John Pearson's Buckets Blog

Tales From the Top (Coaching)

Issue No. 242 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting features an extraordinarily jam-packed book of crucial coaching questions and leadership notes like this one: “Businesses and leaders reduce their own effectiveness when they attempt too much.” Plus, this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Crucial Coaching Questions

I was tempted to title this eNews, “Dangerous Place.”  Graham Alexander, who tags himself “The World’s #1 Executive Coach,” warns: “…if you think you are doing everything right, you are in a dangerous place.”

Normally I dismiss ego-driven books and especially ego-driven titles like “World’s #1 Pastor, World’s #1 Politician, etc.” But a good friend, Werner Jacobsen, highly recommended this book. We kind of coach and mentor each other over breakfast a couple of times each year. (I may nominate him for World’s #1 Talent Manager, his pre-retirement profession.)

Werner’s book pick is golden.  In my consulting work, I also do coaching—and this book is both my Coaching 101 and Coaching 401 gold standard.  Great coaches ask great questions (Alexander calls them “Million-Dollar Questions”):

   --What are you hiding?
   --List the things that you have never discussed with complete openness and honesty with anyone.
   --What are you afraid of?
   --Do you nip negativity in the bud?
   --Are your customers thrilled?

The coaching stories are numerous and relevant to any leader with a pulse. Alexander writes about a newly promoted executive: “During a discussion about something unrelated to the frantic pace he was keeping, I stopped the conversation and said, ‘With respect, I don’t want to continue this conversation. I want you to tell me honestly, How are you feeling?’

“That simple question stopped him cold. He thought about it for a few minutes and then replied, ‘I haven’t admitted this to anyone else, because I am fearful it would have a demotivational effect on people, but I will answer you honestly. I’ve been in this business for thirty years. I thought I knew everything about this business and that I’d be able to succeed in this role. That’s why I took it on. But I want to tell you that it’s ten times harder than I could ever have imagined. I’m not at all sure I can succeed.’”

As Max De Pree famously said, “The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality.”  Coaching can help leaders get reality (that elephant in the room) smack dab out on the table.

The coaching primer has 10 chapters with 10 probing questions. The pure gold in the book is there for the taking: two-page executive summaries of each chapter (20 priceless pages), each with about 30 bullet points in four categories: Million-Dollar Questions, Action Items, Leadership Notes and Wake-Up Calls.  Brilliant.

Million-Dollar Questions: “What knowledge about yourself are you missing that could make a significant difference in your life and/or your company’s performance?” “What’s the one missing piece in your puzzle?”

Action Items: “Give it away. Identify three areas of responsibility and ten places you are involved to give away.”

Leadership Notes: “Whenever you have a grievance, only take it to somebody who can fix it. Only have conversations with people who can affect things positively.”

Wake-Up Calls: “Slay the sacred cows.” “Identify meetings you are no longer going to attend and what meeting agenda items you are going to drop from the meetings you run.”

Use this book two ways: for your own enrichment (you’ll be convinced on the value of finding a coach)—and for tools and insights for coaching others. In the final chapter, Alexander asks a hum-dinger: “Are the people I lead stressed out? What legacy am I leaving?”

Coaches who are Christ-followers will want to have this book in one hand and the new book, The Cure (see my review), in the other hand—a perfect blend of leadership savvy and grace.

To order this book directly from Amazon, click on the graphic below: Tales from the Top: 10 Crucial Questions from the World's #1 Executive Coach, by Graham Alexander.  (Note: copies of this 2007 out-of-print book may be limited. Order quickly!)

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) In our delusional leadership patterns, we frequently announce that life will be normal once we get over the “next hump.” (How’s that working out for you?) Alexander asks, “Are you routinely breaking promises to yourself and your family regarding your schedule?”
2) Here’s another Million-Dollar Question for you: “What on your to-do list today, if not done, would have catastrophic consequences for the business?” Now…how do you balance Questions 1 and 2?

Results-Driven vs. Activity-Driven - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in my book, Mastering the Management Buckets, is to model, mentor, coach, preach and practice the importance of creating a results-driven culture versus an activity-driven culture.

Graham Alexander (see above) asks, “Would you rather have the results you want in life, or the reasons you haven’t got them?”

For a free download of the first chapter, The Results Bucket (one of 20 core competencies), and a weekly staff meeting worksheet, “When the Horse Is Dead, Dismount!” visit The Results Bucket webpage.

Eat That Frog!

Issue No. 241 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting highlights a best-selling book for your weekly Procrastinators Anonymous self-help group.  And in my bucket commentary this issue: why you should stop describing your workplace as a “family.” Plus, this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Procrastination Smorgasbord Antidotes

Stop whining about your overwhelming workload—and listen up! Author Brian Tracy has good news and bad news for you. “…the fact is that you are never going to get caught up. You will never get on top of your tasks. You will never get far enough ahead to be able to get to all those books, magazines, and leisure time activities that you dream of.”

The author and executive coach adds, “And forget about solving your time management problems by becoming more productive. No matter how many personal productivity techniques you master, there will always be more to do than you can ever accomplish in the time you have available to you, no matter how much it is.”

The good news? Frogs!

