G14 Financial Summit 2

There were no helicopters, motorcycle police, barricades or press.  The simple wooden sign confirmed this was the right place.  I parked under the dark trees and found my way into the building through a back door.   To the right, Sam's breakfast of fried eggs on toast smelled delicious (especially since I'd left home before 6am).  To the left, Andrea was loading a washing machine.  I ducked through a low doorway and into Anthem's large lounge. 

This was review day, when all the Exec groups reported back on 2015's budget exercise.  Steve Line, our former audit partner, stepped briskly into the room  and shook hands with all present.  Huw, sitting beside me with a grave expression, was fidgeting.  Jan positioned himself  - probably unnecessarily - on a back row bench.  Hilary gave out neatly clipped bundles of paper for those who hadn't studied their advance copies.  Mick started us off with a song, scripture reading and prayer.  Ed, co-chairing, invited Steve to open.

"I've lost sleep over what I've found here," he announced, referring to Hilary's pack of reports.  "You have some major decisions to make.  It's not all about cost cutting.  It's about heart and head, and which you'll follow.  You share a DNA, and you can all give reasons why things shouldn't change.  And I've known you all long enough to say that you're very good at talking round things, and then doing nothing about them."

"The best way I can describe it is like a funnel, out of which you need to squeeze some results.  But first you have to put in some weighty decisions, like whether you see yourselves - the whole Church community - as custodians or innovators?  These provide the pressure onto your commitments, strategies and actions.  Do your top level Execs make these decisions?"  Steve's emphasis on 'make' suggested that he knew jolly well...

"As we go through these reports and analyses, I suggest you ask, 'So what?'.  'So what?' if you have low community house occupancy, less than a full weeks' wages, etc.  Like I said, it's heart and mind.  I'm here perhaps just to give an outside perspective.  You'll find that uncomfortable.  And I shall make it uncomfortable, or else you'll do nothing."  'Nemesis' may have been the word Steve used, but he was being a good friend.

The Exec reports and analyses were uniformly excellent.  As Steve had predicted, the community issues provoked most cross-conversation, because they were closest to home.   Folks feel more distanced or detached from various Jesus Centres or business subsidiaries.  By now, Huw was looking even grimmer.

Ed ruthlessly drove each agreed decision marker to an action point, and named a responsible person or group.  Steve insisted that the communication of decisions to all involved - across the Church - must improve.  There was tension: it's true there's been buck-passing, stalling and indecision.  Some of us 'retired' business executives, like Kelly, Ed and I, have made our presence more evident among the not-for-profit entities.  I have to say that there's begun to be a sharper culture, but it's only a start.

We wound down to whether and when we should meet again to pick up progress.  Steve, probably feeling that a good day's work was about to slip through our fingers, interrupted: "No later than the end of March."  Then, even with a nice buffet lunch waiting, he apologised for leaving abruptly, 'to get an afternoon nap'.  That man deserves a quality Xmas hamper from Goodness Foods: I hope Ed made a note.

Financial Summit

Ed was behind it all.  He bumped into Steve Line, who had been our audit manager for a dozen or so years, first with Coopers and Lybrand and latterly with Grant Thornton.  "How're are things going?", Steve had naturally enquired.  Ed was honest.  "We're in a bit of a pickle, with Church business profits on a downward trend (if there at all), and New Creation Christian Community struggling to pay its way as comfortably as we've been used to.  The result is that we're stumped for giving to our charitable Church and Jesus Centres work at the scale we'd like to." 

This was nothing new to our Church members, as the whole situation had been carefully explained at Annual Church Convocation in August.  What to do about it - for the best - was the tricky question. 

Steve, since moving out of 'the profession', has been running an innovative business that recycles carbon fibre.  "Hah, I've found that doing the stuff is a lot different from just giving advice," he sympathised.  "But, keep in touch."  His personalised number-plate Porsche suggested he'd mastered the challenges nicely.

So, late September found about 16 of us, charged with the care of our overall finances, spending the best part of a day chewing things through with Steve.  He was direct and penetrating.  "So, where would you like to be with things in five years' time?" "Whoa!  When I pop along to church there's no chance of getting away without putting something in 'the plate'."  "I detect turmoil!"  "If you ask me, that's a no-brainer."

