NCCSDA ClearVoice
It’s ClearVoice. The NCC Communication & Development Department is equipping churches and schools to communicate with clarity, integrity, and purpose. Episodes help listeners tell mission-centered stories, navigate ethical communication, and respond effectively in times of crisis. The goal is simple: develop confident communicators, build trust, strengthen engagement, and advance the mission across Northern California.
NCCSDA ClearVoice
NCC Advantage
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Marc Woodson, President and Jose Marin, Executive Secretary at the Northern California Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, share how the journey toward organizational health, now known as the NCC Advantage, started and explain the difference it has made for the network of churches, schools, and other ministries
Hi, my name is Mark Woodson, and I serve as president of the Northern California Conference. And I'm here with my good friend and colleague, Jose Morin. Jose, how are you doing today? I'm doing great.
SPEAKER_02I'm excited to be here as part of this first podcast on organizational health. And I'm just excited to share a little bit about our journey and hopefully that more churches and ministry leaders are able to take advantage of this huge benefit as what it is organizational health.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm glad you said Advantage because that's the name of this podcast, the NCC Advantage, where we're going to be talking about organizational health as it relates to our office, as it relates to our churches, as it relates to our schools, and uh talk a little bit about the journey that we've been on because as a conference and especially in leadership, we've been on a five-year journey. Can you believe it's been that long? Five years.
SPEAKER_02I mean that's Yeah, it's already five years, but um there's a lot of it that has happened in these last five years.
SPEAKER_00It has, and it's very exciting. So we just thought it'd be great to have a podcast where we're able to share what we've learned uh during those five years, and hopefully it will be a benefit.
SPEAKER_02I think one I think Mark, as we, you know, because I was part, I've been blessed that I've been part of the in the beginning of the journey. And I I think it would be good for us to just to hear how did this come about? How did this dream about having organizational health in Northern California? And I know you have a cool story to share, so share with us why, why organizational health, how did that come up here in Northern? What was the conviction?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, one of the first things, if I can go back a little bit, um when I first came to the Northern California Conference, uh, good friend, colleague who was our education superintendent and who is a leader, shared with me um a few books written by Patrick Lincioni.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00And uh, man, that was back in 2008, and I became kind of a fan uh with Patrick Lincioni's writings. But he wrote a book, um, he's written a number of books, but one book that really stood out was his book called The Advantage. And he's basically in that book saying that organizational health trumps everything else in business or organizations. And uh I read that book, it it was so good, I read it several times. And when I became uh president of this conference uh a few years back, um I was saying we need something like this for our conference, our conference as a whole, and I just began to have questions on how do we do this? You know, how does how does how do we as this big organization, this conference with 150 plus churches and companies and schools, how can we practice practice this? And so it was while I was on um a retreat, I go on an annual retreat for two or three days and spend time just reflecting and asking God for direction. And part of my retreat was reading through the book again, uh, this book, The Advantage. And it had one part in the book toward the end that said, when you're trying to change your organization or when you're trying to bring a different culture to your organization, it might be good to have consultants to help you with that. And I was like, wow, that's interesting. Well, Lencioni has a has an organization, has a business and it's uh the it's the table group business. And uh I would when I got back from that retreat, I said, I wonder if they would help us and what that means. If they help us, and so I went online and uh went to their website, and when you get on the website, you just type in what your organization is like and uh you kind of describe your organization. So I'm describing our Northern California conference with all of its complexities, and sent that uh to them, and I got a response back from a guy named Daniel.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00I got a response back right away, and um I I asked him, I said, How do we do this? Um here's who we are, here's what our conference is like. And one of the things that Daniel, who ultimately has become our consultant, by the way, one of the things he said was, we love working with faith-based organizations, especially churches, because you all are doing a work that makes an impact for all eternity. And he had my attention there. And then he started to answer questions that I had with the size of our conference and what that was like, and he started to answer those questions. And so I like to try to say it was love at first conversation. And from then, um, I felt really convicted and convinced that God was leading us in this direction. But I knew I had to bring this to my um at that time our leadership team, which was our administrative council. Of course, you were part of the you serve as our conference executive secretary. And I remember the word, and I want to hear your response because I remember saying to you all, I really believe if we get involved in this with consultants, this will be a game changer for our conference.
