7 Moves to Multisite Part 1
Jon Ferguson and Eric Metcalf share the process Community Christian Church has identified as they've launched multiple locations
Jon Ferguson and Eric Metcalf
Multisite Move No. 1: It’s a God thing. A number of years ago if you had asked me what the first step towards multi-site was, I probably would’ve said, “Well, it begins with vision.” But experience has taught us that more often God things occur first: God’s up to something. We recognize it. We identify it.
Here are a couple of examples of how we’ve seen this play out as we’ve reproduced sites and churches. The third campus we started at Community Christian Church in the Chicago area was launched when a small, under-resourced church approached us about giving us their facility and six acres of property. Now, when somebody approaches you with that kind of offer, what do you say? That’s like a God thing, right? At least one other local organization had turned it down. Here’s another example.
About six years ago, Troy McMahon (planter/leader of Restore Community Church in Kansas City) was praying about whether or not God wanted him to move back to his hometown of Kansas City to plant a new church. Troy had been on staff at our church for a while. He had been a campus pastor and a really effective and influential part of our team. So we took a trip out to Kansas City to meet with several pastors in the Kansas City area and after about less than a week, came home with all sorts of financial backing. God was at work. Again a God thing.
Below are a couple of questions we use to help us identify these God things:
- Where is God at work? How do we recognize that? I think it’s primarily through prayer, listening and observing. And when we see Him at work, what do we need to do then? We need to join Him.
- How is God working to confirm your prompting or your leading? You may have a great idea, but is it really God at work? Are you seeking confirmation for that idea from Scripture and prayer and through trusted friends and wise counsel?
So identifying that God thing gives you a compelling vision to communicate.
In his book, Next Generation Leader, Andy Stanley talks about three basic components of any compelling vision: problems, solutions and then urgency. You have to present the problem; you have to present the solution; and then you have to provide the urgency or motivation for solving that problem. Andy says most visions lack urgency.
If you look at our Montgomery campus, where we were given a facility and six acres of land, the problem piece was that 70 percent of the people in that community were unchurched. (That’s pretty much true all over Chicago.) So the obvious solution piece for was to launch a life-giving faith community and church where those people can find their way back to God. And then the urgency piece came in–being given that facility and receiving confirmation from God that He was actually moving through a dream of one of the women on our staff provided the urgency.
Multisite Move No. 3: Leader
This is kind of an obvious one. You need to have someone who will lead this thing, And it’s so important for us to look for the right candidate because you end up attracting who you are. So the question is, “What are you looking for in that candidate?” because it’s likely that a campus or church will take on the flavor or the characteristics of that particular leader.
We have some key qualities or things we look for. You may have heard Bill Hybels talk about the 4 C’s of leadership: character: competency, chemistry and calling. These are actually really good categories to use as you’re thinking through who’s the right person to take ownership for launching this new campus. You want to look for a track record of what a potential candidate has done, the legacy that they have left behind them. When you invite a leader into this new responsibility of launching a new campus, you want them to leave this trail of breadcrumbs of people they’ve invested in that have become leaders in other ministries.
What kinds of stories can they tell? One of the ways that we talk about it is, “Does he or she have an apprenticeship story to tell?” Can they talk about how they’ve been developed and how they’ve developed others? If they don’t have that story to tell, it’s a good chance they’re not the right leader candidate.
Chemistry is another factor that often gets overlooked. But I would argue that it’s likely one of the most important of all those C’s. Instead, it tends to be the one we just kind of like to not pay as much attention to. Identifying the right person to lead this new initiative is mission critical.
Multisite Move No. 4: Team
It’s not just about your staff team; it’s also your volunteer team. Who’s going to come alongside this new initiative? When it comes to building a staff team. you want to think about the key roles required to lead this new initiative. Ask yourself, “What ministries are we going to reproduce at this new location? And which ones will stay at the original location?”
I tend to think of these roles in terms of The Fab 5: adults, students, kids, first impressions and the arts. These are the five things we look at when we launch a new location. We want to look at these factors and ask, “Who will lead each of those initiatives when it comes to the staff team, either paid or volunteer?. What things do we need people to take ownership of when it comes to going after the mission that God called us to do in this new initiative?”
We all have to wrestle with that.
The other piece of team is what we call the matrix, which is really thinking through the questions:
- “What roles are necessary now to fill those teams?”
- “What will it take to provide a quality children’s ministry?”
- “How many small group leaders will we need for that?”
- “How many people will we need in the arts for that?”
- “How many people will we need for set up/tear down if we’re in a portable experience for kids space?”
- “What will it take to fill the roles among those teams, whether or not these roles are in the creative arts, with the tech and lighting team, production musicians and vocalists?
- “How many different roles do we need to pull off the experience we’re hoping to pull off?”
We’ll actually make a pretty big deal out of these roles, sometimes referring to them as spiritual entrepreneurs. Who are the people that will jump on and jump in and help fill the matrix to take on these different responsibilities so that we can have a strong team when we launch this new initiative? It’s really a fun thing to do, and it can be as many as 75 different roles that it might take to pull this thing off.
When they jump onto these teams, we often coach and encourage our volunteers to consider wearing at least one and a half hats. So one hat would be, “I’m a leader, I have responsibility over people,” and half a hat would be, “I contribute on a team, I serve in a role. I don’t necessarily oversee people, it’s a task that I fulfill.”
The matrix is really trying to get to a place where you’re painting a picture for all those ways to get involved, and you’re being clear about that. So you think about staff and team, and you’re also thinking about what it takes to fill those teams with people to get involved.
Next week’s part 2 of this post will focus on Multisite Moves 5-7. Listen to the full podcast here. Jon Ferguson will be one of six leaders talking about multiplication as part of the Multisite Leadership Forum at Exponential West in October. Learn more about the Multisite Leadership Forum here.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar