So What Faith

Greg Smith

Vision & Strategy Trends (#0232)

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Will Mancini is the founder of Auxano – a church consulting group with a unique approach to developing a church’s vision frame before providing traditional consulting services.   He is the author of Church Unique: How Mission Leaders Cast Vision, Capture Culture, and Create Movement (read my review here).

Mancini’s first blog post of 2011 is packed with relevant information about trends in vision and strategy for churches.  He sees eleven trends for 2011 and beyond:

  1. Expect Increasing Diversity of Opinion on What Good Vision and Strategy Look Like
  2. Articulating the Biggest Picture will be the Leader’s Greatest Asset Like Never Before
  3. The Digital World and Social Media will Open New Possibilities for More Churches
  4. Visioning and Spiritual Formation as Disciplines will Merge More Visibly
  5. Small Will Continue to Be the New Big
  6. Networks are Becoming the New Denominations
  7. Leaders will Pay More Attention to Shorter Time Horizons
  8. The Intersection of Personal and Organizational Vision will be Magnified.
  9. Visioning will be Interpreted More as Making Meaning than Predicting Future
  10. External Focus and Biblical Justice will Stay Prominent
  11. Consulting for Vision Clarity will Surpass that for Capital Campaigns

So What?

Do you agree with all of the items on Mancini’s list? If not, which do you believe are not valid or likely and why?  How well is your church positioned to incorporate each of these trends?

As I worked through Mancini’s list a few times, I saw within it four themes:

  1. Leaders must live the vision and ensure it is a part of the congregational DNA (#2, #8,  and #9)
  2. Diversity trumps uniformity (#1, and #5)
  3. Relevance and emerging technology matter (#3, #4 and #7)
  4. Local church comes first and associations beyond that level are valued if they add value [rather than because of historical connections (i.e. denominations) or technical competency (i.e. consultants)] (#6, #10, #11)

Take a few minutes and give your congregation a letter grade for each of these four areas.  What can you do this year to address the area receiving the lowest score?