SPEAKER_02So you remember that day? Yeah, I remember that conversation. I was still in my I was in my office, and uh you came and and you we sat down together and you talked about kind of like laid down this dream about having the conference become a healthier organization. Yeah. And one of the things that you wanted to do first was is to change because I had never heard about organizational health. I had never heard I've heard you know about maybe becoming healthier as an organization, but not really any any resources on that. So when you share with that, um one of the things that caught my attention was the whole notion of making better and faster decisions for the organization. Yes. Because as you remember, our past uh administrative council, we would come out, we would have those meetings, we would be so uh exhausted of those, our brain, we were brain dead. We were meeting, we were meeting four hours. Four hours, yeah. And so and the agenda kept getting bigger and bigger. And it seems like we were we're making very little progress on some of these challenges that were coming up. So when you mentioned that, from my mind came up the idea, it's kind of like having a four-lane highway. You know, you've been in freeways where you have a four-lane highway and then all of a sudden it becomes a two-lane highway, and then all the congestion. I've I pictured that was happening to us.
SPEAKER_00Wow, that's a great image.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and so when when you saw talking about, hey, I want to expand the leadership, I want to expand administrative council to be a leadership team. Yeah. Instead of being four about seven or eight. Yeah. And that's the first thing that came to my mind. Oh, that makes sense.
SPEAKER_00Well, it was one of as you mentioned that it was one of the first questions that Daniel, who ultimately became our consultant, asked me once we bought in, right? So the buy-in didn't really take much. I mean, there were four of us who are part of ACCO, as of course the president, executive secretary, that was you. Yeah. Um, our treasurer, John Rasmussen at the time, and then um assistant to the president at Ferguson. So just four of us. Uh, and everyone bought in right away, but this was gonna mean money as well. Yes. And uh I I'm always afraid, you know, going to the treasurer and saying, Hey, here, here's something we don't normally do. Correct. But thank, you know, I'm so grateful to John Rasmussen who said, Mark, if you think this is a good idea, let's invest.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_00And uh that was a that was a blessing. After that buy-in, though, one of the first questions that uh Daniel asked was, Who should be around the table to help you make those better decisions and make them faster? And that's why in my mind I thought, four guys um leading a conference of 41,000 members, I think we need to expand our leadership team. And um so that's where I felt like we needed we needed some female voices at the table.
SPEAKER_02Yes, definitely.
SPEAKER_00Um we needed the perspective from education, we needed the perspective of uh our ministerial director. Yeah, and um so that was that was uh what what went into that and um just expanding our team to give to give more perspective, I think was very important to do that.
SPEAKER_02And for us was a change, right? Because big change. We were we were used to having administrative councils uh a certain way, it was only four of us. Yeah, but this was this presented a big change. Yes. Um, but yet I think we were willing to take the risk and do the change because we saw that this was gonna be different. This was gonna be different. So yes, that was part of the initial for me, and I got excited about it. I got excited about it.
SPEAKER_00It was a different, a different paradigm, a paradigm shift, if you want, which was the beginning really of a culture shift when you go on this journey. You're you're you're in a different place, you're thinking differently, you're gonna see things differently. And so once we signed on uh and uh to have uh this organizational start this organizational health journey, um working with the table group, we had two consultants, um uh Daniel and Casey. Yeah. And uh I I'm glad to say they're still with us today, five years later. Yeah, over five years later. And first thing we had was an off-site.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Do you remember that?
SPEAKER_03Oh yes.
SPEAKER_00That was what do you remember from that off-site? That first off-site. It was during the pandemic, by the way. Right? And we actually we it's the one we had here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, here at the office.
SPEAKER_00We had here at the office because nobody else was here. Yeah, so it was like an off-site.
