Wayne Hedlund

Author: Wayne Hedlund

  • Leading Difficult People – John Maxwell

    photo credit: Neil. Moralee via photo pin cc

  • Free Stuff For Churches: NewSpring Church

     

    The great people over at NewSpring Church, with Pastor Perry Noble, recently released their new Church Resources website. Pastors and church leaders are invited to sign up and download any of the many resources they have developed, free of charge!

    Available For Download:

    • Sermon Series Images and Video Files.
      You’ll have to make sure you have the right programs to update these files for your church. If you do, there are more than 50 series available. To the left is an example of one of a series graphics.
    • Student Resources.
      These student resources may work great in Sunday services too.
    • And More!
      Check out their website to see what else NewSpring Church has available to help your church reach your community!

      

  • This Week’s Great Links

    Elim Fellowship Declares War on Malaria by Ron Burgio & Tom Brazell
    This fall, Elim Fellowship is declaring war on Malaria. We ask that you join with us in combating the biggest killer in history, MALARIA! We are joining with the Pentecostal/Charismatic Churches of North America (PCCNA) and Word Vision in their War on Malaria. Malaria is history’s biggest killer. In Sub-Saharan Africa alone, it takes the life of a precious child age five or under, EVERY 45 SECONDS! Nearly 2,000 kids die daily from this night predator…almost one million children every year. Mosquitoes ARE Malaria’s weapon of mass destruction. They kill children, they destroy families, and they impoverish communities. Read More.

    Ben & Jerry’s, Chick-Fil-A & Political Correctness by Perry Noble
    Let me begin by saying I absolutely LOVE Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. (Gonna go ahead and tell you that Oatmeal Cookie Chunk is THE BEST flavor I’ve EVER had!!) A few years ago I went to Wal Mart (the closest thing to hell I can imagine…that and the DMV), found my favorite flavor and decided to tweet that I was purchasing some Ben & Jerry’s ice cream…and doing so “unleashed the hounds” in a sense. Honestly, I’ve never experienced anything like it, “Christians” began @ replying me on twitter condemning me and scolding me for buying this product because apparently Ben & Jerry’s supported gay rights/same sex marriage. Read More.

    Good Is The Enemy Of Great by Wayne Hedlund
    “Good is the enemy of great.” So says Jim Collins, author of the book Good to Great. Checkout the opening lines from that book: “Good is the enemy of great. And that is one of the key reasons why we have so little that becomes great. We don’t have great schools, principally because we have good schools. We don’t have great government, principally because we have good government. Few people attain great lives, in large part because it is just so easy to settle for a good life. The vast majority of companies never become great, precisely because the vast majority become quite good – and that is their main problem.” Read More.

    No Dumping: 5 Keys to Effective Delegation by Ron Edmondson
    I have seen, and probably been accused of, dumping responsibilities on people inappropriately and calling it delegation. This form of delegation actually does more harm than good for an organization, because it leaves projects undone or completed sub-par, kills employee morale and motivation, and keeps the mission of the organization from reaching its full potential. Recently I asked two of our staff people to whom I delegate frequently how I am doing in this area. It was a good conversation and helped write this post. The bottom line is that delegation involves more than just ridding oneself of responsibility. You can’t dump and run and call it delegation. Read More.

    35 Quick and Simple Tips for Better Productivity by Mike Vardy
    When people first begin exploring the world of personal productivity and task management, they either don’t know where to start or can’t seem to find their footing when they do. If you’re one of these people, I’ve assembled 35 quick and simple tips for better productivity – ones you can use right away and start to see results in your work and in your life. You don’t need to take on all 35 (in fact, I’d recommend taking on far less and returning to this piece as you feel comfortable taking on more), but each of them can be used to provide you with a sample of what improved productivity feels like. Let’s get started. Read More.

    4 Truths Every Pioneer Should Know by Mary DeMuth
    Pioneering is hard. It is especially hard for those around them. It is even hard for the pioneers themselves. Through God’s strength, I’ve pioneered a lot of things in my life. I parented my kids in an entirely different way than I was raised (and am still plowing that ground). I broke up the fallow ground of publishing, starting from nothing. And my family and I planted a church in one of the most unchurched places on the planet: France. So I get pioneering. Read More.

