Business Operators and Ministry Directors…Same Difference

Yesterday our Director/Team Leaders and BCFS Leadership Team met to discuss a new paradigm for strategic planning and budget development for 2009. It was an exciting time of fellowship, learning, and preparing for the time of the year when we develop our budgets for the coming year. Kenton Keller and Melissa Opheim did an excellent job of leading these sessions.

I started off the meeting with a view toward stewardship. I started by critiquing the perspective that ministry and business do not mix. It is a false dichotomy that pastors use to keep business leaders at arms-length and a number of other tactics that say “stay in your area of expertise.” I reminded the group that Jesus was a leader and a business entrepreneur. He was Joseph the carpenter’s son. Presumably Jesus would learn his father’s trade and be trained in the vocational field of his father. Ok, here is the question: Do you really believe Jesus gave away all the furniture he made, the houses he may have built? I doubt it. What about the followers he chose as his disciples? For the most part they were businessmen like the two brothers (James and John Sons of Zebedee as found in Luke 5) who worked in their father’s fishing business as well as Simon Peter their fishing partner. Jesus even recruited an IRS agent as his finance manager. Most of Jesus’ teachings were on the subject of money or had an economic theme such as the parable of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin, the Lost Son, the Shrewd Manager, the Sower, the Weeds, the Net, and the Talents.

The Apostle Paul understood this for he himself was a tentmaker. In Acts 16:31 he answered the Jailer’s question: “What must I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved, you and your household.” The word for household in Koine Greek is Oikos. Oikos is a root word in Greek whereby we derive a range of business related terms such as possession, belonging, dwelling, builder, architect, construction, steward, manager, accountant, administration, and provision. The basic idea of the root word is a “realm of management or supervision over resources.” Paul even pointed to the work of agri-business as a vocation that would provide for great insight to the ministry of discipleship (2 Timothy 2:1-7).

All this to say that I encouraged our team to think like ministry leaders and business operators (not either or) since they are working with a specific ministry area of responsibility, a management area, an Oikos. I invited them to use their creativity, innovation, imagination, and skill to discover cost efficiencies and ways to develop new sources of financial support in their area of responsibility.

We will expect our site Director/Team Leaders to strengthen their work and position the ministry for growth in the coming year using methods like cost recovery, cost efficiencies, human resource re-alignment, and new resource support at the local level. Rather than a top-down flow we are working from the bottom up. We looked at service offerings by location and new metrics for evaluation. Our Director/Team leaders have been commissioned to creatively plan for the future. I can hardly wait to see what they come up with for 2009. Ministry Director or Business Operator? Same difference.

Comments

[Melissa Opheim]

Dr. Reyes:
Thank you for your encouragement and support of the annual planning process. It is always a pleasure to have our staff come together to plan for the future of Buckner. I am looking forward to working with the ideas and information that will gathered and submitted by our team leaders and directors. I know that they will have great ideas for new and creative ways to continue to impact the lives of the children, families and communities we serve. Thank you for your leadership.

[Paula Smith]

Dr. Reyes,
Thanks to you and the executive team for the strategy and planning session. I feel that the direction and destination for 2009 has been thoughtfully determined and the operational teams can now envision and build the road to take us there. Melissa and Kenton were exceptionally well-prepared. Their leadership abilities are apparent. Thanks to them.

[Mark Hayes]

This was my first Buckner strategic planning meeting. I have to say I was impressed with the focus not only on delivering quality services that impact lives but also on the stewardship of how we acquire and spend the finances it takes to deliver such services. The proposed strategies for collecting and tracking data on these things appear right on target for providing the kind of information leaders need to keep our ministries to children and families going and growing. A big thanks to all of you who keep us in the field going with your “corporate office” work! Also, as I read Scripture, ministry/spirituality/discipleship is not another category distinct or separate from stewardship and business matters. Rather, stewardship and business (and all parts of our lives) are areas in which we are called to be faithful and bring under the Lordship of Christ, and that this then is our spirituality/discipleship/ministry. May God bless our efforts to be faithful stewards of ministry to children and families.

[Albert Reyes]

Melissa, you did a great job facilitating this event. From my view, the process seems to improve each year. I am very encouraged to engage our leaders in this. I look forward to seeing how the Lord will speak collectively and individually as we shore up our stewardship for the coming year.

[Albert Reyes]

Paula, it was so good to see you at the meeting this week. I was encouraged by your enthusiasm and willingness to think creatively. Thanks for your leadership. Kenton and Melissa did an awesome job!

[Albert Reyes]

Mark, thanks for your note. I am encouraged this was a good experience for you, espeically since it was your first experience in our planning sessions. Our lives tend to become an integrated whole rather than psuedo-compartments. Thanks for underlining that thought. Let's stay in touch. Let us know what we can do to help you succeed in this process.