Video Transcript: Learning the Culture

All right, so we've been talking about culture, just a reminder of how we got here to talk about culture. We're defining leadership as a leader with all of his strengths and all of his  weaknesses, interacts with a culture of a place, or a people or an organization, which basic  definition is how we do things here. And he interacts with them in order to define a vision or a preferable future. And as he defines that preferable future with them, He gives them the  impetus or the leadership in doing the planning, and the praying, and strategizing on how to  make that future a reality. So now we are into the idea of how do you learn the culture of a  place, you got to know where you are before you can know where you've got to go to a  preferable future? And last time I introduced this, this model here, espoused values,  observable artifacts and basic assumptions. Are those things that you'll see culture in, you'll  be able to identify Oh, yeah, that's, that's who this group of people are. Now. It's very  important. I told you the story of the pulpit in my previous church, that is an artifact. It was an artifact, that was something that was important, although I didn't know it's important. And so  you got to spend the time in order to get to know what are those important things that are  part of the culture that make up the culture. In fact, there's a story I don't know if it's true or  not. It's a story of The United Methodist Wesleyan pastor who was sent to serve in a small  church in a small rural town on the East Coast. And he went there. And he noted the first  thing he moved into the parsonage they had a place for the pastor to live. And he noted that  the church building had a two entrances, that's all it had. And the one was mostly blocked by  this fairly good sized tree that was sitting out there. The tree was so big, that that door could  hardly be used to get people in and out. And so he just thought, how stupid Why didn't  anybody cut this tree down before and without asking anybody without talking to anybody, he loved to do this sort of thing, owned his own chainsaw. So he got out there cut down the tree.  And wasn't long before some people from the church stopped by, they were horrified. Turns  out that that tree was called the Wesley tree. And according to legend, John Wesley himself  had planted that tree, on one of his visits to the United States back in the 1700s. And so it  was a very important artifact as far as identifying who they are. And because he didn't find  the time or take the time to get to know that culture, he committed a major faux pas, and  within a week, he was out of there, they, the church would not stand for his presence there.  That's the kind of thing about artifact, it's something important espoused values. Now  espoused values in other words are the ones that are spoken. That's a little tricky. Because a  few years ago, in business, it was very important that you define your core values. And I'm  going to walk you through a process in order to do that. But one of the challenges of defining  your core values is that sometimes they go into a drawer somewhere, nobody reads them  again. And so you have to ask, well, you know, what are your values in this place? And that's  a fascinating thing you'll do that with will do that with mission and vision statements as well,  if you just go around and ask some people what your mission statement, and you know,  people wrote it down some time. But they couldn't remember it at all. I mean, when I came to  the church, I just completed serving as okay, what are the values of this place? And they  couldn't articulate them? What's the vision of this place? What's the mission of this place,  couldn't articulate them, even though they were written down somewhere, they were written  down, and they were put aside that often happens with values. And so values are in the  process of changing all the time. And so how do you define what they are now it's a very  important thing to define what they are now. And then basic assumptions, underlying often  unconscious, things that determine the organization's attitudes, thought processes, and  actions. These are the things that define a place, but they are assumptions about life, my one  son-in-law is a structural engineer. And when he graduated from Washington University in St.  Louis, with his master's degree, he went to work for an organization that designs schools and  as a structural engineer, he was needed in that kind of situation. And so he went to work for  this company that was owned by somebody in their 80s, who was still working every day 80  plus years old. And there were basic assumptions about how work should be conducted by the owner, and therefore those values were filtered down to everybody in the organization, a  values such as an assumption rather that you can't be trusted to put in your time. And so  they had a 7:59am starting time in this business, and everybody was expected to be there at  7:59. And at eight o'clock one minute late, the doors were locked and you'd miss a day's pay, 

