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Planning is a conversation. For congregations, it starts with the question: “What work would be most helpful for this holy conversation? While the roadmap to the full planning process appears linear, like any good conversation, it will have its own natural flow. Simply use this chart to ask “where should we be giving most of our attention at this time?” Leaders should also ask what type of structured conversations are people willing and able to have now. Those will become entry points into other parts of the planning process.
Three Phases of Planning
It helps to think of the planning process as having three phases. In the book Holy Conversations each of these phases is described in detail:
- Getting Ready—preparing the people to plan.
- Collecting Data—gathering relevant information.
- Shaping the future.
The first phase, getting ready, involves preparing the board, leaders, and the full congregation for the process. It involves teaching people to see what’s possible, and motivating them to want to engage. Who should you invite to play a leadership role? What preparation methods will be most effective for them? What form of planning should be pursued? These are all questions for the crucial preparation phase.
More involved planning processes, such as full blown, frame-bending strategic planning, should be guided by a planning team or committee. That team should be carefully selected, organized, and trained. The planning team should do a needs assessment to avoid becoming overwhelmed with information. One way is to work on a SWOT analysis (identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats).
Phase Two—collecting data—is potentially the most dangerous part of planning. That’s because we all like information and tend to believe in data. Don’t let data inhibit, or even stop, the holy conversation of discernment. Data only gives the appearance that the answer is found. Therefore, before you start gathering data, clarify the questions raised by the needs assessment, and let that assessment be your guide.
Begin with internal data about the congregation and its participants. Who are we? What are our gifts? What are our strengths? This is where the SWOT analysis done in phase one is helpful. Internal data that relates to key questions of the planning process include statistics on membership and attendence patterns and trends, congregational histories, financial and facilities assessments, and interviews with recent new members. Next gather external data about the wider community. Is it growing or shrinking? What are its demographics? How might you characterize lifestyles within the community? To avoid rushing to judgement about this data, it is crucial to analyze it for insights.
Gathering the team’s “learnings” is what Gil Rendle affectionately calls the “So what?” moment of planning. Using a simple conversational construct, such as the biblical exercise found in the book, it’s possible to summarize learnings in ways that crystalize insights and convictions.
The final and third phase of the planning process is the point where all of the hard work and holy conversation of planning is shaped into a story about the future. This creative moment is a time to trust discernment and take risks. It is based on the insights, information, and learnings developed earlier. Shaping the future can come in the form of a unique defining statement about the congregation in terms of mission and/or vision. Once the uniqueness of the congregation and its future has been shaped in descriptive statements, the next stage is to move toward workable plans. Objectives are what the congregation must do or be to shape its future. Goals state how the congregation will accomplish those objectives. They are often expressed as programs, events, or strategies. Formulating objectives, goals, and recommendations can lead to clear plans for action that shape the congregation’s future.
Giving Voice to the Congregation
The planning process is an effort to help the congregation tell its story. Biblical theologian Walter Wink suggests that every congregation has its own angel with two voices: the voice of personality and the voice of vocation. The voice of personality speaks to the congregation’s past, the people who have left their imprint, commitments made, and risks taken. The voice of vocation, however, is the voice of the future. It talks of commitments and values to be lived out, hopes to be realized, and costs to be paid willingly for the greater purpose. The result of the holy conversation is the naming, claiming, and commiting to a vocation. It is the first step on a path of faith and calling.
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