SPEAKER_02This was our first time coming together in this new format of the leadership team, yeah, where we had the HR director, we have the uh education and ministerial, and then we had also communication at that point. So for us, okay, oh, okay. This was a new team. What's gonna happen now? How are we gonna go about it? Yeah. So that first team for me, it was kind of like unknown. There were some unknowns to it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But the one thing that I will take away from there is the clarity to the sixth question. That for me was the one of the biggest takeaways, like, oh wow.
SPEAKER_00They got us doing that on the very first day. Because this was a two-day off-site, but they got us doing that on the very first day.
SPEAKER_02And then the other thing was getting to know each other as a team player, uh as a team, and the whole notion of becoming vulnerable as a team and getting to know each other to make those better and more and better and faster decisions. That's what that's one of the takeaways. It's just the clarity of answering those six questions in organizational health.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that was one of the things that sticks out to me is them kind of putting us into the world of organizational health by talking about healthy organizations versus smart organizations. Correct. Right? I mean, there's a little bit of debate about verses, right? Because you need what they call the two requirements for success. Yes. Right? And it's being both healthy and smart. Do you remember that? What was what stood out to you on the smart side of things? Yes.
SPEAKER_02And it was interesting uh because I think one of the so it's the the the smart side, and because one of the questions about organizational health in church context that people say, Well, isn't that like business model principles? Yeah. But when you think about church organization, is that we tend to focus on a business model which is the smart side, which is strategy, right? We we we need strategy, we need good financial uh principles. Yeah, finances, uh good finances strategies, and and to be viable as an organization. And I would say the other one is also in terms of technology, being up to up to date with technology. So these are some of the things that we were already doing, right? But we were not focusing on the other part, which is the healthy side. We're making very little progress on some of these challenges that were coming up. So when you mentioned that, from my mind came up the idea, it's kind of like having a four-lane highway. You know, you've been in freeways where you have a four-lane highway and then all of a sudden it becomes a two-lane highway, and then all the congestion. I've I pictured that was happening to us. Wow, that's a great image. Yeah, and so when when you saw talking about, hey, I want to expand the leadership, I want to expand administrative council to be a leadership team. Yeah. Instead of being four about seven or eight. Yeah. And that's the first thing that came to my mind. Oh, that makes sense.
SPEAKER_00And their point is that the healthy side, in a lot of ways, it it maximizes what you do on the smart side. And when we talk about smart side, we're not talking about intelligence, of course. We're talking about kind of the operational things that any organization or business for that matter. And and like it or not, we're in the business. Yes. We're in a business. We're in the business of connecting people to an abundant life in Christ, right? We're in the business of of making disciples for Jesus. It is it is a business, and we fund this business. We have employees. Um, but their idea is that if you become healthy, it enhances everything on the on the smart side. My takeaway too from from that was what they promised. They said, if you're if you're healthy, do you remember this? Yes. If you're healthy, you're gonna have minimal politics. Yes. Right? Uh that's good. And and how they describe politics, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, which is basically is it's it's most of in our churches um context, most of the meetings don't happen in the meeting space. They happen in the hallways or in the parking lot. Right. And so minimal politics is that basically is eliminating those side conversations from real conversation and bringing them back into the meeting space where we're making those decisions.
SPEAKER_00So it sounds like you're talking about those meetings that happen in the parking lot after board meetings over.
SPEAKER_02Yes, well, you know what? I wasn't in agreement with that decision. Yeah. I really think that we should, but that was never brought up in the real meeting. Right. In the real meeting. And I think that's one of the things of organizational health was is that the health side is that it minimizes those politics.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I think that's very important.
SPEAKER_00Right, yeah. And I love one of the definitions they gave that sticks with me is politics is when you is when you change what you say based upon who's in the room. Yeah. And man, that happens a lot, right? So that's why you have those outdoor. Yeah. Another one, and remember it was minimal confusion. Minimal confusion. Minimum confusion. So clarity. The key. When you're when you're and these are really the outcomes, I think, of yes, when you are a healthy organization, healthy business, healthy church, you have minimal confusion. Um I love that part because clarity is so important.
