Organizational Behaviour 101

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Organizational Behaviour 101

• A simple explanation of why congregations can
  feel the pressure to change.

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The Principle

• Every new church
• organizes itself internally to fulfill its goals
• and organizes itself relative to its external
  environment (the surrounding community) in a way
  to promote the churchs survival.

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Surviving in the Environment

• A new church wants to attract new people and
  grow! To create some attractiveness, Sunday
  morning has to be designed in a way that people
  find it meets their needs and feels meaningful.
  So the style of worship is chosen that feels
  right, a nice nursery is created, a Sunday
  school system put in place, and so on. When the
  church has things set up in a way people find
  attractive and meets their needs, they come.

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The idea as a picture

• In the beginning the church (the green circle) is
  organized to fulfill the congregations goals
  (the crossed arrows) .

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The idea as a picture

• and it is organized relative to the surrounding
  community in a way that the church not only
  survives, but thrives.

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The idea as a picture

• People are content that they have things just
  right. They focus on maintaining the system.

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However, things dont just remain the same

• The environment of the church (the surrounding
  community, and the culture of our society) is
  always shifting and changing

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However, things dont just remain the same

• and a congregation can find itself growing more
  and more out of step with the needs of people
  and what they find meaningful.
• This is called growing irrelevance. It
  threatens a churchs survival.

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Growing Irrelevance

• Think about our worship example. More and more
  people are looking for contemporary music, a down
  to earth preaching style that speaks to daily
  realities, a less formal approach

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Growing Irrelevance

• The congregation has been so focused on
  maintaining the worship service as it is that
  they have failed to notice the slow shift in our
  culture

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Growing Irrelevance

• and when they do notice, the gap has grown
  large enough that church members dont want to
  make the changes they now appear too radical.

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But shifts can happen inside the church too

• Initially the church organized its life
  internally to fulfill its goals well. Then,
  assuming the system would always fulfill the
  goals, the focus of people shifted away from the
  goal to maintenance.

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But shifts can happen inside the church too

• This can produce goal drift, which is also
  common to all organizations. The intense focus on
  what a church is doing shifts attention away from
  the purpose for what they are doing.

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Goal Drift

• Again, think about our worship example. Over time
  people can find the repetitive nature of the
  worship becoming more stale, and the constant
  need to maintain it can become more and more
  tedious

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Goal Drift

• The goal of meaningful worship can be eroded by
  a congregational focus on maintaining what once
  was thought to be meaningful.

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Growing Irrelevance and Goal Drift

• These two things can happen to any organization,
  including a church.
• They happen when people forget that.

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Growing Irrelevance and Goal Drift

• Churches organize internally to fulfill its goals
• and organize itself relative to its external
  environment (the surrounding community) in a way
  to promote the churchs survival.

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The Role of Leadership

• Leaders help their churches by reminding people
  that it is the fulfillment of the goals which is
  more important than maintaining established
  systems

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The Role of Leadership

• and that continued relevance helps a church to
  maintain a ministry to its wider community.

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The Questions

• How has your congregation experienced goal
  drift?
• How has your congregation experienced growing
  irrelevance?
• What original value remains upon which to build
  positive and lasting change?