    Image from pagadesign on istockphoto.com 

  • Back To Church Rap

    Check out this totally awesome Rap promoting “Back To Church Sunday”. Awesome.

    Learn more about Back To Church Sunday and all of their available resources at their website: www.backtochurch.com.

     

  • Strategic Planning for the Local Church

    Strategic-Planning-church

    “Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win” ― Sun Tzu, The Art of War

    Wow. This quote so aptly applies to what Christ has done for us on the cross! What a privilege to be serving on the side of victory! It (the quote) also serves as a reminder that sometimes the best way to fulfill a vision is to map out a strategy for getting there before we ever begin. That’s what I want to talk about in this post.

    Last year Elim Fellowship produced a professional recording of my one day workshop entitled, “Strategic Planning for the Local Church”. In this workshop I tackle the following topics:

    • How to build and maintain a cohesive strategic planning team.
    • How to clarify your ministry’s DNA (Mission, Vision, Values).
    • How to apply the ‘Strategic Process’ to any challenge your church faces.
    • How to roll out a strategic plan to your constituents.

    At the time of this teaching, my goal was to impart to my listeners everything I’ve learned about Strategic Planning. I have received, by far, more positive feedback from this material than any other teaching to date. One pastor told me he requires all new elders and key staff to review this workshop as part of their church leadership requirement. Another pastor mentioned to me the other day that his leadership team has already walked through the workshop twice since purchasing the DVD set – and they attended the workshop in person!

    All said, I’d like to invite you to consider purchasing a copy of this workshop for your church or ministry as well. I really do believe it can make a big difference in how you approach and think about ministry. Cost for the workshop is $99.00. It is available at my online store or you may purchase you’re copy by clicking ‘Buy now’ below. Blessings!

    Strategic Planning for the Local Church Workshop: $99.00
    Note: if you are receiving this post via email, click on this link to buy now.

  • Thursday Quote: Who – The A Method for Hiring

    This is a guest post by Pastor Doug Cowburn II. Pastor Doug serves as the Executive Pastor at Elim Gospel Church in Lima, NY. Recently, while sharing lunch together, Doug told me about this book and readily agreed to writing this Thursday Quote about it for your benefit. Enjoy.

     
     
     
    Recently, two different people I know recommended that I read, Who: The A Method to Hiring. I found that this book was not only a great resource for when you need to hire someone, but also a great way to look at writing your own job description. If you’re like me, you want to know when you are being successful at your job. The problem is that many who are in ministry are either working without a job description or the one they have is all activity based. Activity based job descriptions say things like:
    • Connects with volunteers
    • Teaches on a regular basis
    • Leads the deacon team

    Someone could follow an activity based job description for years and never actually move the needle on the church’s mission. I want to be an “A Player” who delivers his best and contributes toward the church’s vision and mission. In order to do this I need a job description, or as this book suggests, I need a scorecard that gives me some targets to hit.

    Here are some of my favorite quotes from the book:

    “We define an ‘A Player’ this way: a candidate who has at least a 90 percent chance of achieving a set of outcomes that only the top 10 percent of possible candidates could achieve.”

    “The scorecard is composed of three parts: the job’s mission, outcomes and competencies. Together, these three pieces describe ‘A’ performance in the role—what a person must accomplish and how. They provide a clear linkage between the people you hire and your strategy.”

    “While typical job descriptions break down because they focus on activities, or a list of things a person will be doing (calling on customers, selling), scorecards succeed because they focus on outcomes, or what a person must get done (grow revenue from $25 million to $50 million by the end of year three). Do you see the distinction?”

    “Scorecards: • Set expectations with new hires • Monitor employee progress over time • Objectify your annual review system • Allow you to rate your team annually as part of a talent review process.”

    As you can see, this book was written primarily for the business world, but it has huge implications for ministry related job descriptions as well.  What would your scorecard look like?

