Employee policies are for cowards
When organizations try to solve personnel behavior problems with new policies rather than with direct confrontation with the difficult employee it poisons the work environment.
Dancing Guy teaches about leadership
A leadership seminar in under three minutes:
Decision making in crises
Alban Institute discusses how churches handle sensitive information using a case study as an example of how things can go wrong without prior planning:
Death notice: Rev. John Worrell, publisher of Nevertheless
It falls to this Sunday blogger to note the death yesterday of The Rev. John Worrell, whose name might be recognized by the past few generations of Texas Episcopalians, and most certainly will be recognized by their members of the clergy.
Expanding our understanding of vocation
Writing for the Alban Institute, Craig Satterlee says that many Christians do not grasp the vocational nature of the work that they do every day, and wonders whether our weekly worship has something to do with that:
The PB On Leadership
The Presiding Bishop, the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori reflects on leadership today at the Washington Post's "On Leadership" online blog. Some interesting comments here in this short video. What are your responses to this piece? For instance, what are the upsides and downsides of a church that is "agile" ... "nimble" ... and "deals in deadlines"?
On being nimble
It's a new week, of course, and we never know precisely how the wind will blow tomorrow; but over the past several days we've heard a lot about how the church's leadership structures need to be more nimble: structurally, maybe, as well as intellectually and spiritually.
So we offer the following video meditation on what it means to be agile.
Penciling in the Holy Spirit?
Sarah Drummond writing for Alban Institute wonders if planning can leave room for the Spirit:
Ministerial Reflection
Alban Institute discusses the practice of Ministerial Reflection. While encouraging ordained ministers in training, this practice is helpful for all in ministry - ordained or not:
Emotional intelligence, & conflict competence
Alban Institute's weekly offering looks at research about the skills congregational clergy need to handle conflict and their own emotions in tough situations.
There is no I in individual. No, wait...
Writing for the Alban Institute, John Wimberly tackles a couple of vexing issues, including how to evaluate the success of ministries, rather than the individuals active in such ministries:
Finding holy space in everyday stories
Alban Institute promotes ethnography as a way to build up congregations and their leaders:
Life after governance change
Alban Insitute discusses governance and how it may be changing from the "way it's always been:"
Backgrounding agency helped clerical reps in Iran
An opinion item at The Reporter of Vacaville, California, notes the role of international peace building initiative Search for Common Ground in the background effort to send clerics, including The Rt. Rev. John Bryson Chane of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, to assist in the long effort of securing freedom for hikers Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer from imprisonment in Iran.
Current crop of Republican hopefuls is Danforth's embarrassment
John Danforth, who sat in the U.S. Senate for two decades on behalf of Missouri, and who was also an ambassador to the U.N., counts his priestly ordination to The Episcopal Church among his bona fides. Though a Republican, he's recognizable to the Stewart-Colbert crowd for rankling the ranks of the GOP on occasion.
Faith leader with Occupy Seattle tells his story
John Helmiere is the convener and Minister of Listening at Valley & Mountain Fellowship in Seattle. On his blog he's written "john's response to police brutality," detailing his recent arrest and overnight experience with Seattle police responding to Occupy protestors.
Sermon as proposal: preaching and the self-identified 'spiritual, but not religious'
Among its many merits, an article by Adam J. Copeland in the Lent 2012 issue of Journal for Preaching contains this poignant idea of how preachers might expand their thinking in consideration of those calling themselves "spiritual, but not religious" (SBNR).
Duke Chapel's dean: "stretched" and "humbled" while in Durham
In reflecting Tuesday evening on his seven years as dean of Duke Chapel, Sam Wells said his own faith was strengthened during his tenure and he hoped he pushed the chapel to engage more fully with the rest of campus and surrounding community.
Church in Wales reviews structure
Members and leaders of the Episcopal Church aren't the only ones thinking about restructuring in the service of mission. The Church in Wales has completed a top to bottom review process that examined the church's structure and ministry.
ACNS:
Discernment: revisited
Alban Institute is re-issuing Charles M. Olsen's and Danny Morris' Discerning God’s Will Together "with a new introduction and updating of the text. The cover is changed from a mosaic of three attentive sheep in the presence of the shepherd to three loping gazelles, indicating community and graceful, forward motion. But why? What have we learned over the fifteen years of attempting to practice discernment in leadership circles of congregations and assemblies? And why now? What still needs to be engaged and instilled?" Olsen writes:
Tom Ehrich: Boomers need to cede control to the young
Baby boomer Tom Ehrich believes many in his generation are "addicted to control" and should rightfully cede power to the younger set. This is true in political life, and also in our churches, he writes:
Are nice people killing churches?
Todd Rhodes and Paul Alexander think "nice people" are killing churches. Here are the top three items from a longer list:
Serve Christ Maybe: acolytes
An invitation to the 2013 Episcopal Diocese of West Texas Acolyte Festival, hosted by the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd, Corpus Christi, Texas, April 19-20, 2013. All youth acolytes, acolyte masters/directors are invited.
A bishop and a rabbi walked into a boardroom
Now that the Pope has begun his retirement, all eyes are on the conclave. But what is it really like to lead a religious denomination in the 21st century? WNYC-FM business reporter Ilya Marritz spoke to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori and Rabbi Rick Jacobs, President of the Union for Reform Judaism, to find out.
The N.R.A.'s political protection racket
Gabrielle Giffords writes poignantly in the New York Times of her anger and disappointment at the cowardice displayed by senators who voted yesterday against making it harder for criminals and the mentally ill to gain access to deadly firearms.
Seven "leadership paradigms" for church growth
On the one hand, one begins to wonder if the many factors that contribute to church growth can be captured in list form. On the other hand, folks seem to enjoy reading and discussing them, so one assumes they make some sort of contribution. Having engaged in sufficient equivocation, we present a new list, this one from Ron Edmondson on the seven paradigms necessary for church growth.
