A ROSE by any other name?
Business Week has a fascinating article on Best Buy's efforts to transform organizational culture through a program called Results-Only Work Environment. (ht: SBSDiva) Basically, the idea is that in an age of ubiquitous wireless, transcontinental contacts, and increasing stress, employees can have more control and thus be more productive by working when and where they need to. The company describes a ROWE as "one where people do whatever they want whenever they want as long as the work gets done." Best Buy claims significant improvements in productivity in their formerly seat- and face-time dependent culture. They've even formed a subsidiary called CultureRx to evangelize this concept with other corporations.
Their website summarizes the imperative on their website:
"Stop thinking of work as someplace you go... Start thinking of work as something you do."
Hmmm. This sounds suspiciously like the missional church movement to be less "attractional" than "incarnational," to focus less on getting people into our (God's?) house and getting God, through us, into their house.
Imagine if we stopped thinking of church as someplace we go, and instead lived it out as something we are. What if we focused on Relationship-Oriented Spiritual Environments (sm), where we stopped worrying about people's pew time and valued their relationship time with Christ, with their families, with people at the margins, with each other in environments that allow for life-changing spiritual conversation and growth. What if we figured out, like Best Buy, how to relate not just as a group of people occupying the same sanctuary on the same day and time, but as interrelated networks of people on a mission? Could e-mail exchanges and coffeeshop conversations have the impact of "a service?" (Many people, even church people, I think, would already say 'yes.') Can meals, or serving meals, be as sacramental as the official Meal? Can we focus on being part of God's mission rather than just putting in time?
How can we make the faith community's power to form and inform its people something that is available 24/7, at the cabin or soccer field or fellowship hall, rather than an hour a week in the sanctuary? (I've written about this before.) How can we empower each other to have more to say to a neighbor or co-worker who is seeking other than, 'You should come to my church?'
There's nothing really new here other than a language and a perspective that tweaks our conventional wisdom. Given that the church is not a business but is, as is Best Buy, an organization of individuals working together on a mission, there might be something to listen to here. The church's mission -- God's mission -- is a far better thing to devote one's time and energy to, IMHO. But if we looked honestly at our performance in being part of that mission, would we say we're doing better than Best Buy?
This is, according to BW, ROWE's commandment number 1 (there are 13): "People at all levels stop doing any activity that is a waste of their time, the customer's time, or the company's money."
What would it look like if we structured the church so that Christians, "professional" and non, stopped any activity that didn't bring people into a deeper relationship with Christ and God's people, and wasted money that could change the lives of people at the margins?
Their website summarizes the imperative on their website:
"Stop thinking of work as someplace you go... Start thinking of work as something you do."
Hmmm. This sounds suspiciously like the missional church movement to be less "attractional" than "incarnational," to focus less on getting people into our (God's?) house and getting God, through us, into their house.
Imagine if we stopped thinking of church as someplace we go, and instead lived it out as something we are. What if we focused on Relationship-Oriented Spiritual Environments (sm), where we stopped worrying about people's pew time and valued their relationship time with Christ, with their families, with people at the margins, with each other in environments that allow for life-changing spiritual conversation and growth. What if we figured out, like Best Buy, how to relate not just as a group of people occupying the same sanctuary on the same day and time, but as interrelated networks of people on a mission? Could e-mail exchanges and coffeeshop conversations have the impact of "a service?" (Many people, even church people, I think, would already say 'yes.') Can meals, or serving meals, be as sacramental as the official Meal? Can we focus on being part of God's mission rather than just putting in time?
How can we make the faith community's power to form and inform its people something that is available 24/7, at the cabin or soccer field or fellowship hall, rather than an hour a week in the sanctuary? (I've written about this before.) How can we empower each other to have more to say to a neighbor or co-worker who is seeking other than, 'You should come to my church?'
There's nothing really new here other than a language and a perspective that tweaks our conventional wisdom. Given that the church is not a business but is, as is Best Buy, an organization of individuals working together on a mission, there might be something to listen to here. The church's mission -- God's mission -- is a far better thing to devote one's time and energy to, IMHO. But if we looked honestly at our performance in being part of that mission, would we say we're doing better than Best Buy?
This is, according to BW, ROWE's commandment number 1 (there are 13): "People at all levels stop doing any activity that is a waste of their time, the customer's time, or the company's money."
What would it look like if we structured the church so that Christians, "professional" and non, stopped any activity that didn't bring people into a deeper relationship with Christ and God's people, and wasted money that could change the lives of people at the margins?
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And I'm not surprised at how the workplace is looking "missional". (In fact, I think the workplace beat the church to it, but that's a matter for historians to settle.) It all goes back to a desire we have for significance, or meaning. I think its built into the fabric of our souls.
Church is not somewhere we go, it is something we are. I think that gets to the essence of what we mean by "emerging." My evangelical brothers knee-jerk about this. They tend to be modernists who cling to their absolute security-blanket. They are afraid of relativism. But the battle they are waging is already lost. They just are in denial about it.
I'm not into conflict if it isn't necessary. I say my piece and let it go. Sooner or later the impact will be felt. The steamroller of the post-modern world is already flattening the foundations of the past.