Theory of Constraints Handbook - James Cox Iii [707]
Then the workshop participants’ “mindsets” became their major obstacle to progress. Ezra Earl called Lisa and me and said that he wanted to have breakfast with us because he was concerned that things were not going well. At our breakfast he scolded us and told us that we were putting too much emphasis on the Bishops and that we needed to treat everyone equally. Lisa and I argued that the Bishops were the ones in charge of their regions and should be the ones carrying the torch. He told us to back off and take us down a different path on the last days, which Lisa and I did. In spite of our best efforts, however, momentum died, and you could almost feel it prior to the end of our time together. Ezra Earl scheduled another breakfast with us and said, “I messed up, didn’t I?” He was not going to get any argument out of Lisa and me—yep, he did. We should have pressed ahead with the plan. There was a lot of learning and exchange of ideas; however, no implementation effort was forthcoming out of the session. I have always admired Ezra Earl for coming back and admitting his error. I have met very few people that had that kind of courage and leadership. It enhanced learning going forward.
Over a decade passed and Bishop John Schol, the newly appointed Bishop of the Baltimore-Washington Conference, the largest in the UMC, was attending a meeting of Bishops and the session that we conducted was being discussed. He learned that I was a member of his conference and after several meetings Chesapeake was hired to help them through a major transformation. What made it inviting to me is that Bishop Schol’s plan looked like it had been copied directly from what we had discussed and developed 10 years earlier. I guess things are done in God’s time, not ours. He called his initiative “The Discipleship Adventure,” and it is almost exactly what we helped the Bishops develop years earlier. The elements of required leadership action are exactly the same five items as listed previously. However, Bishop Schol was ready to act. Hands-on implementation with this group lasted a year and they continued to implement after Chesapeake was gone.
One of the first problems the Bishop faced was being able to find time to be a spiritual leader (on the path) himself. When we reorganized the conference, we created a new position of Chief Operating Officer (COO). This individual would handle most of the legal matters and minutia of day-to-day operations, freeing the Bishop to focus more on making Disciples and being on the path with his leaders. We created “Disciplier Groups” that were groups of pastors who met on a routine basis to practice the five steps together as leadership behaviors, as they led the way in executing the four steps in the box (the Church). While other UMC conferences were reducing the number of people who “ministered to ministers,” the Baltimore-Washington Conference was increasing these numbers. These new leaders were called “Disciplier Guides.” The role of the Disciplier Guide was to facilitate the pastors in the conference being on “the path” with one another. There was some initial role conflict with the Guides and the traditional District Superintendent, but that was worked out over time. These changes took place in 2007.
How do you measure “Disciple making?” The Baltimore-Washington Conference came up with the following metrics:
1. Worship attendance.
2. Whether a church met their financial obligation to the conference.
3. The percentage of people who attended worship that were involved