if you didn't show up by eight o'clock, because it was assumed that you've got to be watched. And your break time was very carefully controlled, and etc. Now for a millennial, that's a  horrible thing to have happened to you. Dress was very important, they had a value on  presenting themselves positively to their customers, but also to each other. And the chairman would talk about, you know, how you were dressed, and how you dress reflects to you. And so every day, they wore a suit and tie. That's how they worked. All those kind of restrictions in  their life. Now, my son-in-law worked there for just a few months. And he was offered a job by  another organization understood the assumptions of a millennial. And so they gave him  freedom to flex his time. In other words, he makes as he puts in his time at work. And he's got to make some time for meeting with other people on significant projects. But he's sometimes  starts work at 5:30 in the morning, so that he can be home by the time the kids come home  from school. So he's not on a clock. But it's understood that he's going to put in his time  during that time, how he dresses, as long as they're not meeting customers, you can dress  fairly casual, it's kind of business casual, which is khakis, or colored jeans or something like  that, and a collared shirt. But it's a casual kind of setting where people are encouraged to  interact with each other. And they do team building exercises, to get to know each other and  that sort of thing. But that starts with a basic assumption about what it's like, as we talked  about last time to work in a millennial generation, and those other people have those other  people that they want to attract. And so they created created a value system that will allow  people like that to feel comfortable there. Now, all of that goes into the culture. So espoused  values, basic assumptions, observable artifacts. So how in the world do you go about finding  what the culture is like where you are. But we're going to talk about learning a cultural  process. First step is to listen. Just to listen to how people talk, listen to what they talk about.  Listen to how they handle conflict, if there is conflict, and maybe if there isn't, that says  something about the organization as well, maybe positively, maybe negatively. But listening  to what is the language that this group uses, is there laughter in the place. Now, it's not one  of our value systems in our church. But one of the things we value that's a staff was the fact  that we have fun together, we'd all go out and have fun, fun working together, we enjoy  working together. And that comes through. And if somebody came in, that's one of the things  I had a consultant come in, and help us with some staff things a few years back, and one of  the things he says is you know what people like to work here, there's a joy that infuses the  place, if you can find all that stuff out, by listening. Secondly, do a values exercise. Now.  There may be a written statement of values, throw that out, and start over again, gather  some leaders together key leaders, and just begin to ask them questions. What are the ideal  behaviors in this place? What does it mean to be a part of this organization? What does it  mean to be part of this church? What? What is important to this church? And what is  important to how people treat each other in this church? And what kind of skills are needed in this organization in order to thrive? You know, how do people fail? In this organization? How  do you deal with those sorts of things? How do you deal with each other? How do you really  want to just talk about those things and then say, what is really important? What defines who  we are and what we are about? And what are our greatest strengths? That's just some of the  key questions to ask with a group of leaders. And it's a fascinating thing, what will come out,  you'll come out with a listing of values that that will be long and large, because it this is fun  stuff for them to talk about. They're talking about their place. And you say, what is it? What is  this place really all about? If you put that down in one phrase, what is it all about? Now in the  church that I've just finished serving? One of the joyous things I learned early on As I listened  to people, and then we actually did a values exercise is that the number one thing on our list  was grace, that we would be a place of grace. Now, the church has not always been known to  be a place of grace. In fact, many people in our congregation had been burned in previous  churches where they'd gotten a divorce. And as a result, they were kind of blacklisted in the  congregation, or they were, in one case, excommunicated in a previous church, because they  did this great sin. People are struggling with sin. We're having a difficult time fitting in. You  know I told you about the John Fisher kind of situation where you know, that 12 steps for the  recovering Pharisee that if you're part of a typical church in the United States, you have to  recognize you're a sinner to get in. But boy, you never admit any sin after that, because what 

will people say? And so as a result, we're not very much a place of grace. But one of my  powerful memories, as a child was having a woman stand up in the congregation in a worship  service. Now, she had to confess, church leaders said this had to be a public confession. And  it was a confession that she had committed a sin against the Seventh Commandment, You  shall not commit adultery, she was pregnant. And she and her boyfriend and engaged in  sexual intimacy, they were not married. And as a result, they made her stand up, which is,  you know, that's a whole thing about that culture and interesting culture. But the idea of  grace, then there was forgiveness offered, but it was hard, because so many people said, Wait a minute. What about those who are greedy? What about those who are cheating in their  business situation, what about and so it was an odd feeling. But what I remember most as a  small kid tagging along with my mother is that this poor woman, young woman, was standing  by herself after the worship service, it was like, nobody wanted to get near her because she  was an admitted sinner. And maybe they were just uncomfortable that they didn't know