Saturday, February 13, 2010 @ 1:57 pm by Josh Burcham

TED brings together some of the greatest minds in all fields of thought. Derek Sivers shared these thoughts on the creation of a movement. It was worth the share.

An excerpt from his talk: Now comes the first follower with a crucial role: he publicly shows everyone how to follow. Notice the leader embraces him as an equal, so it’s not about the leader anymore – it’s about them, plural. Notice he’s calling to his friends to join in. It takes guts to be a first follower! You stand out and brave ridicule, yourself. Being a first follower is an under-appreciated form of leadership. The first follower transforms a lone nut into a leader. If the leader is the flint, the first follower is the spark that makes the fire.

The 2nd follower is a turning point: it’s proof the first has done well. Now it’s not a lone nut, and it’s not two nuts. Three is a crowd and a crowd is news.

Read more thought from Derek Sivers.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009 @ 11:12 am by Josh Burcham

I write to encourage, challenge and help people move to the next level in leadership, creativity and being a Christ-follower. It is what gets my blood flowing, it’s what gets be excited. Anytime I come across information that would help in those areas I pass them onto you. Craig Groeschel wrote this post, Breaking Up the System, and it was worth you taking the time to read if you are in any type of leadership.

Even a good ministry system will eventually limit what God wants to do if the system doesn’t evolve or totally change.

(By system, I mean any program, structure, philosophy, or culture that shapes and helps produce a desired outcome.)

Once people operate within a system long enough, they often start to do ministry out of “muscle memory.” They tend to do the same things and work with the same people, but the results often start to slowly (or quickly) diminish.

Because this is what “we’ve always done,” people might think we just need to do what we did—better. In reality, God might want you to de-construct some ministry philosophy or system so you can hear His new direction.

For example, years ago we were doing everything you could think of at LifeChurch.tv. God directed us into a season of focusing on only five things. This philosophy served us well for about four years. It allowed us to focus on our core ministries without being distracted by lots of less-than-our-best efforts.

After a few years, it became obvious this season was coming to a close. What used to seem freeing started to become limiting. After prayer, we intentionally broke the established system to learn something new.

Read the rest of the post and more great post by Craig and Bobby here.

With that quote, as with everything I write, action is required. It doesn’t make much sense if we just soak in and never squeeze out the sponge, because life isn’t about you. You would be a waste a great human being if you just soaked in knowledge and Christ expects us to go out and do.

Thursday, October 15, 2009 @ 10:44 am by Josh Burcham

Leaders this is for you. As the saying goes, “Leaders are learners. When you stop learning, you stop leading.” Mark Batterson is in the process of finding another location for one of their service, because without notice the movie theater that they have been for years closed down. In this season he is still leading, where most leaders would be getting nervous and just making decisions. Now start learning…

“I was afraid of the people and did what they demanded.”

I Samuel 15:24

Leadership mistakes are often predicated by nervousness. Saul got nervous when Samuel didn’t show up so he took matters into his own hands. He got ahead of God. He rationalized his sin. But the root problem is that he feared people more than he feared God. That is evidenced by the fact that he forgot he was anointed by God not appointed by the people. That is a dangerous place. It makes for nervous leaders. And nervous leaders are terrible leaders.

If you care too much about what people think about your messages, it’ll short-circuit the anointing. You’ll lose confidence. When God has anointed you, you care more about people but you care less about what people think. Your confidence comes from saying what God wants you to say. Nothing more. Nothing less. Nothing else.

Care more. Care less.

Reading the post and more over at Evotional.com.

Saturday, October 10, 2009 @ 2:24 pm by Josh Burcham

You can’t deny the fact that God is moving in some powerful ways over at Elevation Church in North Carolina. Well, I guess there are some out there that could. Pastor Steven posted this insightful post on Vision and resources. Church leader you should read it:

Yellow is to sun as ____ is to moon
Guns n Roses is to best band ever as Tiger Woods is to ____
God is to Satan as dogs are to ____ (the answer, clearly, is cats)

Here’s a ministry simile for all of you who are currently facing a resource challenge.

Resources are to the vision of a ministry what wake is to a boat in the water.

Wake follows the movement of a vessel in direct proportion to the velocity.  And it always trails behind the motor.

Resource follows the movement of a vision in direct proportion to the velocity of the vision.  And it always follows behind the vision.  Behind the risk.  Behind the initiative.

