Ministries are not free to join. Perhaps there's no monetary charge but I promise you it costs everyone something to join.

Here's a sample of "hidden" costs of someone joining your ministry:

• Social Status: it was humbling for me to admit that the movement I led four years ago was not as socially mature as I wanted, and much less social than the average student. Yet for new students with social skills it certainly cost them to stay involved--the cost was many awkward interactions and conversations.

• Linguistics: does your ministry have lots of insider language? or are most of your students from church backgrounds, which has its own language? one of our key target audiences at Chico State is non-believers with a limited church background. these students often spend mental energy "translating" at our events.

• Free time: as someone who manages time really well, it can drive me crazy sometimes to hear what students spend their time on. however to expect that they would manage their time the ...

More »

Leave a Comment

My team at Chico State finished our Fall Semester on campus with some evaluation and planning for the upcoming Spring semester.

I made a short screencast on how to use Google Wave to lead a team meeting because it really did add some value to our time that traditional documents cannot and was fun for us as a team to try something new. Let me know what you think!

Leave a Comment

"I greatly dislike Campus Crusade for Christ, and unfortunately my sister’s experience with them was no better than my own freshman year. Besides being in-your-face obnoxious and a bit too extreme...they are absolutely failing in their representation of Christians." --from a blog post I found through my google alerts

ouch.

This person has taken the time to blog their experience. How would you respond if they were from your campus or this was your ministry they were talking about? 

I can only see more of this happening in the future as more and more students use blogs or facebook notes to communicate their experiences.

I see posts such as these as great opportunities to extend and shape conversations that previously were impossible to have offline.

How have you engaged the issue of online transparency?

How much of your ministry is in the public view online and to what level are you engaging those who are talking about you or your ministry, both positively and negatively?

photo c...

More »

Leave a Comment

If you have yet to take a look at Colin Powell's presentation on leadership you're missing out.

I've pulled some quotes out but the entire presentation is just twenty slides long.

Here are some of my faves:

"But as companies get bigger they often forget what got them there: things like all-hands involvement, egalitarianism, informality, market intimacy, daring, risk, speed and agility."

"All the great ideas and visions in the world are worthless if they aren't implemented rapidly and efficiently."

"If you ask enough people for permission you'll inevitably come up against someone who believes its his job to say 'no.'"

Leave a Comment

"Value exists externally—what’s happening outside the business has more value than what’s going on inside." --Lane Becker

Lane shared this thought at Web 2.0 Expo NY during his seminar "The New Customer Landscape." This inversion of value represents one of the most significant shifts between Millenials and their predecessors. Within Campus Crusade I would say this is perhaps the second greatest challenge to leading up (leading those who have more power or a larger title) in my organization.

The previous assumption has been that what's being said/produced INSIDE the organization is dramatically more valuable than outside. Social online networks and online publishing platforms have radically changed this.

An even worse assumption to hold than value existing internally is that control is maintained through silence. That staying off channels such as facebook or blogs will someone silence or prevent conversations from going on.

With more and more new Campus Crusade staff membe...

More »

Leave a Comment