what  to say to her, my mother went to her gave for a big hug. And I remember her saying, as I'm  sitting next to her six years old, something like that saying, Well, I guess it's just you two, we  just we two here we're the sinners. And I didn't find out till almost 30 years later, that my  mother was pregnant when she got married. And so she understood what this a woman was  dealing with, and was able to engage in it and offer her grace and forgiveness and love. Now,  I've shared with you something about my failure in previous churches, and when I came to  this congregation, they lived out that value of grace. In other words, we're not going to judge  people for where they have been or what they've done, or what they're dealing with. Rather,  we are going to be an avenue and channel of God's love and grace and mercy to people. And  so we get people in that church, who are dealing with drug addiction, we've got some who  have conquered, who conquered alcohol addiction, we got some who aren't. In fact, my wife  one Sunday was in the bathroom and came out and says, you know, somebody has been  smoking marijuana in there. And she looked around and was able to identify who it was, at  least, I'm fairly certain who it was. So well, they're here, at least, we had a man knows, got to  do his funeral, but as an alcoholic, and eventually drank himself to death to never conquer  that addiction of alcohol, but he could come to our church and he could be received and  loved, and he could be encouraged to do more. And on the other hand, we had a guy there  who had gotten a 50 year pin from Alcoholics Anonymous, because he was sober for 50 years. But he could come in and say, Yeah, I'm an alcoholic, but I fit here, I belong here. We had ex convicts, people who had been in jail for sexual sins against children. And they could find a  place there. Now, of course, we created a safety net for the children as far as interaction and  all that sort of thing. But saying, we're all broken, we've all failed, we all sin, and so they said  ah grace, that's got to be number one on the list. After that, there came you know, things like  Bible teaching, and commitment to spiritual growth and discipleship and those sorts of things. But that's those kind of values, that those are the things that come up, who are we really at  our core? What does it mean to be part of this congregation? Now, values come in two  different styles, you should know that there is a value that you state sometimes people will  say it, say it but you know, it's not true. It's an aspirational value. In other words, they wish it  was true. Many, many years ago, I was working with a church and they said, you know, we  want we are a welcoming congregation. We are here our value is to have people come in and  we're going to enfold them. But then you look at their practices and you say it's not your  value. Because there was no place when people came in to identify them as visitors, there  was no place they could go to get for information. There was nothing that was said to them,  we found that there were people who met the people that they knew after the worship  service, they wouldn't meet new people, because they were just comfortable those new  people. And we found that the community we were in was a fairly middle to lower middle  class. And yet the church was upper middle class. And so you've got Cadillacs and Lexus cars  in the parking lot and a big SUVs that are fairly new, and somebody coming in an old jalopy  didn't fit, etc, etc. And so and they had this horrible designation, they'd had some people join  the church, but one of the things they would say about them and say, Oh, that's a community  person. In other words, they're not really us, but a community person, a project, somebody to  work on, to hopefully make him like him or her like us. And so it was a good value. And they 

made some powerful changes in order to address those issues. But when somebody said that, you know, our value is welcoming people. And as they started discussing it, they realized,  that's not really our value, our value is feeling safe, our value is feeling comfortable. And if  these people come in, we'll be nice to them. But it isn't letting them come in and fit. And yet,  you know, they made the changes necessary. And they were able to do it so aspirational and  real values. Sometimes that becomes a definition that you've got to work with. As you work  through values, somebody will say something, and the group will have to discuss, is that  really a value? So you do the values exercise, you get people together to talk about who? Who are we really, what are we really about here as a congregation? What is the essence of who  we are? What would it be like to fail here? What? What does that what are our greatest  strengths, then you take those values, and you group them. For instance, if you get a bunch  of values that are like, like honesty, you know, we're committed to being honest with each  other are committed to have integrity with each other, we're committed to treating each  other respectfully, etc. You might put all those under a rubric of truthful or something like  that, if you try to group them, and define the central, group them into similar areas, such that  you don't have 400 on the list. And then you define the central themes. What is essential?  