change dyamics

1. within a congregation change dyamics Terri Martinson Elton Luther Seminary terrielton.com

2. Folk tale

3. Change is Natural! • Name things that change! • What happens when things do not change?

4. Dealing with Change #1 Personally! • Change Exercise! • How do you deal with change? • Share with a partner one time you dealt very well with leading a change process and one time you did not deal very well with a change process.

5. Dealing with Change • What is your Change Style? • Conserver • Pragmatist • Originator

6. Dealing with Change • Conserver • Place high value on structure. • Prefer current situation over unknown. • Goal: better utilize resources while preserving structure. • Like change to be gradual and within current reality. • Enjoy predictability and honor tradition. • Know the rules and follow them. • See details. • Prefer tested/proven solutions.

7. Dealing with Change • Pragmatist • Functional change. • Prefer to explore existing paradigm. • Goal: practical, workable outcomes. • Appear practical, agreeable and flexible. • More focused on results than structure. • Appear more team oriented and are often mediators. • Will change assumptions if assumptions are blocking outcomes.

8. Dealing with Change • Originator • Reengineering. • Prefer fast and radical approach to change. • Goal: challenge structure and open to fast, fundamentally different, even systematic change. • Appear undisciplined and unconventional. • Enjoy risk and uncertainty. • Appear to be visionary and systematic in their thinking. • Make up the rules as they go and value future possibilities. • Promoters of innovation.

9. What does a theological view of change look like? Acts 10:9-16 What does this text say about change? Theological view of Change #2 9 About noon the next day, as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. 10 He became hungry and wanted something to eat; and while it was being prepared, he fell into a trance. 11 He saw the heaven opened and something like a large sheet coming down, being lowered to the ground by its four corners. 12 In it were all kinds of four-footed creatures and reptiles and birds of the air. 13 Then he heard a voice saying, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.”14 But Peter said, “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is profane or unclean.”15 The voice said to him again, a second time, “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.”16 This happened three times, and the thing was suddenly taken up to heaven.

10. Theological view of Change • Overall biblical view… • Genesis 1 • Exodus 20 • Promised Land • Gospels • Acts/letters • Revelation

11. What does a theological view of change look like? What theological resources do we have to drawn from when dealing with change? Have you developed your own theology of change? Theological view of Change

12. Dealing with Change #3 Theoretically • Not all change is the same • How can theories about change help us lead change?

13. 1. At the core… Two Types of Change exist: Adaptive and Technical

14. Adaptive vs Technical Change Ronald Heifetz in Leadership without Easy Answers • Technical situations are when “a problem can be clearly defined and a solution can be clearly applied.” • Adaptive situationsrequire learning and arise when our deeply held beliefs are challenged. Leading Change in the Congregation, p. 42-43.

15. Adaptive vs Technical Change One of the first questions leaders need to ask when facing change and conflict is What type of situation is this? Adaptive or technical? List issues that are adaptive. List issues that are technical.

16. Change vs Transition Change is an event, transition is a process! Most often when we speak about change, we are referring to the process of transition!

17. 2. Change as Transition William Bridges highlights three stages… • Letting Go – sadness, fright, depression, grief • Neutral Zone – high anxiety, lowered motivation, self-doubt, lowered energy, disoriented, polarization, confusion, uncertainty • New Beginnings – new understandings, values, attitudes, identities, finality of the past, risk, pressure, accountability, stress

18. 3. LifeCycle Theory • Organizations are born, grow, age, and die. At each stage of development, certain challenges must be overcome is the organization is to survive and thrive. • Thriving as an organization depends not only upon how it deals with its internal change, but also how the organization deals with the external change around it.

19. "Social institutions and movements have a natural life cycle that parallels our human development... Normally, one thinks in terms of 25-40 years for a neighborhood life cycle. Neighborhoods change because over time the demography, land use, economic and social networks of an area change. More often than not, the same changes that affect a neighborhood also affect the local churches which are a part of that neighborhood.“ Explorer #53, an e-publication of Leadership Network

20. LifeCycle Theory Effectiveness

21. LifeCycle Theory Ministry Structure Nostalgia Goals Questioning Beliefs Polarization The Dream Dropout Leading Change in the Congregation p. 135. Where do you see your congregation?

22. 4. Change as Conflict Discover your Conflict Management Style Two Goals: • Help people learn about the range of conflict-management strategies and how each works. • Help people identity their own preferred styles of conflict managements and to consider using other styles.

