In November 2008, Tony Lancaster was driven to Southern California by his brother, and dropped off with a change of clothes and a backpack. Fresh out of rehab, having just lost his business and all of his money, Tony was without hope. But later that year, everything changed. He found Jesus Christ, which eventually led him to make a difference in the world by giving back what he himself had been given: hope. Tony started, and still leads, HOPE Café and Catering, which serves fresh, gourmet food to groups of any size (between 10 and 10,000!).
Yellowstone & Business
At a recent One2One meeting with a long-time Convene member, Steve—a man with a great heart for God, family and business—shared about a recent vacation to Yellowstone National Park with his extended family (wife, 4 daughters with husbands, and grandchildren). He described the park as a sanctuary of geothermal activity, forests, mountains and wildlife in an ever-evolving landscape. Steve was evidently moved in spirit by this experience. Steve described Yellowstone in this way:
“The environment is constantly changing”
“Only the strong survive”
“God’s hand is so evident there”
My immediate reaction was to ask, “How is that like your business environment?”
For certain, in our information-deluged and technology-advancing world, the environment is constantly changing. How does your business keep up with the pace? Our Convene team has a saying, “What got you here, won’t take you there”.
For certain, in our still-precarious economic environment, the strong survive by great leadership and team building, innovation and operational efficiency. How do you hone your leadership skills?
“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another”—Proverbs 27:17.
For certain, God’s hand is active in your business. How do you stay focused on God’s intent for your company and your stewardship thereof? Convene helps to impel your decisions through the filters of Kingdom Purpose, Vision and Values.
Could your business have a legacy like Yellowstone?
“Let us not give up meeting together…but continue to encourage one another”. Hebrews 10:25
The Convene points of difference: A conversation among Convene chairs
Convene Chairs eat their own cooking. They get together and work challenges and opportunities just like the CEO teams they gather. In a recent conversation we talked about how we have come to understand and respond to the question that often comes: "What are the points of difference between Convene and other peer-based advising groups for CEOs and business owners?"
Our answer? We have:
* An Essence Process (that distills the team's best thinking)
* The Holy Spirit Co-Creating Wise Counsel (with like-minded peers)
* A Safe Peer Environment Committed to the Ongoing Transformation of the Leader (producing trust, vulnerability and speed of decision-making)
These elements, when combined, lead to greater clarity sooner.
This in turn, empowers our members to make more confident decisions, grounded in deeper understanding for greater (Kingdom, business and family) impact.
Three great temptations wage war against a CEO: fear, pride and confusion. When a CEO does not have clarity on the issue at hand, on God's will for them and their stewardship of the company, or on a particular opportunity, it is nearly impossible to act dutifully. Fear, pride and confusion block right and timely action.
The alternatives are twofold:
1) To not act, delay the decision, gather more facts, avoid, put off, minimize, rationalize or spiritualize.
2) To act with compromised effect based on un-clarity of purpose, opportunity, etc.
By engaging a Convene Team with a tough issue, a CEO is:
1) Humbling themselves by submitting their pride to the counsel of the team, thereby counteracting the enemy's tool of pride;
2) Gaining truth, wisdom, insight and clarity, thereby counteracting the enemy's tool of confusion;
3) Gaining depth as a leader, borrowed experience and encouragement from others thereby counteracting the enemy's tool of fear.
"For God is not a God of confusion, but of peace." (1 Cor 14:33 - ESV)
It is interesting that Paul, who wrote those words, creates a dichotomy between confusion and peace.
And so, we answer the question about the Convene distinctive as more confident decisions, grounded in deeper understanding for greater (Kingdom, business and family) impact... and personal peace.
Convene Chairs
-Harris Wheeler
-Marcus Bigelow
-Mark Vincent
-Michael Powers
-Mike Petty
-Ron Hoover
-Todd Kemp
Saving Money and Culture
A regular practice at Convene Forum Day is for members to bring business issues—we call them Opportunity/Challenges—to their CEO peers to gain wisdom and insight from multiple perspectives and experience. Convene uses a standard format and process for the subject member to present the issue and for fellow members to gain understanding and provide guidance. A member recently presented his challenge in consolidating two manufacturing plants into one location. Although only a mile apart, they could achieve production efficiencies and cost savings by combining under one roof. This would involve selling two buildings and finding another in the same area that could accommodate the operations—a monumental task in the midst of sustaining a vigorous enterprise—so daunting that it created paralysis of action. Through the Opportunity/Challenge process, the group helped him quantify a potential $30,000 per month savings should he make this change.
Perhaps more significant was the member’s confession that a drastically different culture had prevailed at the satellite location, a result of its isolation from the ownership and management team located in the main facility. He felt discontent at them not sharing the values and practices that he so earnestly strove to maintain at the headquarters. Through inquiry and advice, the Convene team helped him realize that the cultural costs were as important as the monetary costs.
One of the questions of the Opportunity/Challenge process asks for the “intensity level” of the issue on a scale of 1-10. The member came into the meeting rating this a 3 to 4 intensity—fairly low on the scale. After an hour of discussion among his Convene peers, he moved this initiative up to a 9 to 10. That was three months ago; since that time he’s announced the decision to his management team and staff, has engaged a realtor to sell or lease both buildings, and began a search for a single building to accommodate the entire operation. The thought of saving at least $360,000 a year and unifying the culture of his staff motivated his action on this initiative.
Functioning as a virtual Board of Advisors, the Convene Team will continue to advise and hold the member accountable to a plan that is manageable and attainable.
What could a peer advisory group like Convene help you realize and achieve?