SPEAKER_02And in for example, and the six answers to the answers to the six questions, right? Yeah. Part of the clarity. Yeah. But for me, it was I'm in a role as the as the executive secretary. We have different leaders uh here at the conference level. But the question number three: what do we do? Yeah. I think having that clarity for me, that we we don't do the work of the church. Yeah, we don't do the work of the educators or the pastors. So what's our role? What's our clarity? Yeah. So our clarity is that we operate and we provide the resources for the people in the trenches and for the organization. So for me, it's like, wow, that's my clarity.
SPEAKER_00So clarity and clarity brings alignment.
SPEAKER_02Alignment.
SPEAKER_00Which is one of the things that organizational health boasts about is that you can get alignment. So we're gonna spend, we're gonna, we've got some future episodes, right? That we're gonna talk about those six questions and how that brings uh how that brings uh clarity. Then they talked about high morale. High morale. This is a these are kind of evidences of a healthy organization. High morale, high productivity, yes, and then low turnover. And uh have what do you think? Do you think uh we've been seeing some of those things as we've been on this journey?
SPEAKER_02And and and we have seen it here because we have had different people from the office have invited to serve in other roles and different places, and during this journey, many of those leaders have said, you know what? No, I I don't see myself going right now because I'm excited about what's happening here and having more of the clarity. So it's helped our turnover. Yeah, and at the same time, there were people who were not not a fit. And so that that was that was kind of like the lower turnover. But I would say one of the things that really stood out for me in that first offsite was that even though we even though on organizational health, these are qualitative, yeah, right? It's not like you don't have a data for how do you know you don't measure it necessarily, right? These are qualities. These are quality. But one of the things that really resonated with me from uh Casey and Daniel was that one of the overarching evidences of your organization becoming healthier is joy. Oh, joy in the work. Joy in the work that people come to work with more joy in what they're doing.
SPEAKER_00There's more joy in the meeting, which is probably what brings about high morale, correct, yeah, which brings about productivity because you enjoy you enjoy uh what you're doing in in that. So I I really like that. Well, we're don't have a lot more time, but um this is gonna be exciting. I can't wait till we get to some of the subversions.
SPEAKER_02What are the four disciplines before I I think we can give a little bit of a.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so we'll give that, and then yeah, the so just like and you mentioned this earlier, we were talking about health, you know, and one of the things I like to, or I think they even said this to us, and I've used it when we're talking to uh other organizations, is you know, when you're trying to be physically healthy, yeah, there's certain things you're gonna do, right? Most people say you're gonna, you're gonna, you know, you're gonna get exercise, your diet, you're gonna eat right, um, you're gonna get your rest, um, all those things that go into uh being healthy, right?
SPEAKER_02And how many people do it? Even though they know it? How many people do it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because those are simple, they're simple things, but it takes discipline, right? And so you can't just wake up one day and say, hey, on Monday I'm gonna get good rest, I'm gonna eat right, I'm going to exercise, and then the next day say, Okay, I'm healthy, now I don't have to do any more. Correct. Right? It's a journey. It is a journey. It is something that you're continuing to do. The same thing is true with organizational uh health, to become a healthy organization and a healthy, um, yeah, a healthy business, or a healthy church, healthy school, healthy ministry, there are four disciplines. And uh so the first discipline is kind of what they started us on is building a cohesive leadership team.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And that's when we expanded our team from four to eight at the time. And at that first off site, they worked with us on getting to know each other better and understanding our personalities. And you remember that? Yeah, I remember that. We did the Myers Briggs.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and it's uh it's a vulnerable it's a vulnerable moment. Yeah. Because we you're getting to know who we are, and sometimes we come into I think one of the beautiful things about organizational health in in this first discipline is sometimes we're trying to prove stuff. We're trying to prove that we're competent at what we're doing. And I think organization allows us to say, hey, I'm not gifted in all areas, but maybe I'm gifted in this area, and this is how I can contribute. You fill it in on the on the gaps, and we can help each other.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so that cohesive leadership. We're gonna we've got a whole episode on on that discipline, uh building a cohesive leadership team, right? It's a it's a work in progress. Uh the second discipline that goes along with that, and you've talked about it, this is an area you love, those six questions, it is creating clarity. Creating clarity. And that's uh that's you're gonna hear that word clarity a lot because it shows up in the other uh two disciplines, right? So creating clarity is answering those six questions, and we're not gonna like I said, we've got a whole episode to put toward that as well, those those six questions which which provide your organization clarity. And clarity, and I've said this before, but clarity is so key. Well, the third discipline also talks about clarity, and it is overcommunicating clarity. Yes. Right?