What's unique about us, what makes us who we are? So that's the next step, then you create  the list. And you come back with the same group of people. And you check and say, Is this  true? Is this what we said? And then when they agree, and they prioritize them in some way,  then you word them? Well, you try to find an interesting way to word them so that people so  that they will be memorable for people, for instance, the one that's listed there, deliver Wow,  through services Zappos value statement, their number one value statement is that they are  about service, they are about serving you. They only sell online, they don't have a store, but  they're going to create a wow experience through service. Now that creates an image, right,  and you know that if your deal was Apple's who can expect high quality service, because  that's who they are, at their core, the core of their being, and it's that kind of thing, you you  word them well, and your word them in my ways that evoke emotion, that tie you into  people's feelings. When we get into change processes, we're going to find the feelings of  people are very important when you're trying to create change, because people will go with  their feelings more than they will go with their reasons. So in wording, a value statement, you  have to create something that creates that kind of sense of oh, I can connect with that I gave  me in using a word like wow, in a value statement is important because it says it this is  exciting. It's exciting to do it. And if you're working at Zappo's, you know, that's what you're  about, this is what we're doing. So that's all part of the value process and you put them to the test. You try it out with a larger group, not just the key leaders now but with others, you begin  to maybe do some focus groups or you invite people in or you go to people or send your, your elders or leaders out to meet with various people in small groups of your church to small  groups to talk about, we've been talking about this, what do you think, is this true of us and  then take their information back and write them out? And so that's a process to create a  values list. What are your core values? Who are you at the core of your being? So you listen.  You do a values exercise? And then do a culture walk? You know, how is space allocated? Who  gets what office and why? What's the signage like what is assumed about the people who  would come into your business or be served by your business or come into your church or be  served by your church. The problem is, in doing this is that sometimes we get very  comfortable where we are. Andy's family church leader at NorthPoint church in Georgia says  that, you know, it's kind of like an old couch. If you live in the house, and you have this old  couch, you just become so comfortable with it, you just, that's who you are. That's how you  how you live, it's your couch, you don't even notice that it's getting old, you don't even notice that it's getting ratty. Because that's just been there, it's been there forever. Had some of that experience. When I went to the church, I served first in California, the first building. And we  got a group of people starting to think about culture. And one of the things they did is they  walked into our worship area. Now there were a lot of assumptions made by those who had  built that building back in 1971. One of their assumptions was that they never wanted to grow bigger than 450 people. And so that would be about 100 to 150 families could meet in that  church. And so they designed the building so that it couldn't be grown beyond that, we had 

three different architects trying to create a way to effectively expand that building before we  decided to relocate. And they planned well, the idea was, well, once once they got that big,  that's all they wanted to do, and other churches could start, but that's what they were going  to do. And so there was that assumption, there was an assumption that if you came in, you  didn't really care how things looked. And so the walls were just like cinderblock plain  cinderblock going around, and nothing fancy about them all. And they had a wonderful  statement and in the dedication ceremony that I found in a file, and that was that, you know,  those that rough, rough brick just reflects the roughness of who we are. But the reality was,  they were cheap. At least that was my interpretation. And so that was an assumption. They  had an assumption about the pews. The church was built in a time when orange was a  popular color. I had a friend come in and walk through. And they said, woah look at this, it was it was kind of dirt, brown carpeting, and pews with a bright orange kind of covering, they were comfortable, but bright orange. And I was told by this person I had invited in his and  knowledge of how you do this sort of thing. They said, You know those that color orange was  popular in 1971 and 1972. That's it. So anybody who walks in who's not aware of that color,  was not aware of who we are beyond seeing what we are discerning some values there. And  the value is that we're really going to just be ourselves and we aren't going to look, we're  gonna do a thing to make you feel more welcome, we aren't going to do a thing to make you  feel relevant. Turns out our sound equipment was just a horrendous thing. For people who  came with large sound equipment. In fact as one person put it, you know, the Beatles had  better. We had better sound systems in our homes at that time than the Beatles recorded  their most famous songs on and you come into our church and the sound system was terrible. And so the underlying assumption is, this church is for us it's comfortable for us is not for  people who come in. And so there are all these kinds of assumptions that we had to walk  through. We said we're about welcoming people, similar to the church I described earlier. But  if you walked in, you wouldn't find a sign anywhere that would tell you, where are the  bathrooms? Where do you bring children? If you came in with three children? Where do