He quotes Mark Twain’s wit and wisdom, “Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.”

So Tracy serves up two frog rules and 21 ways to stop procrastinating and accomplish more in less time.

Frog Rule #1. “If you have to eat two frogs, eat the ugliest one first.”
    
Frog Rule #2. “If you have to eat a live frog at all, it doesn’t pay to sit and look at it for very long.”

Time management books are a dime a dozen.  So what’s different about this one—and why should you read it?

Instead of tasting the frogs, taste these chapter titles:
   --Apply the 80/20 Rule to Everything
   --Practice Creative Procrastination
   --Focus on Key Result Areas
   --Upgrade Your Key Skills

I recommend books that align with my 20 buckets (core competencies).  They must also have alignment with the best leadership and management writers.  The author references Peter Drucker, Stephen Covey and others whose works complement this must-read procrastination fix-it book.

I’ve mentioned before that my friend and mentor, George Duff, reads Drucker’s The Effective Executive (“know your time”) once a year.  Covey’s four quadrant diagram in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is mentally tattooed on my forehead. A look in the mirror reminds me: Am I focused on the correct quadrant? Several clients report that Getting Things Done, by David Allen, has dramatically changed their daily productivity.

So…what do you read every year, especially in January, to keep yourself and your team members focused on Priority #1?  Try Tracy’s book. You can read it in about 90 minutes (117 pages)—and the 21 short chapters with two “Eat That Frog!” next steps are perfect for a weekly “Procrastinators Anonymous” self-help meeting. 

“Hi. My name is John and I’m a procrastinator.
Please pass the donuts.”

If you’ve conquered procrastination, you will still find the 21 strategies valuable—especially as you coach others. “One strategy might be effective in one situation and another might apply to another task. All together, these 21 ideas represent a smorgasbord of personal effectiveness techniques that you can use at any time, in any order or sequence that makes sense to you at the moment.”

The one-liners are memorable—and poster-worthy:
   --“Goals are the fuel in the furnace of achievement.”
   --“Just find out what other successful people do and do the same things until you get the same results. Learn from the experts.”
   --“One of the very worst uses of time is to do something very well that need not be done at all.”
   --“Before you begin scrambling up the ladder of success, make sure it is leaning against the right building.” (Stephen Covey)
   --“It only takes about 10 to 12 minutes for you to plan out your day, but this small investment of time will save you up to two hours (100 to 120 minutes) in wasted time and diffused effort throughout the day.”
   --“Resist the temptation to clear up small things first.”
   --“Time management is really life management, personal management. It is really taking control of the sequence of events.”

Idea: buy a dozen books to share with your team members. Delegate to a point person who will recruit people for five-minute chapter summaries at each of your next 21 staff meetings.

To order this book directly from Amazon, click on the graphic below for Eat That Frog! 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time, by Brian Tracy. (And thanks to Bob Neill for this excellent recommendation!)

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) Somehow, we always get payroll out on time!  Brian Tracy’s Law of Forced Efficiency says, “There is never enough time to do everything, but there is always enough time to do the most important thing.” How effectively do you manage your time?
2) Myth-buster! The author writes, “Under the pressure of deadlines, often self-created through procrastination, people suffer greater stress, make more mistakes, and have to redo more tasks than under any other conditions.” Have you believed the myth that you’re more productive under deadline pressures?

We Are NOT a Family! - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in my book, Mastering the Management Buckets, is that leadership and management is complicated—and you need to balance all three legs of the three-legged stool: Cause, Community and Corporation.

I noticed an organization’s website recently that described their staff and board as a “family.”  Oops!  That works for a while (and wouldn’t it be wonderful?), until someone in the family (Community) gets fired (Corporation) because the team member, for example, was activity-driven versus results-driven (Cause). 

Effective leaders maintain a delicate balance of all three legs on the stool—not just the family (Community) leg—and to ignore the other two legs invites more complicated problems sooner or later.

For a list of the 20 buckets (core competencies) grouped under the three legs of Cause, Community and Corporation, visit the The Bucket webpage.

JOIN IN! WORKSHOPS, ROUNDTABLES & BLOGS

March 13, 2012 (Dallas) – ECFA Spring Nonprofit Forum (Day 1): Nine Governance Essentials for Nonprofits (with Dan Busby, Michael Batts, Richard Hammar, Steve Macchia and John Pearson)

March 23, 2012 (Brea, Calif.) – CEO Dialogues Roundtable (with Mark Holbrook, Ed Morgan and John Pearson)

ECFA Blog on “Governance of Christ-centered Organizations” – Add your thoughts and comments to John Pearson’s weekly blog posts, including, “What Drains Your Board Members?”

 

 

Boost!

Issue No. 240 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting helps you ease into 2012 with an easy-to-read 52-page “boost” that might also give your team a new tool for blessing your customers, donors, board members, volunteers and others. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Outside-the-Book Boosts

Happy New Year! If you still have unread books from 2011, I’m giving you grace—and a soft landing for 2012—with this issue’s brilliant book, plus a brilliant idea.

Think about this one on two levels:

Level #1: a very unique way to bless your family, or your team, or your board, or your donors, or your volunteers—or all of the above; a page-at-a-time.