SPEAKER_02Which has to do with the stories, right? The stories of of that clarity, of how now it's beginning to shape and get into the organization.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because you're dealing with uh clarifying your purpose, clarifying your behaviors, your values, right? Your how do you make decisions, right? How you make decisions, um, what is what is gonna be successful.
SPEAKER_02What is the most important thing?
SPEAKER_00What is the most important thing right now? Man, we're gonna be that's gonna be a great episode. We talk about that one, yeah. We talk about those six questions and how that really helps you to clarify for your team. So that's over communicating clarity and the different ways you can communicate. And in this day and age we live in, there's so many different ways that we can communicate. So that's that's gonna be exciting to talk about that as well. And then the do you remember the fourth discipline? Reinforce clarity. Reinforcing clarity. So those things that you've said, here's who we are, here's what we represent, we find ways to to reinforce that with the people that work in that organization.
SPEAKER_02And and now like the evaluations, the things that you put in place, how do you recognize people, how do you rec how do you value people? I think those are the things that now begin to be ingrained in practical ways into the organization popularity.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So that's uh even how you hire people, right? How do you yeah how How you hire people, how you recognize them, as you said. All of that is about uh reinforcing reinforcing clarity.
SPEAKER_02Well one thing I was gonna uh share, because I know we're gonna we're getting ready here. Yeah, I was out of time. Man, we're gonna have to do that. It goes fast when you have very fast. But I think one of the things that as we talk about the four disciplines, one of the things that I have really seen work for organizational health is that this is an operating system.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02That helps you to be disciplined for the health of the organization.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02And I think that's you know, many, how many who doesn't want to be a healthy church?
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02Who doesn't want to be a healthy school?
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02I think all of us.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02But I think the disciplines, many times we lack the disciplines because we don't have a system.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02And organizational health is the system where it helps you to do all those four disciplines you talked about.
SPEAKER_00That's that's such a a great point because so many times people see this as, oh, this is one more program. Yeah right? Program that I need to do. And we're saying, no, it's not a program, it's to enhance what you're already doing. Correct. Yeah. You know, with your work. So all right, that's all the time we have for today. Um, but we're gonna leave with uh a couple of good quotes. Yes, right?
SPEAKER_02Yes. Well, um, I think there the first one is is one that Patrick Lincioni shares, and he says that the diff the difference between a team of champions and a championship team isn't the skill of those athletes, but rather lies in getting everyone rowing in the same direction. I would say, and that's the quickest way to win a gold, I would say that is the goal of organizational health. Yeah, it gets people rowing into the same direction to win gold for Jesus.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And guess what? Before Patrick Lincioni said that, Ellen White said that. Yes, right? Uh, and here's her words. See if you can connect those two. If Christians were to act in concert, moving forward as one, under the direction of one power, we know that's the power of the Holy Spirit, for the accomplishment of one purpose, they would move the world. Wow. So Alan White already said it, and organizational health helps us to bring that alignment so that we can move the world uh for Jesus Christ and for the kingdom of God. So that's our that's our first episode. That's our show for today. Tune in uh to our next episode because we're gonna be talking about discipline number one building a cohesive leadership team. I can't wait for that one. Me neither. Looking forward to it. Thanks, Jose, for partnering with me on this.
SPEAKER_02It was great, great pleasure.