This section of Seth Godin’s book has some insight for us as we lead others in the world of sport. We who are engaged in Sports Ministries are creating movements of the spiritual sort. Let’s gather some wisdom from Godin’s thoughts about micromovements.
“This is the heart of the matter: every leader cares for and supports a movement.” That’s us. We care for and support the movement of God’s Spirit in the lives of men and women of the sports world.
“Today, you can have a narrow movement, a tiny movement, a movement in a silo. Your movement can be known by ten or twenty people, by people in your community of people around the world.” Our teams vary in size and composition, but this principle is very encouraging. We don’t need a group of thousands of followers to effect change and to create movement. We don’t need hundreds of followers for our twitter account or a minimum number of friends on facebook to have deep, significant leverage within a community and to lead a genuine movement.
“The key elements in creating a micromovement consist of five things to do and six principles:
1. Publish a manifesto.
2. Make it easy for your followers to connect with you.
3. Make it easy for your followers to connect with each other.
4. Realize that money is not the point of a movement.
5. Track your progress.
Principles:
1. Transparency is really your only option.
2. Your movement needs to be bigger than you.
3. Movements that grow, thrive.
4. Movements are made most clear when compared to the status quo or to movements that work to push the other direction.
5. Exclude outsiders.
6. Tearing others down is never as helpful to a movement as building your followers up.”
Let’s now consider these items one at a time with application to our spiritual micromovements within sports clubs, teams and organizations.
“Publish a manifesto.” Many teams and clubs do this and do it effectively through stating their purpose statements, team values, goals, etc… Many do not. We may be among those most qualified to help our teams to crystalize their values and goals into a clear statement and to express it well. This sort of action leads to unification of the individuals around powerful ideas.
“Make it easy for your followers to connect with you.” For most teams this is what happens at practice, during team meetings, watching videotape and other activities; they connect with their leaders, the coaching staff. In our role as sport chaplains, sport mentors or character coaches, we must be intentional about creating moments and situations which the players and coaches can effectively connect with us. That certainly happens face to face, but it can also be via email, phone calls, SMS text messages, facebook, twitter and other things I’m just not aware of yet.
“Make it easy for your followers to connect with each other.” This is where a lot of teams break down. They can connect the coaches and the players well, but getting the connection between players is much more difficult. We have found good success in this regard with what we term “team building exercises.” Our way of doing this with sports teams doesn’t involve activities like ropes courses, rather it engages the players in conversation, creating connections between them through interaction related to passion for the game, core values, family, and more. If you’d like to discuss how this process could work with your teams, send me an email and we can talk it over. I’d be pleased to contribute to your success in connecting people.
“Realize that money is not the point of a movement.” Resources (monetary or otherwise) simply help to fuel the movement, they are not the real goal. The best coaches know this. The best sport chaplains also know this. In the same moment as we decide to “cash in” on the movement, we’ll probably kill it also. Beware the ever-present sin of greed. If we should sacrifice our movement’s integrity in order to “get paid” we lose and so do all those whose hearts we lead.
“Track your progress.” Sports teams do this even without thinking, they track the progress of everyone and everything. What they measure tells us a lot about what they value. It’s the same in sports ministries. What we measure and track re: progress reveals a lot about what we really value. What looks like progress to you? What do you measure? What do you really value? Answer these hard questions and then track your progress as your movement grows.
“Transparency is really your only option.” The more we hide, the less we’re trusted. Keep things transparent and simple in your ministries, especially financial things. The all too regular public failures of ministry and sports leaders illustrates this principle very well.
“Your movement needs to be bigger than you.” Some coaches get this, others don’t. Some think they’re bigger than the game or their institution, others understand that the sport will continue long after they’re fired, retired or dead. Some of us in sports ministry also lose track of our place in the larger process. We would be well served to cultivate an attitude that sees our movement, our team, our ministry and certainly the Lord’s purposes for each person in our movement as much larger than us. This can be accomplished by wise partnership with other trusted colleagues, mentors and leaders we’re developing.
“Movements that grow, thrive.” The point here is to focus on steady growth over instant, explosive expansion. Good sports coaches call this being process oriented rather than simply results oriented. They focus on player development over the long haul is more effective than a utilitarian attitude which uses the player for what he can give and then discards him in favor of a new one. Sport ministry leaders should learn from this principle by staying focused on principle driven, relational development of individuals and micromovements rather than organizational, pragmatic and global movements which are more impressive to donors.
“Movements are made most clear when compared to the status quo or to movements that work to push the other direction.” Coaches do this with their teams by making comparisons with other teams, other programs, other systems or even the past coaching staffs. They use statistics and their core values to draw contrasts between their program and their rivals. Sadly, some sports ministries draw similar distinctions in the competition for donor dollars and volunteers. Wiser comparisons can be made related to the status quo in terms of the core values, goals and personal development of those in their care.
“Exclude outsiders.” Most of us probably had an immediately repulsive reaction to this statement, but it’s really insightful. Teams do this most simply. No one not on the team has access to the changing room, to team meetings, to wearing uniforms, to riding the team bus, etc… If you’re not on the team, you’re excluded, it’s normal. As we serve sports teams and individuals, exclusivity is also not just proper, but even mandatory. We are often in possession of private and privileged information which if handled improperly could be hurtful or embarrassing to many people. We must exclude outsiders (media, fans, other teams and sometimes even family) from information and settings which are reserved for those directly associated with the team.
“Tearing others down is never as helpful to a movement as building your followers up.” Again, the wisest coaches don’t spend much time tearing down their opponents, rather they work to build up their teams. We who serve in sports ministries can learn from this note. Sometimes in explaining the distinctive advantages of our particular brand of ministry, we fall into the trap of sharing the distinctive flaws in the others. Suddenly we’re comparing our ministry with Brand X. “We’re better than them because…” Such marketing strategies are unwise and worse, childish and dishonorable to our Lord. Let’s commit ourselves to the building up of those who are running in our lane. Let’s focus our minds toward the building up of those in our micromovement. With a wise, altruistic attitude toward everyone in ministry, we stand with our Lord who said, “Other sheep have I which are not of this fold.”
As you develop your own micromovement, do these five things and mind these six principles. In doing so, you’ll discover new ways to lead and to engage the hearts of those in your silo movement of ten, your miniature movement of a hundred, your community or even the whole world.
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