April 2013 – Page 2 – The Flipchart

Harvard Oxymoron – Creating an Organic Growth Machine

The Harvard Business Review audio library is a great resource and one I use regularly. Over the years it has been an invaluable source of ideas on organisations and personal development (explore at http://hbr.org/multimedia).

But I was puzzled by the title of an interview given by Ken Favaro called ‘Creating an Organic Growth Machine’ (listen here – it’s worth it).

The material was fine, and led me to rethink the way we could approach the funding of Pioneer Ministry in the Church of England (see the posts starting with Problems with Pioneers – Revex v Capex Funding). It was the oxymoron embedded in the title that caught my attention.

Organic. Growth. Machine.

Machines don’t grow organically. At least not the ones I’ve dealt with.

For example, I analysed the shop floor layouts of the production lines at Transtec PLC in Coventry to see how we could reorganise the machines that produce aluminium engine parts for Jaguar cars. And another time I examined the machines that produce aluminium extrusions in a factory in Holland to ensure we could achieve the shapes and finishes we needed on a glazing contract.

Obviously there was no possibility that these machines could exhibit any signs of organic growth.

I knew what Ken Favaro was getting at. It was the idea that in some way we can combine two ideas into one image to give us a model for organisational development: combining the idea of a well ordered, machined process with the idea of organic growth in the natural world.

The problem when we combine these two images is when we ‘drill down’ (there’s an irony, using an image borrowed from the oil and gas industry) into the metaphor. For example, we treat machines in a very different way from nature.

We tweak machines; we prune plants.

We maintain machines; we nurture plants.

We plan for obsolescence in machines; we allow for re-generation in plants.

We drive machines for maximum consistent production: we tend plants for seasonal fruitfulness.

There’s a “So what?” about all this? Does it matter? It’s just an idea.

Well, I think it does. The images we overlay on our organisations can set the language, the pace, the values, the expectations, and the measures of success. Care is needed when handling powerful images, and it takes a high level of leadership skill to shape metaphors and images into a strong coherent narrative that doesn’t disenfranchise the true resource of the organisation – the people around whom it is built and sustained.

All Change (and they don’t owe you)

Today is the penultimate day of clearing out my office. I’m cooking. it’s 9pm and I’m sitting in the kitchen, waiting for the pork chops with celeriac and apple and new potatoes to reach perfection. And I’m exhausted!\r\n\r\nThe office move has taken six weeks. That’s six weeks of clearing space in my small home to make space for the equipment, materials and furniture I’m moving from my small office. It’s amazing how much can be carefully slotted into small spaces.\r\n\r\nAnd tomorrow is adverts day for jobs in the Church of England, and along with at least six of my contemporaries that I know about I will be studying the options and possible moves around the country.\r\n\r\nI’m hoping that exactly the right job appears but the reality is that it’s hard to get a job in the church at the moment. This is partly due to the large reduction in full time clergy posts taking place across the country, plus the unusually high number of existing experienced clergy currently looking for a change in post, plus the high number of curates looking too, many of whom would make excellent incumbents, and perhaps my unusual personal style and CV won’t help me land a traditional role either.\r\n\r\nSo from this weekend I’m without work, without an office, and looking for a job in a highly competitive field.\r\n\r\nOn Tuesday I wake up with nothing in the diary and nowhere to go.\r\n\r\nGreat!\r\n\r\nNo really … great!\r\n\r\nI do not expect the Church of England to be the answer to my personal needs – for money, security, purpose or satisfaction in ministry. I am responsible for my own well being. The church doesn’t owe me. And likewise I remain open to the fact that churches (or even The Church) might not think I’m the answer to it’s needs at this time.\r\n\r\nIt may be a pedantic semantic clarification, but the call on my life is God’s call not mine. I may aspire to say my time is God’s time, but the opposite is true too: His time is my time. We have a shared history, God and I, and it’s brought us to this place: my history in some way a part of His history.\r\n\r\nAnd so with pockets full of skills and experiences and creativity, if I’m not chosen for the jobs I think are ideal for me – I’ll make my own future in a place where we (me, the people I live with, God) can flourish.

Problems with Pioneers – Personal Funding

In a previous related piece – Problems with Pioneers – Revex v Capex Funding – the argument was made that funding pioneers out of diocese or local church funds is difficult, and it’s better for pioneers to obtain their own funding.\r\n\r\nPaul gave us the biblical model for this when he used funds raised in Macedonia to pay for his work in Corinth and from Philipi for his imprisonment in Rome. And when the funding ran out in Thessolonica he and his companions “…worked our fingers to the bone, up half the night, moonlighting so [they] wouldn’t have the burden of supporting them while we proclaimed God’s Message to you”.\r\n\r\nSo before launching out Pioneers need to ask two basic questions. First …\r\n\r\n…do you back yourself to succeed?\r\n\r\nThen ask the question any investor would ask …\r\n\r\n…Why? How do you know? Where’s the evidence? Are you being honest and realistic? (that’s four, I know)\r\n\r\nAnd there is a third question for those who are married…\r\n\r\n…does my husband/wife agree to using our current funds for ministry rather than for our family and pension?\r\n\r\nIf all these questions can be answered positively then crack on and … work out the sums.\r\n\r\nThere are entrepreneurial ways of funding church planting, but the traditional model is to fund one or two ministers for three to five years. So allow £50,000 for one full time minister with a family per year. That’s £250,000 for five years. And don’t forget the possible cost of hiring a venue and equipment.\r\n\r\nSo now all the ducks are in a row, its time to … think about the ‘ownership’ problem.\r\n\r\nIf you can back yourself and raise your own funds why would you do it for a denomination that will not participate in the risk? And if you plant a successful church, and the denomination has not participated in the risk, why would you give them the benefit of your income stream and assets and resources?\r\n\r\nStill interested? Can you afford it? Family on board? Agreed terms with your denomination?\r\n\r\nIf yes – it’s time to plan.\r\n\r\nIf no – it’s time for the church to rethink funding options for church planting …