Some best practices in the corporate world translate well to the nonprofit sector, including churches, experts insist. And at the same time, churches can benefit by looking at some lessons failed business learned the hard way.
Baptists with expertise in both business and congregational life note several areas where churches can discover lessons worth learning:
• Core values and mission.
“Start with a core set of values — an irreducible minimum of nonnegotiable basics,” said Chris Stull, executive pastor at First Baptist Church in McKinney, Texas. “For churches, those core values are always biblical, and they are always straight from the heart of God.”
Stull, who earned a master of business administration degree from the University of Oklahoma, believes the business world has “helped churches get their arms around” the importance of using core values to determine mission and strategy.
Mitchell Neubert, who holds the Chavanne Chair of Christian ethics in business at Baylor University's Hankamer School of Business, agreed; for-profit businesses have learned the importance of understanding their mission clearly, and churches should embrace that principle.
“That's a critical idea that goes to the matter of core identity,” he said. “From its mission, the business or church makes decisions about where it invests its resources.”
A growing number of churches — particularly congregations that have adopted the purpose-driven model espoused by author Rick Warren — recognize the importance of being able to clearly state their mission, he noted.
The process of defining values and developing a mission statement can be a learning experience for congregations. Phill Martin, deputy chief executive officer of the National Association of Church Business Administration, noted churches benefit from the dialogue surrounding the adoption of a shared vision and by asking missional questions.
“The hard part is deciding what are the things that we could do well as a congregation but that we shouldn't do because they are not central to our mission,” he said. “Saying ‘yes' to some things also means saying ‘no' to other things. The mission can become derailed if the church tries to do everything and goes off in every direction.”
• Goals.
While a growing number of congregations recognize the value in adopting a statement of mission or vision, many struggle with taking the next step in the business model — adopting measurable goals related to that mission, said Neubert, who has been part of Evangelical Free Church and Baptist General Conference congregations in the past and currently attends Highland Baptist Church in Waco, Texas.
Granted, some of a church's goals — particularly related to the spiritual growth of its members — may be difficult or even inappropriate to quantify, but he insists the discussion generated by setting goals can be beneficial in itself.
Neubert recommends churches regularly engage in these kinds of discussions, paying particular attention to how the Holy Spirit seems to be leading in affirming what is important or essential.
“People find it easier to direct their attention toward goals. It's a mechanism to motivate and to measure how far we've progressed,” Neubert said.
Churches and nonprofit organizations can develop quantifiable goals by adapting the balanced scorecard approach — a strategic planning and management system developed by Robert Kaplan of Harvard Business School and consultant David Norton — to their mission, he suggested.
The balanced scoreboard approach challenges business to look at their organizations from four perspectives — learning and growth, internal processes and the customer's viewpoint, as well as financial health.
Neubert, who has consulted with nonprofits and worked five years as a ministry director with Campus Crusade for Christ, believes the system can be adapted successfully to a church or nonprofit organization.
For example, spiritual vitality may be one component, measured at least in part by the number of people involved in programs at the church, in missions projects and in community ministries, he noted.
Churches also can learn from business how to develop effective strategies to meet their goals, Martin added.
A growing number of churches mirror a trend in business away from long-range plans to shorter “seasons of decisions,” he noted.
“You don't see many businesses with a 20-year strategy that are not radically evaluating their strategy every two or three years,” he said. “It's OK to have a dream of what you want to see over 10 years, but a two-year or three-year strategy for a church seems more realistic.”
• Accountability and integrity.
“One of the issues that's at the forefront right now is transparency in accounting and governance,” Martin said.
Whether it's corporate scandals like Enron, financial collapse like the subprime mortgage crisis or governmental investigations, such as Sen. Charles Grassley's probe of several televangelists' ministries to see if they are complying with tax laws, the demand for accountability grows ever higher, Martin noted.
“Churches are learning there is a high level of expectation that churches will be honest with their supporters — with their shareholders, to put it in business terms,” he said.
When it comes to financial management, churches should not shy away from the same kinds of discussions that happen regularly in business — topics such as costs versus benefits and return on investment, Stull said.
“Long term, a church should not presume upon tomorrow,” he said, particularly when it comes to taking on inordinate amounts of debt.
Bob Bass, a retired general contractor and layman at Bon Air Baptist Church in Richmond, believes churches benefit from many of the same basic financial practices that guide successful businesses.
“One of the most basic is to keep costs and expenses within income,” said Bass, who has been involved with his local association of churches and the Baptist General Association of Virginia.
“Our churches need to be honest about income expectations,” he said, noting the danger of church leaders sometimes interpreting prudent financial practices as lack of faith.
When churches encounter financial difficulties, they need to “work both sides of the problem,” finding ways to increase income and reduce costs, he noted.
Considering another aspect of integrity, Bass counseled churches to avoid promising more than they can fulfill.
“I see businesses that create artificial expectations in their advertisements, trying to dupe people into doing things they shouldn't do,” he noted. “Churches should be honest, faithful and not make unsubstantiated claims.”
• Structure.
Churches should follow the common business practice of developing written policies and procedures without becoming slaves to them, said Dennis Lambert, administrator at First Baptist Church in Washington, D.C.
Lambert, who served as a congressional chief of staff on Capitol Hill and worked in city management, believes organizational structure, clearly defined expectations and explicit policies and procedures provide a vital framework for churches.
“Flexibility is a wonderful quality, but it's only positive if you have organization in place. Otherwise, flexibility only leads to chaos,” he said.
• Motivation.
Churches can learn from business how to motivate workers — paid or volunteer, Neubert observed. Obviously, businesses hold an advantage over churches in one respect. They can entice workers to work harder by offering more money, and they can fire workers who don't meet expectations.
But, Neubert insists, extrinsic motivators — tangible rewards and threat of punishment — generally just generate short-term results.
“In business, we are finding some of the best long-term results come from intrinsic motivation,” he said. “That includes giving people a sense of ownership, the opportunity to be creative and the chance to do tasks they find more interesting, challenging and exciting.”
Of all places, churches should excel at offering intrinsic motivation — giving people an opportunity to do meaningful work that fits their spiritual gifts and God-given talents, he noted.
“As Christians, we recognize God has gifted people for different types of ministry. The challenge for leaders is to figure out where people fit,” he said.
• Key differences.
For all that can be learned from business, Martin advises congregations to remember fundamental differences exist between the for-profit sector and churches.
“Business is about making money. It's about producing products or providing services,” he said. “For churches, ministry is the bottom line. … Ultimately, you can't measure a church by the sum total of its assets.”
Craig Harwood, a human resources director with Coca-Cola, leadership consultant and former bivocational pastor in New York, stressed the importance of context.
Some of the biggest “train wrecks” in congregational life occur when well-meaning lay leaders try to “help” the church by imposing business practices that do not fit the character and context of a specific congregation, said Harwood, a member of Roswell Street Baptist Church in Marietta, Ga.
Even valid business principles may be rejected if they are not translated into terms acceptable to a congregation, he added.
“There can be a backlash against applying business language in churches,” he said. Some members may see discussion of marketing or performance evaluation as too secular or as compromise with the world.
“Every principle needs to pass through the filter of Scripture,” he advised.
Neubert agreed that not all business practices can — or should — be transplanted into church life.
For instance, although he believes in the importance of setting goals, he added churches should guard against viewing the achievement of goals as their ultimate measure of success.
“In God's economy, faithfulness is more important than results,” he said.