Perfection? Really? A Reflection from Matthew 5:48
If you have been a fan of Downton Abbey, or other television or literary fare that portrays nobility and their servants, you are well aware of the contrast of what happens upstairs where everything is presented in perfect symmetry, and what happens downstairs where the trash must be disposed of and where the coal dust and sewage gather. Something similar happens when you do some fine dining. Linen tablecloths, atmospheric lighting, carefully prepared recipes and meticulously attired serving staff appear on one side of the swinging door to the kitchen. And what exists behind it? Rinds, soiled cloths, garbage and empty boxes.
Or consider what it takes to create a perfect performance, one that draws standing ovations for incredible dexterity, vocal beauty, or visual delights. Prior to that incredible, memory-making moment comes falls, failure, a frequent being passed over during auditions, and repeated mistakes.
We do our best to create the simulation of perfection, but it is always built on something that has to be destroyed or hidden or lived beyond.
Q. Can you identify other ways the appearance of perfection is built off the consumption of something or someone else?
How does this show up in your life?
How does this show up in your enterprise?
We all have some idea of perfection. Some folks strive for it. They mourn when what they wanted “to be perfect” is not. Nothing less suits them and they are frequently disappointed. Others despair over whether perfection can be achieved and perhaps stop trying altogether. Whichever side of that line we fall, the perfection marker remains in front of us and we are well aware that we cannot measure up, that our perfect moments are built on imperfect ones, and that we cannot maintain them once they’ve begun.
So, when we hear these words from Jesus in Matthew 5:48 that we should be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect, it does not sound like an encouragement. It doesn’t sound like it fits with the gospel message of grace that forgives our imperfection and lets us hope to return to God. We simply do not know what to do with it.
Q. Where do you land? Are you mostly disappointed or mostly in despair when it comes to perfection?
The Sermon on the Mount would be easier to hear and respond to if Jesus’ words did not include the standard of perfection. We could then hear them as a call to try, even with the higher standard that Jesus offers. We would hear it as “you don’t need to swear by anything because your word should be enough.” We would hear, “Vengeance is a dead-end, try letting someone else’s anger run its course, even if you are its victim rather than adding fuel to their fire.” We would hear, “work at loving your enemy rather than putting your energy into hate.” If the words of Jesus did not hold up the standard of perfection trying would be enough. Grace would cover our mistakes. We could pick ourselves up and give it another go. We would try to hold to what we know to be good for a longer period of time each time we begin again.
And yet, Jesus seems to tell us that trying is not enough. Perfection is what we should be because we reflect God. God is all these things Jesus calls us to be. How in the world do we begin to understand this saying, find it to be hopeful, and claim it joyfully rather than collapse into despair?
(1) Let’s start with the Greek word Jesus uses for perfection. As so often is the case, a word does not fully convey its meaning when moving from the original to a translation. He uses a word related to telos, which means “the end.” To understand this more fully, we have to understand that the Greeks had multiple words for time (chronos, kairos and telos) just as they had multiple words for love (philia, eros and agape). Chronos refers to a specific moment in time, its flow, the ticking of seconds. Kairos refers to a moment of special magnitude, an auspicious moment. Telos refers to the end of time, the culmination.
Jesus is saying that we need to represent the end state, the culmination of maturity, the completion of the transforming work that God is doing within us. This is a perfection that is NOT built from something that is destroyed. Rather it is built OUT OF what would otherwise know destruction. It is a return to a purpose rather than a triumph at someone else’s tragedy.
It cannot be done perfectly at all times, but we can represent it, call for it, and emulate it to the best of our ability.
Q. Identify an arena in your life where you are
much transformed from what you used to be.
(2) And let’s look to the subject that Jesus holds forth — that of doing what God does. God offers grace where imperfection reigns. According to the Sermon on the Mount God holds a high standard for moral behavior and peacemaking—one that cannot be achieved on one’s own. And what is this moral behavior and peacemaking used for? It is used for showing grace to people who do not deserve it necessarily. And neither do we! We have been shown grace in our imperfection, so we need to represent God as show-ers of grace to others in theirs. And when we do we represent the perfection of God.
(3) And finally let’s look at Jesus’ statement about perfection itself. God is the perfect one. The perfection we point to by living toward our maturity, the perfection to which our lives point, is God’s perfection, not ours.
If we reflect on this a bit more, we can find hope for our journey.
We don’t have to be stalled by petty and imperfect matters that surround us. They always will be there so our one choice is whether we respond in grace or nastiness. And nastiness isn’t just acting like a brute. Nastiness can also be a cold distance. Sometimes nastiness is simply a haughty sniff.
We can gain perspective on the struggles of our lives - even the severe ones. Jesus speaks these words to people, most of who lived downstairs, on the kitchen side of the swinging door, who knew the trash heaps far better than gilded rooms. It is to them, those who will listen, that he invites toward perfection. The audience of naysayers who sometimes surrounded him believed that the trappings of their lives were a sufficient substitute even though their wealth and pretend perfection were built upon the oppression of others.
By any reasonable measure, we are people who live upstairs. We are the diners in the restaurant. We are the ones who believe a perfect performance is possible and expected. We are the ones who join the Pharisees and rulers of old, believing that our lives should be perfect no matter who pays the price for our benefit. We are the ones who whine and complain and demand someone pay for it when we are not pleased or service has not been rendered properly. We are the ones who pout, get in a funk or have a snit when something does not go well. It’s hard to embrace the perfection Jesus invites when we are too busy pretending to be perfect ourselves.
Q. Who will you be? A person pretending to be perfect? A person defeated?
A person of grace, pointing to the perfected grace of God?
If it is to be a person of grace, how will you do it?