Patrick Lencioni launched the afternoon session. He opened by asking why do groups fail? He suggested there are two reasons:

  1. behavioral problems — These are interpersonal conflicts. (See Five Dysfunctions of a Team.)
  2. structural problems — These are typically silos. In the church, it’s when people are more focused on their ministry area than the overall mission of the church.

Lencioni talked about the power of crisis. It’s a rallying cry. The objective is to find a thematic goal that creates that same sort of focus in an organization. Thematic goal has to be:

  • single
  • qualitative
  • temporary
  • share across the organization

He suggested we need to answer the question: If we need to do anything in the next 3 to 12 months, what would it be?

After defining a thematic goal, you need defining objectives. These are four or five things you need to do to accomplish the thematic goal.

There are also standard operating objectives. These are objectives that are regular and routine and will always be important. We can’t ignore these objectives to focus on the thematic goal. But, we we focus on the standard operating objectives and don’t have a thematic goal, life gets boring.

Lencioni then walked through three specific examples from churches:

How do you keep this alive? It needs to be addressed in your staff meetings. Go through each objective and rate each area (green, yellow and red). Talk about each and address progress. The focus is on the objectives rather than the ministry silos. Everyone becomes responsible for everything.

Who owns it? Someone. Someone needs to be in charge. By the way, when there’s not a clear, compelling strategy, people (like elder boards) will try to fill a perceived vacuum.

If you don’t have a thematic goal, everyone on the team will come up with their own. This helps create focus. One of the pastors from the three teachers suggested, “It’s an energy filter.”

Final reminders:

  • If everything is important, then nothing is.
  • Take off your functional hats.
  • Don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good.

All the slides for this presentation will be available in a special Willow Creek Summit section at TableGroup.com.

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