You have a vision for something beautiful that the world needs. It might still be in the idea stage, or you might be a few years into making it real. Either way, how do you nurture your vision into something that can thrive and last?
If you have an idea for a project but haven’t started building yet, we highly recommend Ship It, a free project planning tool by Seth Godin, as a place to start. Set aside at least four hours and walk through every question with your team. This will help you understand if you are ready to start building, or if there are areas where you have more discernment to do.
Once your project is underway, many more questions will emerge about how to structure your project, community, or organization over the long term. One of the biggest challenges for many spiritual innovators is taking on too much. Their project depends so fully on their own energy, that they feel they can never take a break or it will fall apart. To help sustain the great work you’re doing—and your own wellbeing!—we recommend doing some strategic planning. This doesn’t have to be dry or corporate. At its best, it’s a creative, communal process that helps you get clear on what matters most, where you’re headed, and how you’ll get there together. Think of it as a ritual of alignment—bringing your purpose, your people, and your path into harmony.
An Exercise to Begin: Strategic planning
In their book Holy Conversations: Strategic Planning as a Spiritual Practice for Congregations, Gil Rendle and Alice Mann define strategic planning as a structured conversation about what a group of people believe God calls them to be or to do.
Using your own language for the divine or higher purpose, what might such a conversation look like for you and your community? Gil and Alice recommend starting with three questions that we have adapted here:
- Who Are We? (What is our identity?)
- How would we clearly and honestly describe ourselves as a group?
- What Are We Called to Do? (What is our purpose?)
- Based on what we know about ourselves and our situation, what do we believe we are to do?
- Who Is Our Neighbor? (Who do we serve?)
- What is the context for our work together, and who are we connected to?
Gil and Alice’s book is full of wisdom on strategic planning. See especially the introduction and Part I for more detail on these three foundational questions.
Tools & Frameworks for Getting Started
- Community Weaving and the Community Canvas are two great frameworks to help you build meaningful communities. They’re full of powerful reflection questions that will lead to clarity, and some great prompts to help you build a meaningful and thriving community.
- Lean Faith Canvas was created to help new Christian ministries plan strategically, but can be used by anyone launching a new spiritual project.
- A great tool to start your planning with is a SWOT analysis; helping you and your team share assumptions about the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats you face.
- Or check out The Design Kit; a great resource for learning human-centered design.
- The Two-Loops Model for System Change is an insightful strategy tool to help contextualize your work and can lead to clarity in understanding your project’s broader purpose.
Courses & Programs to Build Your Project
- Embrace Community nourishes spiritually-rooted leaders and their callings. Check out their regular Mastermind programs designed for spiritual innovators working in for-profit and nonprofit models.
- Glean Network supports leaders at the crossroads of tradition and innovation and offers a self-guided Design-Thinking & Entrepreneurial Innovation Course for Faith-Rooted Leaders.
- Beloved nourishes open-hearted spiritual leaders as they create and sustain new spaces of sacred belonging. They have a year-long course if you’re just starting out, as well as support for more developed projects.
- Other great programs include Auburn Seminary’s Emerging Leaders Program and Upstart for Jewish innovators.
Deeper Learning on Strategy
- Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown is a guidebook for getting in right relationship with change, using our own nature and that of creatures beyond human as our teachers.
- Margaret Wheatley shares ten powerful principles for meaningful community in this series of short videos.
- How to Lead When You Don't Know Where You're Going by Susan Beaumont is valuable reading for anyone leading a project in a liminal time. This hour-long webinar is a great introduction, too.
- Training for Change has a host of resources and trainings for change-making organizations.
Explore Content
Explore More on Building Your Project in the Resource Hub
Small Groups with Purpose
Insights from Saddleback Church's success; especially it's small groups program, including how it was built, organized, and scaled.
