Over the last week our staff and board reviewed our answers to 6 key questions every organization should answer. They are the highest level description of the destination and the guard rails every organization needs to assure long-term effectiveness.
Here are the 6 questions we reviewed and the place SpringHill provides the answers:
- What do we believe to be true? Statement of Faith.
- Why do we exist? Mission
- What’s important to us? Core Values
- What makes us distinct? Philosophy of Ministry
- What do we want to achieve in 15, 20 or 25 years? Big Hairy Audacious God Goal (BHAGG)
- What do we want to become in 5, 10, 15 years? Vision
The answers to the first 4 questions focus on the “now” and need to be a present reality within the organization. Thus they are the guard rails that keep the organization from getting off track.
The last 2 questions are future focused and provide the organization’s long-term destination. These answers need to be guided by and consistent with the answers to the first 4 questions.
All the answers should be treated like the Constitution of the United States – slow and laborious to change. Why? Because any change needs to appropriately involve every stakeholder group of the organization, and this takes time. If the answers keep changing it’s because the questions have never been truly answered.
Not only is it necessary to answer these 6 questions, it’s absolutely essential that the answers drive everything else in the organization. Every decision made within the organization is to be subservient to the answers to these questions. That’s why these answers are so important, and why they should rarely change.
Finally, we believe answering these questions not to be, a an act of calculation, but an act of discovery, a discovery that will pay richly in a long future of effective ministry.
To see SpringHill’s answers to the 6 Key Questions click here.