deliberation."
4.  Think, "Future over Past."
5.  Think, "Results over Activity"
6.  Think, "What's the wise thing to do?"
7.  Think, "This is bigger than me."

1.  Think, "What does God have to say about this?" This should not be a given.  However, not all leaders ask this question.  Yet, it ought to be the starting place for any godly leader.

2.  Think, "Simplicity over Complexity".  As my previous posts have argued, this is one of the primary differences between teachers who lead vs. leaders who teach.  Leaders continually ask the question, "What's the simplest way for me to say this?"

3.  Think, "Action over Deliberation."  Leaders have a bias toward action.  Whereas, teachers and others often have a bias for discussion, debate, deliberation and delay.  Leaders ask, "What can I do?"

4.  Think, "Future over Past." In other words, leaders ask, "Where are we going?", not "Where have we been?"  They immensely dislike the thought, "We've never done it that way before," because they don't look back, they look forward.

5.  Think, "Results over Activity."  Non-leaders have a tendency to say, "Hey, I put in my hours," or "I worked as hard as I could," as if activity were enough.  But leaders don't focus on activity, they focus on results.  They ask, "Did I get it done or not?"  And if they didn't get it done, they ask, "What do I need to do to get it done."  Time is almost irrelevant. 

6.  Think, "What's the wise thing to do?" In other words, leaders don't ask, "What's the easiest or safest or most pragmatic thing to do?"  They ask, "What's the wise thing to do?"  And part of wisdom is asking, "What have others, who've gone before me, learned about this?" Or, "What do my peers think about this?"  Or, "What have I learned from similar experiences in the past?"

7.  Think, "This is bigger than me."  In other words, leaders aren't driven by holding on to ministry, but rather by giving it away.  Leaders see a big vision and can't wait to involve others in the pursuit of it.  Non-leaders have a hard time giving ministry away because, for them, it's all about them and what they can do. Whereas for leaders, the task in front of them is so big, they can't help but involve others in it.

So, there you have it, my first run at how leaders think.  What do you think?  Do you have some other ideas that are more important than these seven.  I'd like your feedback.

Simplicity Applied

In my past few posts, I've been talking about how leaders tend toward simplicity over complexity.  So let me share with you one way that I've been trying to apply that concept in our church lately.  As just about every church knows, having enough leaders to lead is a continual challenge.  In addition, having enough leaders who actually fulfill the normal leadership expectations about recruiting, equipping, managing, casting vision, motivating, team building etc., is even rarer.  So how do we turn that around?  And how do we do it simply?

Well, one of the ways we can turn it around is to make sure that we use simple, easy to grasp language with our current leaders like, "We want all of our leaders here to be part of creating a leadership pipeline."  As a teacher, I like to make things more  complicated and cerebral.  But, as a leader, I know I need to come up with simple word pictures that anyone can catch on to and understand without a lot of thought involved.  It's not that people aren't bright.  It's that we're all overwhelmed with information.  So simple language wins out.

Secondly, we need to create a simple first step like, "If you're interested in (or we think you'd make a great leader), why don't you come and attend our leadership orientation class (in our case, we call it Seneca 401: Discovering Your Leadership Potential).  Again, this is an easy step to grasp on to (and yet, one that is often forgotten in the leadership recruitment process).  In addition, one of the pluses of doing this as a class is that it allows for a consistent message about expectations.  Other leaders may not cast a vision for the high call of leadership, or they may not prequalify a leader, or they may not paint a picture of what a godly leader looks like or they may not explain what the leadership expectations are of your church.  In other words, most leaders (lay and paid) simply play the, "Tag.  You're it!" game and then say to themselves, "Phew! I'm glad I got someone to do that!"  But rarely do they paint a big vision or paint a big picture of what a successful godly leader looks like. So developing some kind of orientation is a great first step in developing your leadership pipeline.

Thirdly, we need to give people a simple image of what a godly leader looks like.  In our case, we've chosen to use three H's to do that (at some point, I'll upload the image of our three H's which are on my assistant's computer).  But, in text form, this is what we've reduced it down to.  We need to develop the

1.  Head
2.  Heart
3.  Hands

of a godly leader. The Head is related to wisdom and "Thinking Like a Godly Leader".  The Heart is related to character and "Being a Godly Leader".  And the Hands are related to skills and "Acting Like a Leader".  This is simple, but not simplistic.  However, more importantly it's an easy image that anyone can use to remember the three critical areas of what constitutes a godly leader.  Looking at a mirror, anyone can remember, "If I want to grow as a leader, I need to develop the head, heart and hands of a godly leader."  They can then unpack that and use it to think through, "How do I need to change in the way I think so that I think more like a leader?"  "Where do I need to grow in my character so that I'm more of a godly leader?"  And finally, "In what skill areas do i need to develop in order that I might be a better leader?"  Anyone can remember to ask themselves those kinds of  questions because anyone can remember, "Head, Heart and Hands."  So, for a teacher who likes to make things complex, the joy of learning to lead better is that it also makes me (and you) better communicators as well.  So, how can you make what you're developing or teaching these days more simple?

More on Leaders Who Teach vs. Teachers Who Lead

Since several of you have asked for more information on this issue, I thought I’d share another post on this critical issue because it can be so easily misunderstood.  You see, once a church exceeds around 150 people per week in attendance, a pastor’s primary duties become to lead and to feed.  It’s not that the senior point person can do just one or the other, he/she has to do both.  However, based on one’s natural tendencies, there’s almost always a natural inclination toward one or the other.  It’s not that one is right and one is wrong or one is better and the other inferior, they’re just different.