Level #2: Borrow the author’s idea—and create a similar-type book, published by your organization.  I’ll explain.

The book itself—with bright graphics, unique size and rich, thick, coated card stock—invites you (no…compels you) to thumb the pages. The title grabs you: Boost! (Hey…I could use a boost!). The subtitle revs up the motor: “52 Infusions of Wisdom to Revolutionize the Way You Think and Live.”  Hmmm.

Here’s the simple, but radical idea: each of the 52 pages has a Twitter-length thought and a Bible verse.  The back side of each page/card is blank, designed so you’ll detach one page per week—and presto—you’ll now have a year’s worth of wisdom “infusions” to post on your refrigerator, desk or in your car.

Example: “Fight these three evils all your days: cynicism, fatalism, and narcissism. Instead, look for and embrace these three friends: faith, hope, and love.” (I Corinthians 13:13)

My own market research with Boost! was pure gold.  I passed the book around the table at a recent board meeting—and asked members to detach one of the 52 pages and then share the wisdom.  Several mentioned how the verse, and/or the thought, was especially appropriate to the challenges they faced that week. Bingo! (Or should I say “Boosto!”)

Dean Curry, the author, is pastor of LifeCenter, Tacoma, Wash., and uses these inspirational and motivational “shots” to encourage people when he speaks to service organizations and Fortune 500 companies. Like this one: “Gratitude makes problems small and lets God be big.”

Honest: it would be very tempting to list another 20 or 30 of his tweets here—they are that good (and equaled only by the outstanding graphics)—but then you wouldn’t buy the book, and his copyright lawyer would call me!  So…buy the book!

When the book arrives, then host a “Boost! Brainstorm Breakfast” and discern if the “Level #2” idea might work for your organization.  Think about creating your own 52-card book with 52 wisdom thoughts. If you work with churches, ask 52 pastors to contribute a page; or 52 donors, or 52 volunteers, or 52 students, or 52 homeless shelter guests.  You get the idea.  But get Curry’s book first—the gold standard in packaging—so you’re not tempted to photocopy or quick print your finished product. Cheesy doesn’t bless!

To order this book directly from Dean Curry Books, click on this title: Boost! 52 Infusions of Wisdom to Revolutionize the Way You Think and Live.

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) What would be your Twitter-length (140 characters) “wisdom infusion” for an inspirational book?
2) Author Dean Curry’s radical outside-the-box idea was to tear a page out of a book every week—so that after 52 weeks, the “book” is empty.  What was our best “Thinking-Outside-the-Box” idea in 2011?

Meeting Boosters - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Meetings Bucket, Chapter 20, in Mastering the Management Buckets, borrows a page from Jim Rayburn, the founder of YoungLife, who preached that it’s a sin to bore a kid with the Gospel.  It’s also a sin to bore our team members and board members with poorly planned and executed meetings!

There are five “Energy Boosters” in this Meeting Buckets chapter you can use when your meeting starts spiraling into boredom hell.  Here are two:
   IDEA #1. STAND AND SHOUT.  “OK, we’re almost ready to make a decision.  Let’s all stand and go around the circle and give your opinion on this. One minute maximum per person.”
   IDEA #2. TRIADS.  Use this approach when one or two people are monopolizing the discussion.  Break into groups of three and ask the facilitator of each group to report back. Write the conclusions on the flipchart. (Remember: people are either readers or listeners.)

For more resources, including a downloadable Word document for one-on-one weekly meetings, visit the Meetings Bucket webpage.

BOARD GOVERNANCE RESOURCES & TRAINING:
March 13, 2012 (Dallas) – ECFA Nonprofit Forum: Nine Governance Essentials for Nonprofits (with John Pearson, Dan Busby, Steve Macchia and Michael Batts)

ECFA Blog on “Governance of Christ-centered Organizations" – Add your thoughts and comments to John Pearson’s weekly blog posts, including: “10 Questions to Ask Before Joining a Board.”

 

Top-10 Books of 2011

Issue No. 239 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting features my annual Top-10 list and my Book-of-the-Year pick.  In 2012, remember to leverage your time and delegate your reading to team members. Ask for a brief weekly book review at each staff or department meeting. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Top-10 Books of 2011

As you welcome in 2012, here's a recap of the books I reviewed in 2011 (Issues No. 207 to 238). To read all the book reviews featured in Your Weekly Staffing Meeting, visit the archives here at my Buckets Blog.  To download a PDF of the chronological list of book reviews from 2006 through today (all 238 issues), visit the Book Bucket at the Management Buckets website. In 2011, I posted 34 reviews: 32 books, one Harvard Business Review classic article (“Managing Your Boss”), and one DVD (Waiting for “Superman”).

Here are my Top-10 picks of the year. It's a tough assignment to narrow it down to 10, since all of us are at different levels of competency within the 20 buckets. But...maybe this will be helpful to you.  Other than my top pick, the other nine are listed in chronological order.

2011 Book of the Year

[  ] Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses, and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Move Forward, Dr. Henry Cloud – Read the review.

Dr. Henry Cloud, a leadership coach to CEOs and business executives, and a clinical psychologist, has introduced a new term into the leadership lexicon: the pruning moment.