  • This Week’s Great Links

    Unlocking the Secrets of Church Sound by Josh Cummings
    Poor sound can be extremely distracting. We’ve probably all been there: the worship leaders mic gives annoying feedback during the service, the preacher sounds like he’s underwater, or you can’t hear the lead vocals over the band during worship. Though it is often a thankless role, the church sound tech has the power to enhance or detract from the communication of the gospel in our church services. With that much depending upon one person, I thought I would give you a few tips on how to improve in this article on the art of mixing. Read More.

    Trust: The Glue That Makes Everything Possible by Tony Morgan
    I have gained a great deal of insight from Sam Chand’s new book called Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code. Sam’s excerpt on “Trust” was so insightful that I asked him if I could share it on my blog. Trust is vital for any team yet it is fragile and easily destroyed. Fortunately, trust can be rebuilt causing a team to become stronger and healthier. “Mutual trust among team members is the glue that makes everything good possible. Without it, a team quickly disintegrates into a gang of people protecting their turf and forming angry alliances.” Read More.


    2012 Challenge for our Catalyst Team by Brad Lomenick
    Here are 10 points we discussed and committed to as a Catalyst team earlier this year in January. Thought I would share them so as to motivate or inspire you to challenge your team as well:

    1. Authentic. Be Real. Human. approachable. Guard against hubris.
    2. No sideways energy. Communicate. Focus. Guard against silos and wasted energy.

    Read More.

    The Reason Many Policies are Written by Ron Edmondson
    Many policies are written because someone didn’t want to solve a problem. In her book “Unleashing the Power of Rubber Bands”, Nancy Ortberg talks about the need to differentiate between “a tension to be managed and a problem to be solved“…. Most of the time, in my experience, churches are notorious for creating a new policy to attempt to manage the problem rather than doing the difficult work of solving it. Solving the problem often involves getting personal with people. It involves challenging people. It involves change. It involves holding people accountable to a higher standard. That’s messy. It’s never fun. Most churches like neat, clean and seemingly easy. (Just being honest.) Read More.

    How to Make the Host Ask: The 2012 Version by Mark Howell
    (Note: Mark uses the term ‘Host’ to indicate small group facilitators.)
    Getting ready to recruit HOSTs for an upcoming church-wide campaign? Let me give you my best shot at some keys to maximizing your impact. Here are what I think are the keys to maximizing the harvest. Read More.

    Create a Content Strategy for Your Church Website by Bryan Young
    Content Strategy is becoming more and more popular among web professionals — both the idea and the implementation. More focus has gone into design, user experience, and techniques of getting people to websites that the reason people come to websites can get lost. Of course, I’m talking about the content, itself. “Content strategy plans for the creation, publication, and governance of useful, usable content.” (Kristina Halvorson) Just like you wouldn’t begin a sermon without first coming up with a topic, researching, and planning, you shouldn’t do the same with the content on your website. Everything successful, from businesses, to books, to websites, begins with goals and figures out the best way to achieve them. Read More.

    Image from pagadesign on istockphoto.com 

  • Don’t Miss Your Life Video

    I ran across this great 4 minute video over on epicparent.tv the other day and just had to share it. Powerful and relevant. Hopefully, this doesn’t hit too close to home. Whether it does or not, it would be a great opener to a message on parenting. Enjoy.


    If you can’t see this video, try clicking this link.

     
    I have to wonder, how many of us are ‘missing our life’ and don’t even travel? God give us the courage to be the men and women of God you’ve called us to be for our kids!

  • Tactical Tip: Backup Your Files!

    You’ve heard the horror stories – maybe you even have one of your own. A computer crashes and everything stored on it gets wiped out. Lost forever. In fact, this story rings true for me very recently. This past year my laptop hard-drive got corrupted and by the time I got things up and running again I discovered that my whole hard drive had been wiped clean. Thankfully, the only stress I carried was the loss of time and energy – I had a solid backup of everything.

