The Muse

In recent years a number of plant managers I've been privileged to know have lost their jobs. Sometimes it was because their manufacturing lines moved overseas. More often than not, especially in the runup to the 2008 recession, it was simply an arithmetic move on the part of C-level executives focused on the quarterly statement in hope to please investors.

My brother Eric Vincent and I have many occasions to talk about Organizational Development. We work together after all.

We are pleased to announce the release Becoming a Steward Leader, the second volume in the Nonprofit Leaders in a For Profit World series being published by Christian Leadership Alliance.

Never have I seen a table filled with so much confection!

At the Recent Christian Leadership Alliance conference in Orlando, FL, my brother Eric Vincent and I taught a six hour intensive called The Art of Agreement. 

I was moved to tears Friday morning as I read the following blog from my friend Rebekah Basinger, about a story told by another friend, Bill Enright, regarding the generosity of the congregation of my childhood that I also later pastored. It serves as a powerful reminder to me that we cannot see all the long-term results of our actions, but that they are there.

This article is adapted from a recent issue of Midweek Manna from First Baptist Church, Beloit WI.

EASTER

We baptized a 91 year old man today,

Sitting presidents and presidential candidates are notorious for confidently stating erroneous and discredited information that press secretaries must clarify later. To a degree this is understandable because of the unwithering and relentless public scrutiny they receive. Any mistake is going to be caught, magnified, caricatured and published. Still, it is a lesson to any organizational leader that they need to be in command of their facts and to offer the front seat to the people who know what they do not.

In Kent Wilson's 2010 doctoral research for the University of Aberdeen on what makes for a steward leader in nonprofit organizations, a good number of the CEO's he surveyed identified steward leadership as not much different than servant leadership.