He defines the pruning moment as “that clarity of enlightenment when we become responsible for making the decision to own the vision or not. If we own it, we have to prune.  If we don’t, we have decided to own the other vision, the one we called average.  It is a moment of truth that we encounter almost every day in many, many decisions.”

The Other Nine:
 
[  ] The Talent Masters: Why Smart Leaders Put People Before Numbers, by Bill Conaty and Ram Charan – Read the review.
An insider’s look at G.E. and why their top three executives are extreme students of the company’s top 600 people. Really…they know their top 600 people very, very well.

[  ] Chasing Francis, by Ian Morgan Cron – Read the review.
Disenchanted mega-church pastor finds solace from his uncle/priest in Italy and follows the footsteps and ministry philosophy of Saint Francis of Assisi. Caution! Reading this novel may require vast quantities of pasta and wine.

[  ] 15 Minutes Including Q&A: A Plan to Save the World From Lousy Presentations, by Joey Asher – Read the review.
I was very tempted to make this my top pick of the year—it’s that good. It inspired me to radically change my presentation/facilitation style. Perfect for both rookies and experienced speakers and presenters.
 
[  ] Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge From Small Discoveries, by Peter Sims – Read the review.
If your products, programs and services are stuck-in-a-rut, download the Kindle version today. The book focuses on five fundamentals: 1) Experiment (fail quickly to learn fast); 2) Play (a fun environment never snuffs out or prematurely judges the ideas—the case study on Pixar is amazing); 3) Immerse (get out with customers and learn from the ground up); 4) Reorient (make small wins and necessary pivots); and 5) Iterate (repeat, refine and test frequently).

[  ] The Third Conversion, by R. Scott Rodin – Read the review.
This very short novelette, by the author of The Steward Leader, quotes Martin Luther: “There are three conversions necessary to every man; the head, the heart and the purse.” It will change how you do fundraising and/or giving. One of my clients ordered 50 copies.
 
[  ] Smart Moves for People in Charge: 130 Checklists to Help You Be a Better Leader, by Sam Deep and Lyle Sussman – Read the review.
So smart and practical, I reviewed it twice this year.

[  ] The Company Culture Challenge, by Robert Betzel and David Russell – Read the review.
Gut check time! “Do you know that statistics prove it costs an average of one year’s compensation to replace an employee?” Stuck with team members who “were great actors during interviews, but poor performers on the job?”  The recruiting standards chapter is brilliant.

[  ] Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck—Why Some Thrive Despite Them All, by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen – Read the review.
I titled this review “Jim Collins Lexicon 2.0.” For example: “First Bullets, Then Cannonballs.”  Discipline and creativity will push you to test, test, test—with low risk bullets, then re-calibrate, another low risk bullet, more re-calibration—then when the empirical side of creativity has honed in on the target—let the cannonball rip! One CEO’s mantra: Be “one fad behind,” never first to market, but never last.  Collins has six bullet points (sorry) on “The Dangerous Lure of Uncalibrated Cannonballs.” Brilliant.
 
[  ] The Cure: What If God Isn’t Who You Think He Is and Neither Are You, by John Lynch, Bruce McNicol and Bill Thrall – Read the review.
For many people, this will be the top book of the year. The wicked hoax, as the TrueFaced co-authors describe it, is the hopeless equation: “More Right Behavior + Less Wrong Behavior = Godliness.” (Not!) A colleague emailed me this week that he just ordered 20 copies for his staff. Visit their website to view the videos and download a free chapter.

And finally, these reminders for 2012:
C.S. Lewis said, "It is a good rule after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between."

And I would add: 1) Delegate your reading. Assign books to other team members and ask for mini-reports at staff meetings. 2) Read relevant chapters only. Don't feel guilty for not finishing a book. 3) Hold high the value of sharpening the saw and model it yourself and reward others who read. 4) Budget for books. Invest in your people by investing in books. 5) Discover whether your people are readers or listeners. Audio books might be helpful to some.

I have some fantastic books coming in 2012! 

P.S. Weekly Insights on ECFA Governance Blog
ECFA recently asked me to post a weekly commentary on good governance on their blog, “Governance of Christ-centered Organizations.” Check it out  and add a comment at my first post on “10 Questions to Ask Before Joining a Board.”

P.P.S. Download the Master List of Book Reviews
Click here to download my chronological list of 238 book reviews from 2006 through this month.

Happy New Year!...and thanks, as always, to our eNews sponsors: Christian Community Credit Union and Mission Print.

The Cure

Issue No. 238 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting highlights a hot-off-the-press book from the authors of TrueFaced and Bo’s Café. It’s a powerful book to share with your staff in 2012.  Merry Christmas! And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

The Room of Good Intentions

Ruth Haley Barton says that “the best thing you bring to leadership is your own transforming self.”

But…what if you or the people you work with are stuck, plateaued or going south in their walk with God?  What if you can smell the dysfunction, but can’t quite label it? What if working harder and smarter still doesn’t cut it? What if sin (big sins and little sins—prioritized within your precise theology) is the perpetual obstacle to personal health and corporate health?

What if (and here’s the kicker)…God isn’t who you think He is and neither are you?

