Leading Change at MAABC

At our last meeting we worked together to go through the book Our Iceberg is Melting  by John Kotter which deals with steps for dealing with and leading change. Kotter points to the following steps to use in an effort to effectively lead and manage change.

Step 1: Establishing a Sense of Urgency

Help others see the need for change and they will be convinced of the importance of acting immediately.

Step 2: Creating the Guiding Coalition

Assemble a group with enough power to lead the change effort, and encourage the group to work as a team. 

Step 3: Developing a Change Vision

Create a vision to help direct the change effort, and develop strategies for achieving that vision. 

Step 4: Communicating the Vision for Buy-in

Make sure as many as possible understand and accept the vision and the strategy.

Step 5: Empowering Broad-based Action

Remove obstacles to change, change systems or structures that seriously undermine the vision, and encourage risk-taking and nontraditional ideas, activities, and actions. 

Step 6: Generating Short-term Wins

Plan for achievements that can easily be made visible, follow-through with those achievements and recognize and reward members who were involved. 

Step 7: Never Letting Up

Use increased credibility to change systems, structures, and policies that don't fit the vision, also hire, promote, and develop employees who can implement the vision, and finally reinvigorate the process with new projects, themes, and change agents.

Step 8: Incorporating Changes into the Culture

Articulate the connections between the new behaviors and organizational success, and develop the means to ensure leadership development and succession.

In our group discussions we spoke about how this related to our church and worked to identify what we felt were our "icebergs" that were "melting". The following themes emerged:

1. Our debt and inability to meet all our financial obligations

2. Needing new people and younger people to take on leadership roles

3. Widening the circle of people who do the core of the work of the church.

4. Rekindling the passion for the work of MAABC

Pastor Cooper, at a previous service, suggested four guiding questions that he asked us to think about as we look forward.  These questions are 

1. What does it mean to be MAABC after 20 years?

2. What does it mean to be MAABC in 2013?

3. What does it mean to be MAABC at 5263 Warwick Road?

4. What is the relationship between MAABC and offering acceptance, help and hope?

Our task is to look at these four questions and see if truly they are the right question to help guide us as we figure out our "iceberg" and a solution to it.