The Sanford Berenberg Experience: Message of the Day - Two Pillars of a Strong Organization

Good Morning,

Earlier this week I was listening to Alistair Begg on the radio. He was talking about how churches can founder and fall apart. I thought about it and it made sense that these two concepts, if not followed could cause any organization to founder and fall apart.

These two concepts, or pillars, if you will, are Focus and Fellowship.

Focus – Leadership needs to remain focused.

Fellowship – The Organization needs to work together and not let any issues fester and grow causing wedges within the itself.

Focus:

Focused leaders are more apt to lead strong organizations. Leaders who are easily distracted have a harder time keeping their organization strong. Leaders who have a challenge staying focused can improve their ability to focus by removing distractions from their organizational life, here a few tips:

Ignore the minutia – Keep the main thing the main thing.

When directed to look at the small stuff, resist and keep the main thing the main thing. Every decision, every action should work toward the goal and mission of the organization. Otherwise, toss it.

Now, if your organization is strong, and everyone can readily remain focused, then by all means, dive into the minutia and have fun with it. If you have challenges focusing, then avoid it at all costs.

Avoid being dragged into the minutia – As simple as it sounds, we often find that our organizations will see things which they feel are important, that when held up to the light of the organization’s mission are not really that important. Stay away from those things. This means changing the focus of the team from the small, seemingly urgent items, to the large important targets.

Fellowship:

Organizations where all people get along are often rare, but they are strong. Those that have strong fellowships are not only well put together, they work hard to maintain their cohesion and meet any and all dissention head on.

Letting problems fester or having members of the team or organization who have unresolved issues with their group or leadership will challenge the fellowship of the organization.

Back in 1996, during my first trip to Scotland, I was in Kirkwall, the capital of the Orkney Islands. We had just finished our tour of the island by a local guide and heard the stories of how safe it is there, and how close the community was. During dinner I suggested moving to island. At that moment, half a dozen locals all turned and stared at me. It was not a pleasant feeling. They tolerated me enough as a tourist, but they were not about to let me enter their fellowship as a neighbor. In this case, the community worked hard to keep unwanted elements out.

While organizations cannot always dictate who joins them or in what roles, teams that work hard to help keep everyone focused on the organization’s goals, putting out fires quickly, working toward consensus, and managing trouble sources to either buy in or opt out will have a stronger fellowship and a stronger organization.

Achieving focus and fellowship are not easy. They take determination and guts to face the distractions and put out the fires all while keeping an eye on the organization’s goal.

Hard, but not impossible.

Enjoy!

Sanford Berenberg
Sanford@berenberg.net
http://www.berenberg.net

http://sanfordberenberg.blogspot.com/
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