As you reflect on your own spiritual journey—and the spiritual journey of your colleagues, your boss, your board members, your volunteers, your spouse and/or family members—sometimes defining reality is the first big step. Trust me—this hot-off-the-press book defines reality, perhaps like no book you have ever read.

The Cure gently describes (in story and commentary) two profound fork-in-the-road choices.  One fork: a “Pleasing God” sign points me to a giant building labeled “Striving Hard to Be All God Wants Me to Be.” The door has a title, “Self-Effort.” Inside, I’m drawn to the Room of Good Intentions. It’s downhill from there as the co-authors invite us into the richness of the story—and the futility of this choice.

The wicked hoax, as John Lynch, Bruce McNicol and Bill Thrall describe it, is the hopeless equation: “More Right Behavior + Less Wrong Behavior = Godliness.” (Not!)

The clarity of the Good News jumps off the pages in all seven fork-in-the-road chapters: Two Roads, Two Faces, Two Gods, Two Solutions, Two Healings, Two Friends, and Two Destinies. Down the other path, gratefully, is the Room of Grace.

They write: “You’re in the Room of Grace! Grace! That word appears 122 times in the New Testament. The Judaizers in the Apostle Paul’s day hated it. They feared what it would do if it got loose. ‘Paul, you can’t tell them this!’ they said. ‘These people are immature, lazy and have little religious background. They’ll abuse as soon as they can. They’ll live Christianity-lite. These people are weak and want to do whatever they want. And believe me, what they want is not good.’”

We’ve been suspicious of cheap grace all our lives—so many of us hustle back to the Room of Good Intentions where we’re more comfortable with a book of rules, disciplined striving and serious sin management.  Eventually though, some of us—because of Jesus—strip off our masks. “No one told me that when I wear a mask, only my mask receives love.” Wow.

Using themes from their other books, TrueFaced and Bo’s Café, these amazing friends and humble leaders (I’m privileged to be on the TrueFaced advisory council) have given us a precious gift—a roadmap to grace. 

The Two Healings chapter oozes with fresh insight and descriptive markers. “If you haven’t been here yet, you will. You’ll be wronged, hurt, then feel left for dead in an environment promoting just the opposite. It’s a dangerous moment, because it causes us to wonder whether a place of safety, authenticity, grace, and love is actually possible this side of heaven. It’s here that many of us make the choice to return to our self-preserving ways.”

Reflect on a recent relational conflict and maybe you will identify with this: “Suddenly, in a fight you never wanted, you discover you’re not only the victim but the issue.”  Then notice how the 11 escalating responses (what…not 10?) are uncomfortably too familiar. Example: “You become intent on telling ‘your side of things’ to as many as possible.” (How did they hack my emails? Yikes.)

Some readers trust me way too much when I pontificate, “Read this book!” One size (one book) doesn’t fit all.  Except this one. This one is waaaaay different and way too important. You must read this book—and share it widely.

To order direct from TrueFaced (single copies or bulk discount), click on the title: The Cure: What If God Isn’t Who You Think He Is and Neither Are You, by John Lynch, Bruce McNicol and Bill Thrall. You can also download a free chapter and view the videos at the TrueFaced website.


Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) The Cure’s fictional character complains, “Soon, I was back to trying to impress a God I imagined was growing more and more impatient with me.” Can you relate?
2) The authors write, “Believers in Christ additionally are tempted to wear a mask when we think we’re in competition with others, graded on a spiritual curve.” Do you have colleagues, or family members, who grade themselves?

Eliminate the Fog Factor! - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Printing Bucket, Chapter 19, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to combat the fog factor in your written materials. Does your audience understand what you’ve written? There is an objective way to measure the fog factor.

Run your newsletter—or a story on your website—through the “Readability Statistics” in your spellcheck software. For example, the Flesch-Kincaid grade level for this eNews issue is 7.1.  And the Flesch reading level is 68.3 on a scale of 100. What are your fog factor scores?

For more resources, visit the Printing Bucket webpage.

 

Invisible Neighbors

Issue No. 237 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting features a book/DVD and powerful website about the poor, the homeless and the addicted—and what Jesus might have to say about the poor if he showed up physically in your Sunday service and at your church’s Monday night board meeting! Why this book now—just before Christmas? Read on. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Race to the Bottom

Wow. Let me say that again. Wow.

I’ve waited until a few weeks before Christmas to tell you about an extraordinary book, DVD and website.  If you read this review, you might be tempted to think “guilt trip.” But it’s far from that. It’s a journey I’m guessing you’ve been longing to take. Maybe you just didn’t know how.

Author John Ashmen has delivered a road map for Christ followers who know all the Bible verses about the poor—but don’t know the poor. “If you don’t see them, you’re not looking,” says Ashmen in his 100-page gift. Serving in soup lines during the holidays is OK, he says, but he has more ideas for you.

Ashmen is the president of the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions but—amazingly—he doesn’t reveal his vocational passion until page 94. That’s stunning. Lesser leaders would trumpet the organization and be Chief Huckster for the Brand in the first chapter. Ashmen’s integrity and intellect focuses the microscope, instead, on the person in need.

