Cultivating Courageous Innovation and Risk-Taking

Sources: Michael Slaughter, Larry Osborne, and George Barna

Issues of innovation

• Introducing vs. Implementing

– America good at introducing innovation, Japan better at developing apps

• Prioritizing among multiple innovations

Top-rated Ministry Innovations in last 25 years (www.barna.org )

1. A/V technology in worship

2. Music/arts in worship

3. Ministry emphasis • Gift-based service

4. Computerization and internet applications

5. Ministry philosophy and models• Seeker-driven

• Rarely!– Recoveries of old ideas

• Ecclesiastes: “there is nothing new under the sun”

• ie. Priesthood of believers leading to gift-based ministries

Are these new ideas?

Six Emerging Innovations

1. Postmodern ministry models

2. Senior ministry to boomers

3. Multi-cultural ministries

4. Technology for global missions

5. Pastoral training process

• From seminary to field-based

6. Congregational connectivity

• From denomination to city-reaching

Diffusion of Innovation

1. Awareness

2. Interest• Consideration of benefits

3. Trial • Experiment, tinkering

4. Decision• Where $ gets involved

5. Adoption

How People Adopt New Ideas(… and the church is slower than the culture!)

Innovators

Early

Adopters

Middle Adopters

Late

Adopters

Never Adopters

2% 18% 60% 18% 2%

Traits of Innovators

• Curiosity• Self-confidence• Courage• Dissatisfaction with

current models• Mental perseverance• Future-orientation

Best-Practices of Innovators

1. Insight• The ability to mentally model outcomes of

alternatives

2. Courage• Willingness to take on calculated risk

• This is why they hate committees!

3. Flexibility• Willing and able to make mid-course corrections

• They never fall in love with their first draft

Smart Innovators and Riskers …

• Deal with more in social situations than they do in formal presentational contexts

– Where resistance is more formal, stiff, and unbreakable

Innovation Attracts Things

• Creative people• Excitement• Quality enhancement• Resources• Image enhancement• “Movement” (a life of its own)

– It also attracts:• risk• the chance of being drawn

off-track• criticism

Igniters, Accelerators, Idea-KillersLarry Osborne, www.northcoastchurch.com

• There are 2 Igniters

1. Personal Passion– “why can’t it be done

this way?”

2. Organizational Problems– “let’s try harder” vs.

“try something else”

5 Accelerators

• Clear mission and values– Helps you to know what “fits”– “mission creep” (Y.M.C.A.)

• Bias for action– Vs. a bias for “study”

• Permission-granting vs. permission-withholding (“let’s study it more”)

• A respected champion– Holds off middle-adopters from

premature closeout

5 Accelerators

• Planning in pencil– Organizational mindset to considered

experimentation– Hint: don’t baptize new ideas with

Bible verses to get buy-in!

• Viable exit strategy– Most start-ups fail; do you know

where the back door is?– Rule of thumb: add new things

rather than changing old things

5 Idea-Killers

1. Past failures

2. Surveys• Surveys: there was no market for

minivan, fax, or microwave

3. Group-think• Ideas entrusted to groups often

move towards harmony and the least-objectionable (weakest) idea

• Individuals innovate; groups critique and mediate

5 Idea-Killers

4. Cultural disconnect– Importing Willow/Saddleback

uncritically

5. Past success• Some things that used to work well

no longer work in a newer day• Peter Drucker: “If it ain’t broke, fix it!”• Starbucks: doing things they said

they would never, ever do

Building a Risk-Taking ClimateMichael Slaughter, www.ginghamsburg.org

• First, start with a focused-faith picture.

– “In the last days, God says, ‘I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.”

-- Acts 2:17

Then, move with Courage.

• “”Get yourself ready! Stand up and say to them whatever I command you. Do not be terrified by them, or I will terrify you before them.”

-- Jeremiah 1:17

“We walk by faith, not by sight.” -- 2 Corinthians 5:7

“willingness to risk the

call to transform the

community”

Next, begin to reward risks.

• When people act out of personal passions or callings (instead of committee assignment), highlight and celebrate that.

Begin to redefine boards and structures.

• Have your boards move from being permission-giving to becoming “obstacle-removing”

– Financial – Facility– Staffing

• Have your board

become “experts

in the future”

– Well-versed in

emerging

postmodern

culture

If you can change

your board culture,

you can change the

church culture

Finally, maintain personal moral and spiritual momentum (“drive”)

Devotion to God

Read for life-long learning

Invest in key relationships– Family first, then leader board

Vision for the future– Spend daily time visioning

Exercise for life

Cultivating Courageous Innovation and Risk-Taking

Dr. John P. Chandler

The Ray and Ann Spence Network for Congregational Leadership

www.rasnet.org

John.chandler@vbmb.org Copy right John P. Chandler, 2007