Dan Hotchkiss, author and congregational consultant
Posted in Congregations, Planning on Mar 6th, 2010
… you might want to listen to this public radio interview with my niece Samira Hotchkiss Mehta about the pre-teen phenomenon Twilight and the Mormon worldview of its author: http://interfaithradio.org/SamiraMehta Interesting in its own right, and in my unbiased opinion, possibly an early glimpse of an up-and-coming public intellectual at work.
Posted in Congregations, Planning on Feb 23rd, 2010
Planning efforts often fail, and one important reason is that leaders underestimate the time it takes for causes to produce effects. Your planning process may discern, for instance, that your mission calls you to invite more people than your current space will hold. But if you build a bigger sanctuary, you will produce dust, noise, [...]
Posted in Planning on Jan 28th, 2008
When churches plan, one of the things they often plan to do is grow. They have their reasons: the Great Commission, for one, and the fact that spreading the gospel is a main point of the congregation’s purpose. But when you get past polite chit-chat, other motives will assert themselves. For clergy, church growth is [...]
Posted in Board governance, Clergy, Planning on Jul 19th, 2007
Around the board table, each leader brings a point of view rooted in subcultures he or she belongs to. Subcultures of sex, race, age, and nationality are often recognized. The Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator can help a group to acknowledge and “normalize” such differences. We have barely yet begun to see how powerful our occupational subcultures [...]
Posted in Planning on Mar 19th, 2007
Years ago a bright Yale student asked me how I would describe the difference between a church and any other charitable group. I gave the sort of answer most of us might give: I emphasized the church’s unique life-transforming mission and its special responsibility to treasure and transmit precious traditions across generations.It was a good [...]
Posted in Board governance, Planning on Mar 1st, 2006
Few projects excite and galvanize a congregation more than a new building or a major renovation. People complain about construction delays, capital campaigns, and the general din and dust, but their blood pumps, their wallets loosen, and their enthusiasm rises. Lyle Schaller went so far as to generalize that congregations that build capital are happier [...]
Posted in Planning, Social ministry on Jul 18th, 2005
Most congregations engage in social ministry to some degree, and most feel that their efforts could be better. But planning for ministries that seek to serve or influence the world beyond the sanctuary can be challenging. Because the world’s needs are so large and complicated, outreach efforts are especially vulnerable to criticism. How, then, to [...]
Some time ago, I created a financial self-evaluation tool for churches. I’ve been testing it informally ever since, and welcome further feedback and suggestions. If you use it, I hope you will post a comment here that will help me to improve the Snapshot. Some questions you might address include: How well do the “benchmarks” [...]