I’m not much of a handyman. Sure, I can fix stuff. That’s not the issue. The problem is that when I get into fix-it mode, I start to fix stuff that’s not really broken. I’ll find something that’s slightly off kilter, working at less than optimum capacity, or something that doesn’t match up to my sense of aesthetics, and I’ll start tampering with it.
Sometimes it works out well. I’ll call my wife over to admire my handiwork, and she’ll agree that it looks or works a lot better than before.
But most of the time, my attempts are just a waste of time. When I call my wife over to admire what I’ve done, she’ll tell me that she can’t tell any difference, and she will remind me that it wasn’t broken to begin with. Far worse are the times when my tinkering with something that isn’t working perfectly results in something that no longer works at all.
I hate trying to explain how I broke something by trying to fix it, especially when no one else thought it was broken.
Yet I know I’m not alone. Many of you have done the same thing. It’s something that lots of leaders do. They tinker with anything that strikes them as less than ideal or fails to match up to their standards. They think it’s the pathway to constant improvement and innovation. But most of the time they’re just breaking stuff, and they end up destroying morale.
Serial innovators and successful change agents don’t fall into the tinkering trap. They don’t try to fix everything that’s broken or improve things that aren’t running perfectly. Instead, they focus on fixing the things that will make the biggest difference. They know that a better mousetrap, a more efficient keyboard, or an ingenious new mode of transportation won’t change anything if no one wants it or cares.
So how do we identify the changes — the fixes — that will make the biggest difference? How can we learn what people care about, what they see as broken, and what they’ll buy into if we fix it?
There are no easy answers. This is often more of an art than a science. But if you want to find the kinds of ideas that lead to genuine innovation, changed paradigms, and things that people actually want and use, start by asking yourself two simple questions:
It’s in the answers to these two questions that innovation is most likely to be birthed.
Let me explain.
WHAT FRUSTRATES YOU MOST?
The first question you want to ask yourself is, “What frustrates me most?” Why? Because organizational innovation is often ignited by our deepest personal frustrations.
I’m not talking about low-level annoyances. I’m talking about gnawing frustration, the kind that arises when we’re forced, on a recurring basis, to deal with something that makes no sense. It might be a bureaucratic process, an outdated program that wastes badly needed funds and emotional energy, or a maddening piece of machinery that never works right.
Most people, when faced with these kinds of frustrations gripe about it, mock it with sarcastic humor, or inwardly seethe. But beyond that, they do nothing to change it.
Innovators and successful change agents are different. They will gripe, whine, and tell sarcastic stories like the rest of us. But they’ll also grab a sheet of paper and start imagining something different or head to the garage and start fiddling with that annoying piece of machinery. They can’t help themselves. They’re born to fix what doesn’t work and change what they don’t like. It’s how God made them.
Here’s the good news. You don’t have to be a naturally born innovator to ignite the innovation process. You just have to be frustrated enough to believe there’s a better way. You don’t have to be the one who comes up with the better way.
Think of it this way. The innovators in your organization are like the running backs on a football team. They can’t succeed alone. They need an offensive line to open holes for them to run through. Even the greatest running backs can’t succeed without an offensive line, but an average running back can look like an all-star behind the bruising blocks of a great offensive line.
So if you’re a leader who isn’t particularly innovative, look for the people within your organization who are. Find those who share your frustrations but also have a list of things they’d like to try to make it better. Then take on the role of an offensive lineman. Use your position, power, and influence to open up holes for them to run through. Search for opportunities to give their new ideas a trial run. Let them experiment whenever possible. Become their benefactor and protector.
Most of their ideas will fail. But don’t worry about that.
Just as in football, it takes lots of plays that go nowhere to get a few plays that score touchdowns. As a leader, your role is to make sure your innovators don’t fumble and lose the ball on the plays that go nowhere. To do this, position their ideas as trial runs and experiments. And don’t forget. Always make sure you have an exit strategy in place before you let anyone run with the ball.
WHAT’S BROKEN MOST?
The second powerful question you can ask is, “What’s broken most?”