23. Six Styles • Persuading • Compelling • Avoiding/Accommodating • Collaborating • Negotiating • Supporting

24. 5. Changing culture – leading change John Kotter of Harvard Business School • The 8 mistakes of working the process of change: • Allowing too much complacency. • Failing to create a sufficiently powerful guiding coalition. • Underestimating the power of the vision. • Undercommunicating the vision by a factor of 10 (or perhaps 100 or more). • Permitting obstacles to block the new vision. • Failing to create short-term wins. • Declaring victory too soon. • Neglecting to anchor changes firmly in the corporate culture.

25. Leading Change John Kotter of Harvard Business School The 8 stage process of change: • Establishing a sense of Urgency. • Creating a guiding coalition. • Developing a vision and strategy. • Communicating the change vision. • Empowering Broad-based Action. • Generating Short-term wins. • Consolidating Gains and producing more change. • Anchoring new approaches in the culture.

26. 6. Change as Innovation Everett Rogers’ work. • “Diffusion of innovation is ‘the process by which an innovation is communicated through certain channels over time among the members of a social system.” see website print out, Diffusion of Innovation, accessed 5.24.06 www.ciaadvertising.org/studies/student/99_fall/theory/millman/Diffusion.htm

27. Innovation • Innovation is used generally to mean “an item, thought, or process that is new.” Diffusion “is the process by which innovations spread from one locale or one social group to another.” (see above citing.)

28. 7. The complexity of change! Change viewed as a system. Closed systems Vs Open systems Has all it needs vs. Needs the environment

29. |Congregations as open systems!| Inputs Outputs Those things that The influences and resources Influence and resource the organization wants to put The organization – into the environment – in Known or unknown, order to carry out its mission Wanted or unwanted and contribution to society. Feedback Information generated within an organization by the mere fact it’s operating. Much information is lost, because people do not pay attention to it. But much can be gained from created feedback loops. Leading the Congregation by Norman Shawchuck and Roger Heuser. Pages 209 and 214.

30. …within systems! Organizational systems live within other systems! • Culture • Social Physical • Structure Structure • Technology • Organization • Environment Reflect on how these systems impact congregational systems. Mary Jo Hatch, Organization Theory: Modern, Symbolic, and Postmodern Perspectives, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997) 15.

31. …and voluntary systems In addition to the being systems, Congregations have another component that makes them complex – the fact that they are volunteer organization – meaning they have to “recruit” their own resources for survival, including people, money, buildings, knowledge, etc – but they are also called, by their very nature, to be counter cultural from society.

32. …and counter-cultural systems! Congregations are called to proclaim the gospel! Being disciples or faithful followers of Jesus – is counter-cultural!

33. When we tend to the process of change, it is important to address it systematically. What is going on? And how are other parts of the system impacted?

34. Leading Congregations in Mission Nessan and Cook Everist’s work, Transforming Leadership • 10 practices of congregations in mission • Forming and serving a trusting environment • Drawing on the deep values of the people • Imagining God’s future together • Identifying the assets of the congregation and employing them • Understanding congregational systems and certainty of avoidance behavior

35. Leading Congregations in Mission 10 practices of congregations in mission cont… • Maintaining sufficient differentiation to see the big picture through a support system beyond the congregation • Intentional focus on appreciating and developing the leadership of others • Engaging transforming leadership is hard work • Accompanying this people over time • Remaining rooted in the Gospel above all things

36. The Missional Change Model commitment experiment evaluate understanding awareness The Missional Leader, 84-102

37. The Missional Change Model • Awareness - spending time, listening, discerning. Framed within Scripture/theology. Comes from opening and finding language. As words are given to feelings and experiences…understanding emerges. • Understanding – using dialogue to integrate thinking and feelings. Practice using the new language. With this new understanding, new questions are asked. Begin to test a framework. The Missional Leader, 84-102

38. The Missional Change Model • Evaluate – applying awareness and understanding. Examine current actions and practices in light of new understandings. • Experiment – Risk some change - This leads to experimenting of new actions/behaviors. Experimenting around the edges. Adaptive type of change as the goal. • Commitment – signing on to a new way of life. Confidence grows. Internalized the change and the understanding. The Missional Leader, 84-102

39. What’s at Stake? • What is at stake? • Why change? • How does theology inform our view of change? • How can theory help us lead change? • How do we balance the personal and systematic aspects?