We'd done an impressive job of condensing the mass of figures and graphs, getting them into everyone's hands in advance, and thus leaving the bulk of the time for deliberation.  Very significantly, we'd also done an exercise to sift through the priorities for saving expenditure so we don't damage emerging future ministry.  (That's now gone to 100 wider members for further evaluation.)  But - painfully - 2015 budgets are going to have more than a whiff of Chancellor of the Exchequer austerity flavour.  Maybe not a bad thing, as we are meant to be a church of the people, and 'community bubble' is an expression you hear around. 

Steven's final conclusion was that across all our entities we hadn't adequately trained up our 'succeeding generation', and were feeling the stress.  We've set up different Exec meetings to shape our responses across our various bits and pieces -'entities' - (businesses, community house common purses, congregational regional funds, Jesus Centres, central events and departments and so on).  Steve's promised to come back and hold a review before the end of the year.  I hope we don't flinch.

Trustee Training

We're working hard on succession for our church trusts and business boards.  For sure, we know that the rising generation will not be prepared to become a fresh pair of legs under an old burden.  They must have a say in shaping for the future.  So, much was to hang on the inter-generational training day that Mick conceived after conversations with our Birmingham-based charity lawyers, Anthony Collins. 

Mick puts a lot into shaping our culture, and it's more that cosmetic.  Well in advance we received an informative programme brief, and I got a schedule of table groups.  The key business players and central office teams were under orders to make themselves - and other people invited - available for the day.  Viv and I drove down together.  He's been 'in attendance' at Charitable Trust (JACT) meetings for a year or so.  It's part of his Professional Development Group programme experience - another initiative running to deliver more sustained input to significant employees going forward into management. 

Cornhill Kings Room was purposefully laid out for the job, and Farhad, Mick's PA, was busy.  Simon, our 'facilitator' for the day, stepped forward and made introductions.  It turned out that he attends the Methodist Church where Mick's family were members, and Mary and I married.  As the 50-plus delegates straggled in, Simon repeated the process.  This, too, was more than cosmetic.  It became apparent during the day that he'd remembered an impressive number of names. 

I was due to lead a group from the Church Life Trust, the top-level instrument for our Regions' organisation.  This would be a new challenge, as I'm most embedded in JACT (the Jesus Centres charity) and our Group businesses board.  Life Trust embraces Multiply, and I wondered if this was how I qualified.  In the event, owing to a few absences, I did end up with a JACT group.  It was just three of us: Jayne and Stevo, from Northampton Jesus Centre, and me.

Simon briefly previewed the day's programme, designed to introduce us into running effective meetings.  The he got us straight into an icebreaker activity.  We had to draw - or write - on a post-it note, what fired up our energy in the work situation and away from it.  Then we had to mingle round and explain it to as many people as possible.  I wrote Research on both halves.  This provoked a snort of derision from Stevo, which wasn't a promising start.

Simon's first session was aimed at challenging mindsets that say the most important component in a meeting is the tasks in hand.  No, it's the people, in all their diversity, ability and experience.  He bobbed from flipchart board to flipchart board (there were three tactically placed at different points in the room), and back to his projector.  Then each table had a go at breaking down the question "what's the big issue facing us" into as many contributions as we could harvest, followed by a synthesis to render all the material into one or two key points.  It was a serious challenge.  In the end, Simon sent round 'flying moderators' to slash through the excess where groups were struggling with the consolidation process.  Brilliant.

Our flipcharts were scooped up for Simon's secretary to compile our final offerings, so that after the coffee break we had the results neatly on the screen.  This had all relied largely on in-house focus.  Session two went the other way - producing an analysis of major environmental factors.  Our table was given the one word the Economy.  This had to be exploded into a set of concrete objectives, by which our Jesus Centres could respond to prevailing circumstances, and plan ahead to remain relevant as trends moved forward.  Over lunch, all this was typed up, too.

After the lunch break, Stevo and I took a stroll.  We exchanged notes on Myanmar - where his parents have just landed for six months' church work, and our community initiative in Northampton's eastern development, where he lives with his family.

Now it was time to tackle techniques for handling change processes, and to demystify buzzwords like brainstorm.  More contributions, more lists; flipchart sheets everywhere.  The activities bounced along, followed by cheers for those who had worked hardest at scribbling down everything.   Simon remained firmly in control of the clock, whilst thanking us for every contribution, and somehow managing to turn it to use.  In the finale, the room broke into two, and we competed for even the wackiest suggestions to make meetings more effective. 

"I've no idea how I'll use all this in the meetings as we have them," Jen commented afterwards.  No, I can't see us deliberating while remaining standing up, or taking the agenda in reverse order.  But it was a glimpse of the fact that we could, if so inclined.