He writes, “Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. noted that in the story of the Good Samaritan, the first question the priest and Levite each asked was, ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ But then the Good Samaritan came by, and he reversed the question: ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?’”

Ashmen tackles the problem—and the opportunity—of the poor, the homeless and the addicted with a crisp writing style (almost lyrical at times).  He delivers a book that is part inspirational, part historical (his sweep of evangelicalism is brilliant), part theological, part sociological, part political, and oozing with creative Christ-centered solutions to poignant problems. If there’s any guilt, it will be self-inflicted. Ashmen doesn’t go there.

And he writes insightfully to all four socials styles (see my People Bucket). Analyticals will love the statistics. He mentions the popular adage, “Torture data long enough and it will confess to anything.” Drivers will appreciate the creative To-Do ideas—dozens of them to fit any level of growing passion; featured at the end of the 18 sections in six chapters. Amiables will be warmed by the stories—real people, real lives in peril.  And Expressives will love the forward-thinking opportunities (how will the church respond?) and the remarkable DVD and the book’s website brimming with phenomenal stuff (video, music and more).

God’s value system, asserts Ashmen, “turns everything on its head. Fully following God’s value system is a race to the bottom, to lift up those who are there.” 

Full disclosure: Ashmen is a good friend and the book/DVD/website and small group materials package have been creatively produced by CrossSection (led by Doug Martinez and my son, Jason Pearson). So I can say this with confidence—trust me on this one: it’s a very important book for you, your small group, your pastor, your church and your family. And if you’re a ministry leader—seeking innovative ways to tell your story, you’ll quickly discover that when you minister to the reader/listener with authentic resources, you’ll capture hearts.

To order your copy or request a free preview kit for your church or organization, click on the title: Invisible Neighbors: If You Don’t See Them, You’re Not Looking, by John Ashmen

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) Jesus said, “The poor will always be with us.” But…what do you think he really meant by that?
2) If you read Same Kind of Different As Me or Under the Overpass, maybe it touched your heart, but not your head, hands and feet.  Invisible Neighbors gives dozens of possible next steps for engaging with the poor, the homeless and the addicted. What might be a next step for you?

Why Most Small Businesses Fail - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Systems Bucket, Chapter 18, in Mastering the Management Buckets is that while most small businesses and organizations have a high failure rate, “franchise” operations have much greater staying power. 

The Systems Bucket core competency reads: “We are passionate about systems thinking and process management. We encourage systems people to use their gifts and mentor others for the benefit of our Cause and our Community arenas. We are careful not to tinker or over-tweak, yet we are tenacious about tickler systems. We have a heart to create systems that serve people, not the bureaucracy!”

For the classic book on systems (and franchises), visit the Systems Bucket webpage and order the book, The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About It, by Michael E. Gerber.

 

Death by Meeting

Issue No. 236 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting features a book about four kinds of meetings (including your weekly staff meeting).  And…with the holidays starting, I’ve given you a couple of weeks off from book-buying-guilt; but now it’s time to get serious again. By the way, book-giving at Christmas is a great way to bless your team members.  And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Myth of Too Many Meetings

This is easy to admit—I cannot improve on Patrick Lencioni’s fast-reading, get-the-four-big-ideas-immediately book. So, I’ll just quote him in this issue.

But first…here’s another Pearson Pop Quiz!  Everyone stand up.  OK…now remain standing if your job requires you to attend at least one meeting a week.  OK…now remain standing if you are in a minimum of five meetings a week (staff meeting, one-on-one meetings, etc.). I know…everyone is still standing.  But now…remain standing if you have ever read a book, attended a workshop, viewed a webinar or had coaching on effective meetings management.  (Anyone still standing?)

I use the Meetings Bucket (chapter 20 in my book) to summarize the other 19 core competencies.  My top book pick in the Meetings Bucket is this issue’s book—but I’ve never fully reviewed it here. So…listen to Lencioni talk about “Sneaker Time” (pages 251-252):

“Most executives I know spend hours sending email, leaving voice mail, and roaming the halls to clarify issues that should have been made clear during a meeting in the first place.  But no one accounts for this the way they do when they add up time spent in meetings.

“I have no doubt that sneaker time is the most subtle, dangerous, and underestimated black hole in corporate America. To understand it, it is helpful to take a quick look at the basic geometry of an executive team within the context of an organization.

“Consider that an executive team with just seven people has twenty-one combinations of one-to-one relationships that have to be maintained in order to keep people on the same page.  That alone is next to impossible for a human being to track.

“But when you consider the dozens of employees down throughout the organization who report to those seven and who need to be on the same page with one another, the communication challenge increases dramatically, as does the potential for wasting time and energy. And so, when we fail to get clarity and alignment during meetings, we set in motion a colossal wave of human activity as executives and their direct reports scramble to figure out what everyone else is doing and why.

“Remarkably, because sneaker time is mixed in with everything else we do during the day, we fail to see it as a single category of wasted time.  It never ceases to amaze me when I see executives checking their watches at the end of a meeting and lobbying the CEO for it to end so they can ‘go do some real work.’ In so many cases, the ‘real work’ they’re referring to is going back to their offices to respond to e-mail and voice mail that they’ve received only because so many people are confused about what needs to be done.

