In Church as in Business, Innovation Matters

As president of the Willow Creek Association, Jim Mellado takes his inspiration from an intriguing mix of sources: Peter Drucker, Everett Rogers, and Jesus.  His business is faith, and if the best ideas about evangelism come from iconic thinkers on corporate organization, then so be it.

Even before Mellado joined Willow Creek Association (WCA) in 1992, he was already intrigued with the vibrant church that had created the nonprofit.  As a graduate student at Harvard Business School in the late ‘80s, he had read an article by Peter Drucker in the Harvard Business Review that listed a number of nonprofits with superior organizational skills and impressive rates of growth: the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, the Girl Scouts—and Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois.  

What each of these organizations had in common, Drucker argued, was the clarity of their goals.  The mission was the priority, and the organization was shaped around that mission.  The purpose of a church is usually clear and simple, Mellado says:  “When churches are working right, they are an essential piece of the community that fixes injustices.  They ought to be on the front lines of social response to terrible things that are going on.”

It doesn’t always happen that way, however.  Mellado attributes some of the shortcomings of today’s church to a “dearth of leadership;” a simple inability to translate the goals of the church into a reality on the street.  Just as in business, the harvest may be plentiful, but the laborers can sometimes be few.

WCA exists to help all local churches realize their potential, but its focus is to serve those who are more innovative, progressive, willing to try new things and take risks.  When these churches lead the way, they pave the way for other churches to follow.  “It’s critical that the pioneering churches thrive,” Mellado says.  “If that doesn’t happen, most churches who need someone else to make the first move, won’t change and will become irrelevant over time.”

The major venue through which WCA develops church leaders has been its annual Global Leadership Summit.  Mellado says the summit serves as a magnet to draw out individuals who can bring the church’s mission to life.  “To embrace new ideas, people have to hear about them,” he says.  Today, the event gathers over 7,000 people and is simulcast/videocast to 470 locations, reaching more than 150,000 people from 70 different countries.  

Speakers at the summit come from both the spiritual and secular sectors.  Given that Mellado’s first brush with Willow Creek was as a Harvard MBA student, he is not averse to having the church look to the business world for some pointers on leadership.     

On a very basic level, church leaders have always had to balance budgets and manage people.  But leading the church of today can be a daunting challenge.  Willow Creek, for example, holds services across six campuses for 22,000 weekly attendees and operates on an annual budget of over $30 million.   If today’s pastors expect to maintain their congregations and watch them grow, they must be well-versed in administration, management and strategic planning.  WCA provides resources to help them do just that.

But beyond the everyday administration of a smoothly functioning ministry, the continued vitality of the church depends on constant innovation.  That is why WCA has modeled its approach to leadership training partly on the diffusion of the innovation theory of Everett Rogers, who proposed that innovators and early adopters pave the way for meaningful social change.  

“We’re focused on these innovators and early adopters,” he says.  “We’re the ones that find them and connect them to others that are like them so they can learn from each other.  Pioneering is lonely business, but we’re the ones who can remind them they are not alone.”  

As they grease the skids of connection and learning, WCA encourages church leaders to be “very intentional” about their mission “to connect and serve people who are really far from God.”  Doing so means focusing limited resources on leaders who can stretch their minds in boundless, creative ways to minister to the faith communities that depend on them.  

“People’s needs are unlimited,” Mellado says.  The mission is perpetual and urgent.