you  go with those children? How do you get those children checked into the appropriate age group class? You know what's going to happen in worship, how's that? There all kinds of  assumptions that we were about welcoming people when we weren't. And so we had to go  through these values exercise of creating the values, and then listening to people but also  doing the culture walk to say, Wow, now that we've got some of these values defined, is that  lived out of the way we use our space? Is it lived out in the way we create things here? What  is important, and so that became part of the plans. And then it's just a picture of the church I  just completed serving. Now, if I could be with you, that's the disadvantage of doing these  classes online like this. If I could be with you, maybe meeting in a church we'd take we would  take a walk a culture walk and say what do we know about this particular church, this  particular congregation as a result of simply looking at their space and what they do within  this space. This is the entryway to the church I just completed serving now, there are several  things that you will notice about the values of that congregation. One is you'll notice it's a  cement floor, there's no carpeting. And so there's a value on being simple. And, you know,  you might call it cheap. But I know from serving that congregation for 11 years that it was  being simple, if you walked into the Worship Center, you'd find cement floor, and you'd find  plastic chairs, that we sit on to worship. Now the idea there was we wanted to create a place  where anyone could feel welcome. You didn't have to create a beautiful spot for people, it was functionally very attractive. And in our culture, now that it's changing. Turned out it's very  effective practice to have this old brick, but this was an old Piano Factory. And so you come in, you find a wide open space. And if you came in on a Sunday morning, at about 8:30, you'd  find people starting to gather you find people praying with each other, and for each other,  you'd find coffee on and there's a there's an atmosphere as the worship team is practicing.  And, and there's a sense of yeah, it's good to be here, you'd find here, no signage, apparently, the signage was removed. I don't know if this was a special event that day. But you'll notice  the reference to our mission statement, which is taking the next step. Our mission statement  we'll get into later is, you know, we exist to encourage each other, to help each other take the next step in our relationship with Jesus Christ. And so things were used to refer to that 

signage like that preparing the upper rooms, I think this was a Bible school experience where  we had kids in. And so that idea of working on the upper room that where Jesus had his last  meal with his disciples, so this is probably a message that was given to kids in their situation,  that communion kind of experience of the Last Supper, the Lord's Supper, you'll notice that  that that the beams are just beams, the heating ducts are obviously visual, you'll notice  there's some tables out with material on them. If you went just to the left of this picture, you  would find our welcome area. We have a large section there. It's a large booth and there are  trained people in there. And there are people that are ready to help you with that whatever  question you might ask. We do have signage that exists on poles and various places. But later after this picture was taken, we put in some stuff because our second floor is a youth ministry  area. And so our skilled men in the church built an arrow that flashes that goes up, that says  young youth, middle school, high school are up here, up here, up here, and a flashes all along  that stairwell that you see there. That stairwell was added during one of our expansion  experiences. And it's made out of the beams of one of those old buildings that was nearby  that was torn down. And we managed to rescue the beams so that we could have a similar  kind of experience. So just an idea of a cultural walk, it's, it's very little, but it's that kind of  thing, you start looking for what are important, what is important to the people who are here.  So you do the culture walk then also culture interviews, you learn the history of people, get  some of those people together and hear the stories and who are the heroes in this place?  Who are the people who made this place what it is? What are significant events in the life of  this place? I used to do an exercise where I would give people just a quick outline of the  history of the church. And did this in retreat several times in consulting kind of situations as  well. And have them write very quickly a short life history of that church. And they often go  with the pastors who are the pastors, but other than that they'll do a deal with crises except  for the beginning. Wow, how did this begin? And what was the vision that this church began  with? Who lives at church I just served it was incredible statement that they started together  because they saw that there weren't churches in the community where anyone could feel  welcome. And so they decided that they were going to create that church. They started out in  a room in the YMCA that they rented every week. And when the YMCA couldn't let them in, or  couldn't continue to accommodate them on a Sunday morning, they ended up renting this  decrepit old building that was the Piano Factory. They rented it from the owner. And the place  was in such bad condition that when it would rain it would leak water down from the third  floor down to the first floor and so they'd have pails collecting the water during their worship  services with washcloths in