“It’s as if the executives are saying, ’Can we wrap this up so I can run around and explain to people what I never explained to them after the last meeting?’ It is at once shocking and understandable that intelligent people cannot see the correlation between failing to take the time to get clarity, closure, and buy-in during a meeting, and the time required to clean up after themselves as a result.”

Whoa! That hits close to home!  Good stuff.  So get the book, read his leadership fable (in the classic Lencioni style) and begin religiously implementing his four kinds of meetings: 1) Daily Check-in, 2) Weekly Tactical, 3) Monthly Strategic and 4) Quarterly Off-site Review.

To order from Amazon, click on the graphic below for Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable...About Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business, by Patrick Lencioni.

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) How much time do we waste in staff meetings? Who facilitates the best meetings in our organization?
2) Be honest now: how much time are you unconsciously wasting in “sneaker time” each month?  Any solutions?

Bagels and Bureaucracy - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Operations Bucket, Chapter 17 in Mastering the Management Buckets, is to affirm the high and noble calling of the spiritual gift of administration.

The Operation Bucket core competency reads: “We affirm the high and noble calling of management and the spiritual gift of administration. We reject the fallacy that leaders lead and managers manage. We relentlessly pursue both effective and efficient operational solutions to organizational challenges. We are experts at ruthlessly eliminating costly bureaucracy that impedes results. We are yes men and women!

For more resources, visit the Operations Bucket webpage and read about the “Bagels and Bureaucracy” stand-up meeting idea.

 

Great by Choice

Issue No. 235 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting features a hot-off-the-press book by Jim Collins. It’s a no-brainer addition to your staff resource shelf. (You do have a resource shelf, right?) And this reminder:  check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Jim Collins Lexicon 2.0

True or false? An author’s first book is his or her best.  The second, third or (horrors) fourth book will aptly document the slippery slope into mediocrity.

Usually true.  But if the book is by Jim Collins, the myth is false. And all of us are grateful.

His latest, Great by Choice, keeps his reputation intact for high quality, fascinating, page-turning story/research/label/principle serious management thinking.  If you learned from Built to Last, Good to Great, Good to Great and the Social Sectors and How the Mighty Fall, your life-long learning will continue with what I’m calling the “Jim Collins Lexicon 2.0.”

Using his classic comparison company methodology, this book delivers memorable stories to answer the question, “Why do some companies thrive in uncertainty, even chaos, and others do not?”

“What’s coming next?” Collins asks, building the case for his “10X” companies (his first memorable label). “All we know is that no one knows.” He adds, “Yet some companies and leaders navigate this type of world exceptionally well. 
--They don’t merely react; they create. 
--They don’t merely survive; they prevail.
--They don’t merely succeed, they thrive.
They build great enterprises that can endure.”

Here’s the new lexicon:
--10Xers (comparison companies that beat its industry index by at least 10 times). “If you invested $10,000 in a portfolio of the 10X companies at the end of 1972…your investment would have grown to be worth more than $6 million by the end of our study era (through 2002), a performance 32 times better than the general stock market.”

--10X leadership (the comparison story of the quest to reach the South Pole by two teams of adventurers in 1911). Roald Amundsen, the winner, and Robert Scott, the loser, had comparable opportunities, but it was Amundsen who demonstrated Collins’ triple hallmark of 10X leaders:
   --Fanatic Discipline
   --Empirical Creativity
   --Productive Paranoia

The stories are fabulous, often very funny. Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer had the moniker DOCTOR DOOM and Commissar of Concern, taught to him by the “Grand Master of Productive Paranoia himself, Bill Gates.”  Yet it was Gates who put his foot down when Ballmer wanted to boost the head count to—get this—17 people!”

--20 Mile March (a self-imposed restraint to keep growth under control). “A good 20 Mile March has a Goldilocks time frame, not too short and not too long but just right.” 

--First Bullets, Then Cannonballs (discipline and creativity will push you to test, test, test—with low risk bullets, then re-calibrate, another low risk bullet, more re-calibration—then when the empirical side of creativity has honed in on the target—let the cannonball rip!) One CEO’s mantra: Be “one fad behind,” never first to market, but never last.  Collins has six bullet points (sorry) on “The Dangerous Lure of Uncalibrated Cannonballs.” Brilliant.

There’s a lot more in the lexicon:
   --Leading Above the Death Line
   --SMaC (Specific, Methodical, and Consistent)
   --ROL (Return on Luck)

Each chapter has a helpful two-page summary of big ideas, plus discussion questions.  The bulk of the book runs 200 pages, plus a few more for FAQs, then another hundred pages of research notes for the unconvinced or Collins zealots.

This is a Top-10 book for 2011.

To order from Amazon, click on the graphic below for Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck—Why Some Thrive Despite Them All, by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen.

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) If we were to compare our organization’s work and results against a comparable company/organization. What might we learn? Should we launch a study?
2) Collins says that Fanatic Discipline, Empirical Creativity and Productive Paranoia separate 10Xers from the pack.  On a scale of one to five (five is high), how good are we at these three keys to thriving?

Delegation Bucket Pop Quiz! - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Delegation Bucket, Chapter 16, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to conduct a self-assessment on your delegation diseases. 