Don’t wait for the wake to magically appear.  Produce it by moving forward.
Stop waiting for resources to fall out of the sky.  Go forward as hard as you can as fast as you can with all that you’ve got.

Read full post and more here.

Saturday, October 3, 2009 @ 7:47 pm by Josh Burcham

Great customer service is found in experiences that exceed our expectations. Which is probably a double edge sword for those business, since they need to continuously up themselves (but that is for another post). But none the less we can learn from the experiences we encounter as consumers.

When I fly I usually fly with Southwest, why? Because they’re cheaper than the others and usually have direct flights. The cheaper airlines normally have a sub-par service, but this last trip with Southwest proved otherwise. My return flight was scheduled for 8:00pm and the flight was delayed till 10:00. Thankfully, I was totally cool with some extra time in Colorado. Now the moments of exceed expectations: first, I received a phone call and email from Southwest letting me know that my flight had been delayed, hours before my flight left. Now this isn’t a service I signed up for, it was just normal business for Southwest. Second, free drinks on the flight to make up for the delayed flight. Didn’t partake, but it was a nice (simple) gesture.

Recently, I upgraded my phone to the 3GS. After purchasing the phone I received the below email telling my all about the phone. It was an experience for Apple to recognize my purchase and set me up for success with my new phone. I might be a little bias in this example, but a good example none the less.

(View PDF of Email)

Normally, those experiences are simply ones. Something that didn’t take a lot of work or money. How can you create those types of experiences with your guests in your churches? Probably starts with sitting down in a little creative session.

Saturday, September 12, 2009 @ 10:49 am by Josh Burcham

Perry Noble, pastor of Newspring Church in South Carolina, posted this post last week and it was interesting enough to pass on to you. As leaders we always need to be re-evaluating our leadership and direction, but how do we recognize we have lost our leadership ability and return to our course. Perry lays out 16 signs that I believe will help us do just that:

#1 – He refuses to admit his mistakes.
#2 – He begins to blame the problems on people or circumstances rather than actually seeking out what the problem might be.
#3 – He refuses to listen to the team assembled around him.
#4 – He fights every idea that isn’t his own, thinking his originality is what must keep the church afloat.
#5 – He refuses to face reality.
#6 – He is unwilling to make the necessary changes because it would be highly unpopular.
#7 – He tries to listen to what everyone has to say about every situation.
#8 – He begins to believe that God’s favor on his life is because of how good he is rather than because of how good God is!
#9 – He believes that he can’t learn anything from churches that are smaller than his.  (This would be arrogance!)
#10 – He abuses his staff to accomplish his agenda rather than leading them to accomplish God’s.
#11 – He fears asking for commitment because of how people may perceive him.
#12 – He becomes obsessed with the way things are rather than how they should be.
#13 – He views himself as an expert.
#14 – He tries to motivate with fear rather than vision.
#15 – He doesn’t seek fresh revelation from God and often goes back to what has been done instead of seeking direction for what has never been done.
#16 – He stops taking risks and becomes obsessed with playing it safe.

Click Here to Read Perry Blog

Saturday, August 29, 2009 @ 1:35 pm by Josh Burcham

As I entered my local QuikTrip this morning I found a fresh made QuikTrip Kitchen’s sandwich being handed to me. As well as, a coupon for another free one and a later time. I’ve had their sandwiches before and in terms of quality I would compare it to the cheaper version of Paradise Bakery sandwiches. In other words, they’re good and don’t belong in a typical convenience store. But QT isn’t your typical convenience store and they’re marketing is geniuses.

When they first opened stores here in Phoenix they gave away free mugs that could be filled at any QT location for free. You could fill is with anything, soda, slushes, coffee, etc. It was awesome. But their marketing wouldn’t work if they didn’t back up that marketing with a great and consistent product. Their plan is to give away that great product and get people hooked and coming back. But their key is the great product not the marketing behind that product.

Now, church. How can you create your great products? What do you need to start focusing on and what do you need to stop?

Wednesday, June 3, 2009 @ 9:18 am by Josh Burcham

Found a couple of must read posts this week and had to pass them onto you. These two posts were too good to not link to. Mark Batterson form National Community and Andy Stanley of North Point Church are two leaders in the church today and I would recommend reading any of their books. Mark was talking about hearing the Holy Spirit speak when he wrote this: (more…)