the in the pail so that they wouldn't make a plink, plink, plink,  plink, plink noise when the raindrops would drop in there. And they'd tell these stories, but  they tell the story of the heroes, that first pastor who came and and just went the extra mile  to make things happen. about some of the original members who were just passionate about  receiving anyone, at any time, who could have a vast variety of ages in the group as well as  life experience as well as socio economic level as far as racial level, racial experience, ethnic  backgrounds, all of that. How do you create that you heard about the heroes, how those kinds of situations, and I become part of that history. If you were to come to that church today, they would tell you something about when I came, because it was a miraculous story of how God  called me into that congregation at that time. And yeah, so history to ask questions of people  as you get them, not the key leaders necessarily, but anybody in the congregation has been  there a long time, what would you say? What would you say, are the most important events in the life of this church? What would you say this church is all about? What would you change?  If you could change one thing about this church? What would it be? What kind of people fail to fit in here, just do culture interviews like that, you do those things, and you're going to have a  pretty good idea about what the culture of the organization is. Now, last year, we realized that we had become a little loose with affirming our values. And so I took the staff through a  process of talking about what are going to be our staff values. Now we had a staff of 20, 21,  22 people at various times during the year. And so we got them together. And we just had a  conversation using this process, these steps. And then I would take them each time, and it  took several months, but I would take what we had talked about. And I would go back and  reformulate it and come back. And then I talked to the people in worship and arts because 

they were much more creative than I and just want to show you as an example. The results,  here are the values at Covenant Life Church of the staff. One is we take it personally. In other  words, we're going to give our best to minister to the CLC family, we have a commitment to  the mission of CLC. And we are living that out in our own lives. Now this becomes a statement that becomes part of our evaluation process every year. How are you taking it personally?  How are you living out the value of helping each other take on the mission of helping each  other take the next step in Jesus Christ? What steps have you taken in this past year to grow  in your faith? We continuously grow as the second one we evaluate regularly, and we're  making improvements in our ministry striving for excellence. So in other words, we don't just  let ministries run but every year we go through a process by which we evaluate those  ministries and and we want to grow our ministries toward excellence. We collaborate, we see  ministry as a team effort, and we'll go beyond our job description to serve and to help each  other succeed. And so when we have budget discussions, it's not about you know, oil, if you  get that much that I can't have as much for my ministry, it's, it's what are we doing together?  Let's talk about the big picture. And what what ministry do we have together? And what does  that mean to have ministry together? And one of the questions we ask at evaluation time is  simply when have you served somebody else on staff? When have you engaged in their  ministry? When is the worship guy been helping out in our children's ministry, when have  other people been helping out in worship to help out the worship ministry when there was  some big event going on? Humility is key. We're not competing with each other. It's not our  agenda that is important. But it's God's agenda that's important. And so part of our key value  is humility. And we talk about how do we live that out, because it's tough because sometimes  we like to be. We like to be the ones who get the attention. And we're saying, No, we're not  going to do that. It's our value, slightly an aspirational value. But it's our value that we call  ourselves back to a we focus outward will keep in mind the 16,000 people in our immediate  area that are unchurched as we plan and pray. So we don't want to become ingrown. But we  always want to be doing things that focus on the fact that people need to know Jesus Christ in our immediate community. And we value Grace together. As we value grace in the church, we  will treat each other with respect, forgiveness, and care. And we've had opportunities, many  opportunities to live that out, as we've had staff members who had major moral failures, and  yet we were able to treat them with grace, in many cases, not all, restore them to ministry  over a period of time, because we got to see them, responding to God's grace in a positive  way, and our grace as well. So that's an important part of defining your culture. You know,  learn the values, learn the history, learn the experiences that the church has been through  that has made it what it is, look at the physical structure and see who they are and and and  how the essence of who they are as lived out and how they allocate space. And you'll be a  long way down the leadership path. Next time we're going to talk a little bit about creating  your own personal set of values. And it's kind of an aside from this leadership discussion, but  an important one because your personal value system has to mesh with the value system of  the organization that you work in or work with. And so next time, that's the agenda, see you  then