The organizations with a history of serial innovation are also the organizations with a long list of problems to be solved. Not much innovation takes place when everything runs smoothly or the future seems certain. It’s the panicked and paranoid (or those backed into a corner) who innovate.
Problems are never fun, especially big ones. Most of us spend our lives trying to avoid them. But if you’re a leader, they can’t be avoided. So don’t run from them. Don’t ignore them. Embrace them and attack them. Your greatest insurmountable problems often will contain the seeds of your most significant innovations.
That’s regularly been the case at North Coast.
Years ago we had a sanctuary that seated barely five hundred people, yet we had more than three thousand showing up each weekend. This would have been lots of fun if we were playing a massive game of musical chairs. But we were trying to do church.
Now, that might not sound like a problem. It might even sound like a blessing to some. But it wasn’t. It was a mess. We were in danger of becoming like the restaurant that’s always so crowded that nobody goes there anymore (no one except the foodies who don’t mind the long wait and large groups of people celebrating special occasions).
For a church trying to reach people who don’t go to church, this was a potential death knell. People who love going to church might put up with crammed facilities, bad parking, and weird time slots, but people who don’t normally go to church won’t put up with any of these things.
Putting up a “No More Room in the Inn” sign was also not an option. We didn’t think the innkeeper was the hero of the Christmas story.
We had to do something. So we came up with a concept we called “video venues.” The idea was to add simultaneous worship services, each one having its own live worship experience, style, and ambiance, but sharing the same sermon on a large video screen. We figured we could expand faster and cheaper by finding more rooms for video venues than we could by attempting to build a bigger sanctuary to accommodate everyone.
Lots of people thought we were crazy. Shoot, most of my staff thought I was crazy. “Who wants to watch a sermon on a big screen?” they asked. To most of them, it sounded like a glorified overflow room. And we all know what an overflow room is: it’s a punishment for being late. Who would choose that?
Turns out, lots of people.
The first weekend, we offered Starbucks coffee and some danishes as a reward for those who attended. One hundred seventy-three people showed up. We filled a small room to capacity, twice. Within a couple of years, we had twenty-three hundred adults attending one of these venues each weekend. And though our church had grown to well over five thousand in weekend attendance, we had room for more.
Why did this work? It worked because while most things don’t translate well on a screen (thus the dreaded overflow experience), teaching does. In fact, speaking works exceptionally well on a screen. It’s easier for people to see facial expressions and other nonverbals. That’s why in large rooms with the speaker on a screen, everyone beyond the seventh row watches the screen instead of the stage. They can see the speaker better.
Our biggest problem turned out not to be such a big problem after all. It led to an innovation that changed everything, in a good way. Since that time, we’ve built a beautiful new campus that can accommodate thousands more. But our new facility doesn’t have a single, massive sanctuary. It has numerous large meeting rooms that house more than twenty worship venues each weekend. And we’ve added off-site video campuses as well.
As I write this, our weekend attendance is well over eleven thousand and continues to increase. Seventy-five percent of our congregation chooses to attend one of our video venues or a video campus, and we have the ability to scale this up to accommodate thousands more.
What was once a weird idea in a Southern California church has now become mainstream for larger churches across the country and around the world. Currently, more than five thousand churches in America use some sort of multisite strategy, with more churches being added every week. And it all started because we had an insurmountable problem, one we were unwilling to live with.
The thing that was most broken ended up igniting the innovation that now works best — our video venues and multistite campuses.
RIPE FOR CHANGE
It doesn’t matter whether you are leading a church, a nonprofit, or a business. To identify the programs, processes, and policies that are most ripe for innovation and change, step back and ask yourself, “What frustrates me most?” And then ask, “What’s broken most?”
When you’ve come up with your answers, attack the problem. Relentlessly pursue every possible alternative. You might not be able to come up with a solution on your own. But eventually, someone will. And I guarantee you, it won’t be someone who accepts the status quo or who says, “That’s just the way it is; there’s nothing we can do about it.” It will be someone who is frustrated.
To help you think through your areas of greatest frustration and the problems that are most ripe for change and innovation, here’s a list of questions that you and your team can work through to prime the pump. These questions will help pinpoint the programs, processes, and mechanisms that are most ready for something different.