In his book, The Checklist Manifesto, Atul Gawande wants to eliminate mistakes through the power of a checklist. Gawande points out that people make a lot of mistakes, usually because of ignorance or ineptitude. People may not know what to do or they may fail to apply the knowledge they do have correctly (8). Further…
You can download the habit checklist for the daily habits of prayer, exercise, and evening routine HERE. Remember to only focus on adding in one habit at a time. You can copy and paste from the template into your files.
Weekly planning is one of the keystone habits for a productive life. Why? Because you will either be a slave to your calendar or a slave to the chaos. A chaotic life is one lived without intention, thinking about how you will use your time. Such chaos often leads us to pass our days living…
You win at life and leadership by doing the basics. How do you actually do them? Well, first you need to know what the basics of life and leadership are. For my vocation, I have distilled out five essential habits for Christian leadership. They are: Daily prayer Weekly exercise Evening routine Weekly Sabbath Digital minimalism…
Do the basics. You nothing without the basics. So much of success in life in general, and leadership in particular, is merely doing the basics. There is a large market for sharing the latest leadership hack, trick, or steroid which will make things better or cause your church to grow. It won't happen. Anything good…
Jesus gave the church the task to "make disciples" of all nations (Matthew 28:18-20). He did not reserve the task to just a select few, however. All Christians can make disciples...that means you can make disciples! Unfortunately, many pastors and books make discipleship seem complicated. It's not. Here is a practical guide for how to disciple…
Some Old Testament texts seem harsh, even morally backwards to society today. But if you want people to listen to you on your own terms (and not put words in your mouth), shouldn't you also extend the same courtesy to others? It's just the Golden Rule of Listening: listen to others as you want to…
Here are some scattered thoughts about how the book Team of Teams applies to LBC. 1. Focus on structure and culture of the church. Don't worry about creating a "top down" org chart, those are terrible anyway. Try to visualize the "web" of relationships between the ministry. Leaders must be "crafters of culture." What kind of…
People waste a lot time at work. Too often, they end up doing things which don't really matter. The authors of 4DX wants leaders to reclaim their time and and purpose by focusing on Wildly Important Goals (WIGs). WIGs are the one or two things which really drive results for an organization. However, leaders often give in…
General Stanley McChrystal wrote Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World to recount how the Joint Special Operation Task Force evolved into a new kind of organization. In 2003, McChrystal came to a startling revelation: they were losing. Even though the US forces were better trained, better resourced, and far more expansive,…