ANDY STANLEY
Introduction
F i v e I n e s c a pa b l e T r u t h s A b o u t O r g a n i z at i o n a l C u lt u r e
Every organization has a culture. Culture is a set of unwritten rules that determines how people
in an organization act, react, communicate, problem-solve, and treat each other. Culture includes
the attitudes, beliefs, values, standards, expectations, prejudices, approaches, and phobias that
characterize its people when they are together. Culture is the personality of an organization.
If you have worked for an organization with a clearly defined, healthy culture, then you know
how energizing it can be. If you have spent time in an organization whose culture was unhealthy,
you know how draining that can be as well. Our goal today is to download everything we can in
the time allotted related to what we’ve learned about creating a healthy organizational culture.
Five Inescapable Truths about Organizational Culture
1. Leaders ____________________ organizational culture whether they intend to or not.
2. Time ___________ erodes awareness ______________.
3. Healthy cultures attract and keep ________________ people.
4. The culture of an organization impacts its long-term _________________________.
5. Unhealthy cultures are slow to adapt to ___________.
Conclusion:
Creating and re-creating corporate culture rarely feels urgent. Besides, you can’t fix it with
a meeting, a memo, or a mandate. It’s a bit like trying to pick up Jell-O or win an argument
with your teenage daughter. One keeps slipping away. The other keeps changing the
subject. For leaders, working on culture feels like going backwards. Why can’t people just
do their jobs and get along? The truth is, the good people in your organization want to do
exactly that. They want to do their jobs and get along with the people they work with. While
tinkering with your organization’s culture is not glamorous, it is mission-critical.
Notes:
Introduction
craig groeschel
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF
VALUES IN SHAPING CULTURE
VALUES AND CULTURE
Healthy cultures never happen by ____________________. They are ________________.
The number one force that shapes your culture is your __________________.
What we ____________ determines what we ____________.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate
10
with him and his disciples. 11When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your
teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who
need a doctor, but the sick.” Matthew 9:10-12 HOW DO WE ALLOW OUR VALUES TO SHAPE OUR CULTURE?
1. Determine honestly what your _______________ say you _________________.
2. Identify the values God has put __________________ you.
Answer these questions with one or two word answers:
• What do you passionately love?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
• What breaks your heart or makes you righteously angry?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
3. Narrow down your values to _______ or fewer.
1. ___________________________
6. ___________________________
2. ___________________________
7. ___________________________
3. ___________________________
8. ___________________________
4. ___________________________
9. ___________________________
5. ___________________________
10. __________________________
4. Once you’ve clearly defined your values, describe them in short, _________-giving
statements.
5. Shape your culture and build your _______________ around your _______________.
• Hire and recruit for your _______________.
• Remove people with distinctly _________________ values.
• If you don’t like where you are going, _____________ ______________.
the significance in values in shaping culture
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Craig tells us that what we value determines what we do. Take a few minutes to discuss or
ponder how your organization is living out its values. Take out a piece of paper and make
two columns. In one column jot down what you currently say you value, and in the other
column jot down what you are currently doing. How well do these two align? What hidden
values have you discovered?
2. Craig warns us of our susceptibility to the coopting of values that is widespread in church
subculture. He specifically warns us that adopting what another church is doing, because we
think it will lead to our success, can be a grave error. Use a few minutes to take stock of the
last several ideas that have been implemented in your organization. Was the implementation
of these ideas driven by your values or someone else’s success? What might you need to
rethink?
3. After pondering the first two questions you may be at a point where you need to reexamine
your values? Make sure you watch Craig’s Additional Perspectives segment from the DVD for
insight about how the reevaluation process takes place at LifeChurch.
4. If you haven’t already, answer the following two questions Craig provides to help with
determining core values:
• What do you passionately love?
• What breaks your heart or makes you righteously angry?
Now take out a sheet of paper and write all of the answers to the above questions in list
form. Cut the paper into strips with one value represented per strip. Sort the values from
most important to least removing values until you end up with 10 or less. These are your
core values.
5. Using the example provided from LifeChurch, write out short life – giving statements for
each of your core values.
the significance in values in shaping culture
ANDY STANLEY
THE POWER OF MUTUAL SUBMISSION
Introduction:
Mark 10 (TNIV)
32
They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were
astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again he took the Twelve aside and told
them what was going to happen to him. 33 “We are going up to Jerusalem,” he said, “and the
Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn him
to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, 34 who will mock him and spit on him, flog him
and kill him. Three days later he will rise.”
Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to him. “Teacher,” they said, “we want you
to do for us whatever we ask.”
35
“What do you want me to do for you?” he asked.