    I have a very easy, cheap suggestion for you to backup your files. And once you’ve set it up, you’ll never think about it (unless you need it). Before I share my solution for you, I thought you might appreciate this fairly relevant and humorous clip about a time when Pixar almost lost ‘Woody’ during the creation of their hit movie “Toy Story”.

    If you can’t see this video, try clicking this link.
    Trust me. You don’t want to be caught in this scenario. I’ve discovered a great solution, but it’ll cost you $59/year. That said, the peace of mind you will receive at that cost is well worth it. I’ve successfully restored all of my files this past year alone. I’ve also been able to grab files I accidentally deleted. Even better, there have been a couple occasions when I needed to get a copy of a file from a couple ‘versions’ back – this solution even took care of that!
     
    If you balk at the cost, just consider how much time you have spent pulling together the various files you have on that computer. How much would it be worth to you to keep them safe?
     
    It’s very simple. You install a program that runs in your computer in the background all the time. You select the files you want backed up – there’s no space limit. It automatically keeps your files backed up all the time.
     
    Here’s the solution – I recommend you look into it today (Note: I’m endorsing this company solely because I believe in them, not for any personal gain). Go ahead – give it a try (click the below image).
     

    Image compliments of David Castillo Dominici on freedigitalphotos.net.

  • Thursday Quote: Enchantment – Enchanting Volunteers

    I recently heard about a gentleman who left his church (after many years) because he had nothing important to do there. While he was telling his story, he included the fact that the church he was currently involved in almost immediately got him involved in ministry and he is active, excited, and doing a lot more than he ever imagined he would. He’s also considering full time ministry as a result.

    It can be very difficult to recruit church-goers into ministry roles. Some shy away from it altogether; and many who do recruit people for ministry often do so apologetically. In today’s Thursday Quote I’d like to share an awesome excerpt from the book Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds and Actions by Guy Kawasaki. Although the author makes no claims to Christianity, I’ve found many of the ideas and principles in this book apply directly to Christian Leadership.

    How to Enchant Volunteers
    Volunteers help organizations all over the world, and they are essential for the welfare and success of educational, environmental, social, religious, and other philanthropic causes. While the techniques already discussed in this chapter also pertain to volunteers, these folks deserve their own rules for enchantment: 
    • Set ambitious goals. Volunteers want to know that what they are doing is important and that they are making a difference. Your obligation is to set challenging goals and not waste their time. If there’s anything worse than overusing volunteers, it’s underusing them.
    • Manage them well. When people believe, they want to help, and it’s your responsibility to enable them to help as much as they can This includes planning and organizing how you’ll utilize their activities. You may not be paying them, but their time is still valuable.
    • Enable them to fulfill their needs. Why do people join a nonprofit organization? There are three principal reasons: duty (“I should help my kid’s school”), belonging (“I like doing things with people”), and mastery (“Learning a new skill is more important than money”). Fulfill these needs, and you’re on the way to enchanting your volunteers.
    • Ensure that the paid staff appreciates them. You and your employees must believe in the value of volunteers – if you lack this belief, maybe you should not recruit them. Volunteers often give their heart and soul to an organization, so it’s important that your paid staff appreciates their efforts.
    • Give feedback. People want to know how well they are doing. With volunteers, this is doubly important because you can’t use compensation as a feedback mechanism. So after you set your ambitious goals, provide feedback, and they’ll love you for helping them learn how they are progressing.
    • Provide recognition. Recognition comes in small forms for volunteers: business cards, an e-mail address, a workspace (even if it’s shared), attendance at conferences and public and private expressions of gratitude. See anything that’s expensive on this list? Good, because there isn’t.
    • Invite them in. At least once a year, invite your volunteers into your headquarters. This enables people to meet face-to-face instead of only virtually. Remember the value of proximity to achieving likability? The same concept applies to volunteers.
    • Provide free stuff. “Stuff” means food and drink at working sessions as well as T-shirts and other forms of tchotchkes. Unfortunately, these kinds of goodies are often the first thing an organization cuts when going gets tough, but, dollar for dollar, they are among the most cost-effective forms of compensation that you can offer.
     
    Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”