From Apathetic Bystanders to Passionate Participants

I’ve been contemplating why some organizations have passionate participants and some have apathetic bystanders. What makes one organization have a viral quality that grows and succeeds beyond anything imaginable?

My sister was commenting on how passionate Virginia Tech fans are about their football team. These fans fly across the country for a game as often as they can. When they can’t fly to a game, they will find a Virginia Tech bar and watch the game in their Burnt Orange and Chicago Maroon apparel along with a Hokey Bird painted on their cheek. It seems like there is a Virginia Tech bar is every city. Even across the country in San Diego. If their team loses, their entire day is ruined. If their team wins, they are sailing high the entire week. Virginia Tech fans get amped up about Virginia Tech football. Many pastors make the comment that “if people were as fired up about the church as they were about the football game, then think about how exciting and effective the church would be.” Even though that may be true, church leaders need to ask themselves the question “why aren't people getting excited about their church” “Everything rises and falls on leadership.” After contemplating the question “why” for a couple years much of it came together for me this morning.

Passionate participants understand the “why”
We’ve all heard that “vision leaks” meaning that the vision of your organization needs to be communicated frequently…but don’t just repeat your broad vision with the same fancy words every Sunday. Give them the “why” that your church’s vision is so important and they will own the vision. For example, don’t only say “we’re here to lead people to healthy relationship with Jesus Christ.” Give people the why and who in everyday language. For example, “your friends and neighbors are looking for unconditional love and acceptance in a community that helps them fulfill their need for spiritual connection to God. Show your friends and neighbors this unconditional love and invite them to be part of this community.” That’s a tangible “why” we have Sunday services each week. We want the people that are part of our church to bring their friends and neighbors…not just so they have another thing to do in their busy week. This leads to the next point.

Passionate participant teams have simple, SMART goals
Your vision needs to be part of a fleshed out S.M.A.R.T. goal (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-bound). For example, at the beginning of my company’s fiscal year we communicated the entire strategic business plan to all the Managers and Directors. Towards the end of the fiscal year, we were doing very well in many areas but we weren’t going to hit all business plan targets. So we came up with the goal of hitting $100M in revenue for the first time ever. It was a slight stretch goal but it was very specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound. Plus it was simple goal to remember and easy to communicate. I was constantly being asked by many employees how we were doing and if we were going to hit it. Everyone pulled out everything they had. Do you know what our year-end revenue was? $100,007,000. Wow! The law of attraction to a goal boggles my mind sometimes. What consumes your thoughts will consume your actions! It’s almost funny but I’m excited today because we hit $100M. Almost all people that you would ask would say it’s impossible for someone to be passionate about business (especially for a finance guy to be passionate). You might be even laughing right now, but I’m amped! A vision was communicated and we hit that goal! For us as a church, our goal is to get to 500 in attendance by the end of this year. Not because it would be cool to have 500 people, but because we are impacting 500 lives for Christ and they are experiencing the unconditional love of God.

Passionate participants are part of the action
If someone is going to be part of the action, they need to be on the journey with you and share in the emotional highs and lows. Please don’t miss that. Why would you want to make your church community as sterile as possible by not letting people know that you did or didn’t hit your goal? How boring is that? I don’t want to be part of something sterile. I want to be part of something that is viral. Part of something where I feel I made a difference. Even sports fans feel like they made a difference in the outcome of the game. They call it the home court or home stadium advantage. Think of Chicago Cubs fans. Many of their fans have been fans their whole lives and they have never won a World Series. They hadn’t ever seen success (or at least in 99 years), but they are loyal and passionate fans.

Passionate participants are identified by a clear and cohesive brand
1. Get a cool church logo: It’s almost impossible to not have logo these days but some churches still haven’t figured that out. Get a logo and put it everywhere...church handouts, bulletins, business cards, websites, myspace, etc. It’s the first step in building your brand.
2. Get church colors: When fans go to a game, they where their team’s colors. People love to express their loyalty. Let people express their loyalty for your church. For our church, our colors are yellow and black. Maybe have a Sunday where everyone wears the church colors.
3. Get church t-shirts: I can’t remember who said it, but it is so true. “Good teams have cool shirts.” It could have been in Simply Strategic Stuff by Tim Stevens and Tony Morgan but I’m not sure. People love to express themselves with their clothes. Shirts display someone’s loyalty. Let your church community “evangelize” with a shirt from your church.
4. Get a church brand: Your church brand should be a lifestyle brand. Think Apple Computers vs. Toshiba Computers. Think Starbucks vs. Folgers. One is a lifestyle brand and one is just a brand. What makes you unique? If you can say, we’re just like so-and-so’s church or if you identify your church brand by the denomination you are part of – you do not have a lifestyle brand!

Passionate participant teams have frequent communication and dialogue
To communicate a vision and plan at the beginning of the year and then come out at the end of the year and say we did or didn’t hit the goal is not good enough. After every football game, the coach and sometimes star players come out and say what worked and what didn’t work. They also remind fans what their goals are for the year and where their strengths lie. Do you think coaches do that because they don’t have anything else to do after the game? No way. They are exhausted emotionally and physically after the game. They want to go home and sleep. The key here is to spend the extra time frequently communicating with the people in your church community. Leadership meetings, blogging, frequent emails and even Sunday morning services are great ways of doing that.

Contemplate these things and see what keys are missing in your organization. Let me know if there are other things that you think are key to creating a passionate participant team.