They replied, “Let one of us sit at your right and the other at your left in your glory.”
36
37
When the ten heard about this, they became indignant with James and John. 42Jesus called
them together and said, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it
over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them.
41
43
Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant,
and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.
44
For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a
ransom for many.”
45
l. Healthy and productive staff cultures are
characterized by ___________________ __________________.
A. The message of mutual submission: I’m here to facilitate your __________________
regardless of where either of us shows up on the organizational chart.
B. The assumption of mutual submission: While our responsibilities differ, we are both
_____________________ to the success of this enterprise.
C. The question mutual submission asks ________ ______ ___ _____ _____ _____?
The ultimate dysfunction of a team is the tendency of members to care about something
other than the collective goals of the group . . . Team status and individual status are the
prime candidates. – The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
ll. Best Practices
A. Do for ___________ what you wish you could do for _________________________.
B. Systematize ________-__________ service.
C. Create and maintain a ____________________________ pace.
1. Without __________________, there is no room to serve.
2. Without margin, we seek first our _____________ ______________.
D. Celebrate and ___________________________ mutual submission when you see it.
Tip: What’s rewarded is _____________________.
E. Confront your _______________________.
Q: What’s most important: building a great organization or creating a
_________________ for yourself?
F. Drop the term ___________________________ from your vocabulary.
Tip: If you have to ask for it, demand it, or have people sign a document pledging it,
YOU are the one who lacks it.
the power of mutual submission
Conclusion:
“There is a special trap for every holder of power, whether the director of a company, the head
of the state, or the ruler of a dictatorship. His favor is so desirable to his subordinates that they
will sue for it by every means possible. Servility becomes endemic among his entourage, who
compete among themselves in their show of devotion. This in turn exercises a sway upon the
ruler, who becomes corrupted in his turn.
The key to the quality of the man in power is how he reacts to this situation. I have observed a
number of industrialists and military men who knew how to fend off this danger. Where power
has been exercised over generations, a kind of hereditary incorruptibility grows up. Only a
few individuals among those around Hitler, such as Fritz Todt, withstood the temptation to
sycophancy. Hitler himself put up no visible resistance to the evolution of a court.” – Inside the
Third Reich: Memoirs by Albert Speer, p. 83
notes:
the power of mutual submission
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Andy begins this talk by providing the message, assumption, and question of mutual
submission. Review each of these in your notes and think about how well you believe these
to be true, both personally and in your organization. Rate yourself and your organization
from 1 to 5 (with 1 being “we’re not getting this right at all,” and 5 being “we are already
doing this perfectly”).
2. Andy tells us that the misapplication of the concept of anointing is one of the biggest
roadblocks to creating a culture of mutual submission. How have you or your team misapplied
the biblical concept of anointing? What are some concrete steps that you can take to correct
this misapplication?
3. Take 15 minutes to brainstorm 5 ideas about how you can systematize top down service
within your organization. Refer to Andy’s examples from North Point Ministries for inspiration.
4. How is the current pace within your organization? Take the time to openly discuss with your
team, and get opinions from individuals across the organization. You may be surprised to
fine that the pace varies from team to team. What are a few things your team may need to
stop doing in order to create the margin for service?
5. Andy tells us that, as leaders, we must constantly confront our ego by asking ourselves
what’s most important: building a great organization or creating a name for ourselves?
Develop three diagnostic questions you can ask yourself to make sure you are keeping your
ego in check, and post them someplace you will see them every day.
the power of mutual submission
craig groeschel
CREATING A CULTURE OF
SELF-AWARENESS
CREATING A CULTURE OF SELF-AWARENESS
• Those who don’t _____________ don’t _____________ they don’t _____________.
• The problems you don’t ____________ about are the problems you can’t _______.
Three Principles of Self Deception
1. We as leaders have a ________________ capacity for self-deception.
2. The ______________ we believe lies the ________________ it is to hear truth.
For in his own eyes he flatters himself too much to detect or hate his sin. Psalms 36:2
3. The leader’s lack of self-awareness is the leader’s greatest ______________.
Uncovering the Truth About You
1. ______________.
Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24See if
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there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Psalms 139: 23-24
2. ________________.
He who listens to a life-giving rebuke will be at home among the wise. 32He
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who ignores discipline despises himself, but whoever heeds correction gains
understanding. Proverbs 15:31-32
a. Build a team that _______________ and gives ________________ feedback.
b. Implement annual ______ evaluations for every team member.
• What has God been trying to show you?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
3. ______________.
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
James 1:22
Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. John 8:32
creating a culture of self-awareness
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Ask 3 people you are close to if they see you as a self-aware person. Write down what you
learned about yourself from their responses.