The Delegation Bucket core competency reads: “We are experts at appropriate delegation. We invite team members to accept assignments based on their strengths. We value organized delegation and believe in the Point Person Principle. We track our to-do lists and we add to our don’t-do lists.”

So…what level are you at in the Delegation Bucket core competency?
--Level 1: I don’t know what I don’t know.  
--Level 2: I know what I don’t know.  
--Level 3: I have an action plan to address what I know I don’t know.  
--Level 4: I am knowledgeable and effective in this core competency and can mentor others.

For more resources, visit the Delegation Bucket webpage and download Worksheet #16.1:  "Dysfunctional Delegation Diseases." Take this Delegation Gut-Check Assessment and diagnose the severity of your delegation diseases.  Are you a Code Green, Code Yellow or Code Red?

 

Igniting a Life of Generosity

Issue No. 234 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting asks the “What if?” question about generosity.  This week’s book has 21 “light the fire” stories on generosity. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

Igniting Generosity

What if…there were so many men and women in your organization’s “generous givers” circle—that when you reviewed possible future board member prospects, you had ten times more qualified candidates than open spots?

What if…before your organization mailed the monthly appeal letter, hundreds and hundreds of generous givers—prompted by the Holy Spirit—sent in their checks and made online gifts BEFORE you asked for the contribution?

What if…the stories of sacrificial giving in your church were so numerous—and so life-changing—that a revival broke out even before your pastor broke out his sermon?

What if…God prompted you to use the funds you’ve saved for a special “this is for me” purchase…and you diverted the money to a friend in need? No fanfare. No name. No tax deduction. And…what if you realized that this act of generosity (and obedience) actually produced more joy than your original plan?

If any of these “what if’s” capture your imagination, then you’ll resonate with the quick-reading message of Igniting a Life of Generosity, a 21-day journey to help Jesus followers experience the joy of generosity.

Published by ECFA, this 60-page powerhouse will impact your head, your heart and your wallet with 21 short stories and call-to-action ideas like:

Day 1: A 20-something receives a company car and so he tries to sell his personal vehicle. No buyers. He prays. God speaks: “What are you going to do with the money if I sell your car?” Oops! Plan B kicks in. His deal:  “OK, God, if you sell my car, I’ll give a sizeable portion to this [needy] family.”  No surprise—car sells. Anonymous cash delivered to needy family. No surprise—immense joy experienced by a young steward.

Day 13: (You gotta read this one!) In the late 1800s, a young girl in a Pennsylvania church, Hattie May Wiatt, was prompted by God to begin saving money for a larger church building. Yet she dies in her youth. Good news: the pastor took the 57 cents she had saved and inspired his congregation to multiply that into $250—and the multiplication continued so that by 1912, the church had expanded and grown to over 5,600 members. 

Day 14: A graduate school student learns the power and joy of giving monthly (in six-month specific commitments) rather than writing just one check—and being done with it. The author says that igniting the generosity gift also involves faithfulness and asks, “When you think of wanting to become more faithful, what is one thing you believe God is nudging you about?”

So what if…instead of hassling givers, manipulating givers and shaming givers, our churches and nonprofit ministries actually INSPIRED givers and challenged their heads and hearts with Scriptures and stories—so that their check writing and online giving would be prompted by their attentive ears to the Holy Spirit’s nudges?

Light the fire and share this powerful mini-book with your generous givers and those who have not yet experienced the joy of giving.

Note: Bulk pricing is available in packs of 5, 30 and 100 from ECFA Press.

To order from Amazon, click on the grahic below for: Igniting a Life of Generosity, by Chris McDaniel.

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) The author notes that the contract for the rock band Van Halen required that the host venue provide a bowl of M&Ms backstage, but with every single brown M&M removed. Why? That strange request was stuck in Article 126 of the detailed contract regarding stage set-up logistics.  If the band’s stage crew arrived and found brown M&Ms, then they conducted a thorough safety check—because it was likely the host had not read and implemented other more critical contract requirements.  So McDaniel asks on Day 5 of the 21-day journey, “Can You Be Trusted?” What’s your answer?
2) On Day 21, the author asks, “What are you here for?” What’s your answer—and how might a thoughtful answer ignite a life of generosity in your own giving and in the lives of those people who look to you for leadership and inspiration?

The 7 Accountability Standards - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Budget Bucket, Chapter 15, in Mastering the Management Buckets is to be accountable to others in your financial, stewardship and governance practices.  The gold standard for accountability is ECFA, the accrediting organization that serves more than 1,600 nonprofit Christian organizations and churches.

ECFA’s Seven Standards of Responsible Stewardship™ address seven key areas including: doctrinal issues, governance, financial oversight, use of resources and compliance with laws, transparency, related-party transactions and stewardship of charitable gifts.

For more information on ECFA and other resources, visit the Budget Bucket webpage.

Last Workshop of the Year!
Oct. 25-26, 2011 (Tues. & Wed.) – The Rolling 3-Year Strategic Plan Workshop (Sponsored by Neighborhood Christian Fellowship and Arrow Community Center, Covina, Calif., and hosted by Christian Community Credit Union, San Dimas, Calif.)

P.S. News Flash! