Last week, I read this article that's been floating around for the last little while - I'm sure many of you have read it, too. It's a fascinating account of a Google ex-employee - I'd assumed it was going to be someone firing up about something controversial, but in actual fact, it's a pretty balanced account of one person's perception of the shifting culture at Google.
While it's always important to be careful to remember that we all have our own perspectives which sway how we look at the world, from a philosophical angle, the article triggered a couple interesting thoughts for me...
Google has always been one of the companies people would say was in their top 5 desired workplaces. The facilities (cool place to work), the 20% rule (being given 1 day per week to work on a side project of your choosing), huge innovative environment (new ideas and new products all the time)... who wouldn't want to work there?
All of us have a desire to be in a place where we're appreciated, where we have the opportunity to dream, to come up with new ways of doing and where we don't just have to accept the Status Quo. Certainly in the world I spend most of my time, I'm very aware of that - the young (and even some of our older people) who are part of our churches are looking for a place that has a clear core (core values, core principles), but plenty of room to organically explore what that looks like. When it does... look out.
What does seem to have shifted at Google is the sense of "we now have to not only protect what we have, but we have to be like them so we can keep being at the centre". To me, that's the most dangerous attitude for anyone to have. As soon as we start focusing more on preservation than innovation, we're done. I remember Charlie Walsh, who worked with cyclists at the Australian Institute of Sport, saying that if we stand still and try to hold on to where we are (even if that's number 1), if we just keep doing what we've been doing, others around us are innovating and thinking of new ways to catch us and will overtake us.
Equally dangerous is to look at what someone else is doing and say "they're starting to take some of the number 1 from us - let's do what they're doing, only better (because we're number 1) and we can keep our number 1 place." Obviously, in this context I'm not talking about organizations that are already focused on similar areas.
In the church, sadly, I've seen this play out time and again - we focus too much either on trying to hold on to what we have (preservation) or we focus on what others are doing and say "if we were just like that, then we'd be back in the centre" (could play out in terms of looking at copying things that are successful in culture or in copying what other churches are doing).
For me, I desperately want to be part of a community that knows who they are and what they're on about - knowing what's at the heart and core of who we are. With that locked in, I then want to create opportunities for us to innovate, experiment and try new things, knowing all the time that we're holding on to what makes us "us". Sure, I want to learn from other people, other churches, other organizations and the culture around me, but in the end, I want to be able to allow the DNA that we have to produce organic fruit that is reflective of exactly where we are. What about you?
What areas of my life do I feel like I have to protect? Why?
When am I guilty of looking at what others are doing and thinking "I need to do that so that I can be as successful as them?"
How am I helping create organic, innovative community?
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