Now, if you’ll suffer me to be a bit reductionistic, here’s how I’d break down some of the differences between leaders who teach vs. teachers who lead.

Leaders who teach        Teachers who lead
Favor simplicity             Favor complexity
Decide                         Deliberate
Act                             Ponder
Focus on leading            Focus on explaining
   people somewhere              the text to people
Make sure people           Make sure people
    do it.                               get it.
Want to inspire             Want to inform
Use regular words          Use well developed words
See the whole              See the individual
Church growth              Personal growth

In other words, the whole orientation of leaders and teachers is radically different. Now, this doesn’t mean that leaders can’t teach well or that teachers can’t lead well.  It simply means that each one will have a natural inclination toward one or the other.

However, to be the best church leaders we can be, we need to be masters at both the leading and feeding sides of our jobs.  In other words, leaders who teach need to learn from teachers how to be better teachers.  And teachers who lead need to learn from leaders how to be better leaders.  Or to put it another way, if we want to be the best church leaders we can be, then we need to learn how to augment the other side of our job so that we become more complete church leaders who both lead well and feed well.

Some of the better known leaders who teach would be Ed Young, Jr., Bill Hybels, Wayne Cordeiro and Rick Warren.  While, some of the better known teachers who lead would be Chuck Swindoll, John Ortberg and Andy Stanley.  In fact, Andy Stanley is probably the best example of a classic teacher who has learned to be a great leader.  So, it’s not impossible to do both.  In fact, it’s quite possible.

So, let me ask you, “Toward which side do you lean—the leader side or the teacher side?”  Whichever one you lean toward, make a conscious decision to learn from the other side.  For example, this year, since I’m a classic teacher first leader, I’ve been studying and learning a lot from watching and interacting with pure leaders like Ed Young, Jr.,
Dale O’Shields (the pastor of the largest church in our county—Montgomery County, MD) and my Executive Pastor, Dan Cotter. So, as you look at your leading and feeding abilities, where do you need to do some augmenting in order to be a more complete and effective senior pastor/leader?

Keep it Simple

If you've read my material on the differences between teachers who lead and leaders who teach, then you know that one of the major differences between the two is that leaders prefer simplicity while teachers prefer complexity.  Which, of course, creates a major problem since most of us who pastor churches tend to be teachers, more than leaders.

We had one of those great moments today during our staff meeting when we were talking about how to do a better job at helping people get involved in ministry.  At one point, my executive pastor, Dan, responded to a comment with the following statement, "Oh, I like that idea.  It's short, simple and easy to get."  At which point, another one of my pastors, Mark (who's another teacher) and I broke out in laughter.  Why?  Because it was so typical of the way a leader thinks.  We didn't even have to say anything.  We both knew exactly what had transpired.  The leader had spoken.  While the two of us would normally haven chosen complexity, Dan, the pure leader, knew we needed something that was simple and easy to get.

So, how can those of us who are teachers learn to lead better?  Well, one way is for us to learn to fight our tendency toward preferring complexity over simplicity.  Instead of being in awe with all of our great ideas (and with trying to make sure all of the parts fit together), we need to be in awe with the ease by which people can assimilate that information.  In the midst of being deluged with data every day, most people (and I know this is hard to believe) actually prefer being able to access ideas simply, rather than obtusely (a great teacher word, but terrible leader word). 

So, how can you simplify what you're doing? Leading? Teaching? Designing? Planning? Solving?

There is No Success Without Discipline

Have you ever been disappointed because you had a great dream, but it just never seemed to materialize?  Well, if you have, then you know the reality of the statement above, "There is No Success Without Discipline." It doesn't really matter what area of life you're talking about.  If you're trying to lose weight and get in shape or you're trying to get a good grade in a class, there is no success without discipline.  If you're trying to overcome a continual sin problem or trying to get out of debt, there is no success without discipline.  If you're trying to master a new language or trying to learn how to juggle, there is no success without discipline.  Any way you add it up, there is no success without discipline.

So, why do we keep thinking we can grow great churches without learning to develop incredible discipline?  I don't know if you took my challenge to rate yourself on my post about ranking success factors [link], but Terry Storch did—and was even so bold as to list his ranking on his blog [link].  Now, if you're not familiar with Terry, he's the COO/CTO at Fellowship Church in Dallas.  In fifteen years, FC has grown to at least 19,000 (give or take a few thousand).  So, when Terry gives a ranking, he's speaking from a vantage point few of us have.  So look at how he ranks FC on Tom Peter's four success factors.

        Strategy    Systems    Passion    Execution
FC       5%           20%        35%        40%

Notice what he gives the highest rating to.  You got it!  Discipline/Execution.  Like I said, there is no success without discipline.  FC has done an incredible job because they have a bias toward action.  They decide quickly on a course of action and then fastidiously stay focused on it.  Far too many of us spend lots of times coming up with lots of ideas, but never fully implementing them.  Great churches think differently.  They execute with precision.  Why?  Because they know, there is no success without discipline.

So, where are you falling short on the discipline side?  How much further along do you think you would be if you fully implemented what you already have on the drawing board?  Note: I'm not against new ideas (I'm a dreamer by nature), but the principle is worth wresting with. Why?  Because there is no success without discipline.  So, where do you need to exercise more discipline in leading your church?  As Larry Bossidy might say to us, it's execute, execute, execute.

P.S.  And don't forget to apply this to the other areas of your life as well!!