2. Craig tells us that the problems you don’t know about are the problems you can’t fix. One of
the ways our problems become known is through a culture of feedback. Take a few minutes
to think about or discuss with your team the current state of your culture of feedback. Does
your team have a healthy culture of feedback? Are you personally open to correction? Write
down three ways that you can open yourself up to healthy feedback.
3. Reflect on the last time you rebuked someone on your team. Was it a life-giving rebuke or
a life-taking rebuke? Think about a time you received a life-giving rebuke. Write down the
qualities that made the rebuke you received life-giving, and commit to incorporate those
qualities into your feedback process.
4. Does your organization currently have a 360 evaluation process? If so, are you currently
utilizing this process to create change? If not, what do you need to do to institute this
process into your organization?
5. Craig tells us that sin grows best in the dark, and reminds us that it’s the truth that sets us
free. Is there a sin or insecurity in your life that is currently growing in the dark? Pray about
whom you can confess this to in the next week so that you might find freedom.
creating a culture of self-awareness
ANDY STANLEY
THREE ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS
OF A STANDOUT CULTURE
Introduction:
l. An appealing ______________________________________ A. Setting - the _________________________ environment.
B. Settings create first impressions.
C. An uncomfortable or distracting setting can derail ministry before it begins.
D. Every physical environment communicates _______________________.
1. Clean
2. Organized
“A business that looks orderly says to your customer that your people know
what they are doing.” E-Myth by Michael Gerber
3. Safe
E. Design, décor, and attention to detail communicate _______________ and
__________________ you value most.
F. Design, décor, and attention to detail communicate whether or not you are expecting
_________________________.
G. Periodically, we all need______________ ____________ on our ministry environments.
Questions:
1. Are your ministry settings appealing to your target audience?
2. Does the design, décor, and attention to detail of your environments reflect what
and who is most important to you?
3. What’s starting to look _________________________?
ll. An engaging __________________________________
A. Engaging presentations are central to the success of our mission.
1. Presenting the gospel is a __________________ responsibility of the church.
2. “Teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you” is the
___________________ responsibility of the church (Matthew 28:20).
B. To engage is to ________________ one’s attention.
C. Generally speaking, it’s the presentation that makes information __________________.
D. Engaging presentations require engaging presenters or an engaging _______________
of presentation.
Questions:
1. Is your culture characterized by a relentless commitment to engaging presentations
at every level of the organization?
2. Does your system allow you to put your best presenters in your most strategic
presentation environments?
three essential ingredients of a standout culture
3. Are your presenters evaluated and coached?
4. Does your system create opportunities for your best content creators to partner
with your presenters?
lll. Helpful ___________________________________________
A. Helpful = ____________________________.
B. Helpful content is content that directly addresses _________________________
and ____________________.
C. Content should be age and ____________-____-_________ specific.
1. Information that does not address a felt need is ______________ as irrelevant. 2. Information that isn’t perceived as useful is perceived as irrelevant.
3. Irrelevant doesn’t __________________.
Questions:
1. Is your content helpful?
2. Do your content creators and communicators understand that the goals are
renewed minds and changed behaviors?
3. Is your content age and stage-of-life specific?
Conclusion:
Of every environment, program, and production, ask:
1. Was the context appealing?
2. Was the presentation engaging?
3. Was the content helpful?
three essential ingredients of a standout culture
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Are you able to clearly define what success looks like for your team? Watch the Additional
Perspectives interview as Andy talks about the process of “clarifying the win” at NPM. Take
some time with your team to write out clarifying statements for your team’s success.
2. What does your physical environment currently communicate what you value? What you
don’t value?
3. Andy tells us that our physical environment should always be clean, organized, and safe. Take
stock of the physical environment of your organization. What can you do to currently make it
more organized, clean, and safe? Get the team together for a mass cleaning and organizing
session. You may be surprised at how this one act raises the mood and productivity of the
team.
4. There is a substantial difference between someone who is a great content creator, and
someone who is a great presenter. If you are part of a church staff, take some time to
evaluate your presenters. Are there currently presenters who would be better in a content
creation role? Are there great presenters who need help with their content? If you are not
in a church you can still examine the roles on your team. Is everyone in the right seat on the
bus?
5. In order for content to be helpful it must address both thinking and living. Is your content
currently addressing both of these? This must be a both/and proposition. If your content
is currently weighted heavily on theology, how might you incorporate more application or
vice versa?
6. In order for our content to be helpful it must be age and stage specific. Do you currently
have a standard for determining the “needs to know” for each age and stage in your
environments?
three essential ingredients of a standout culture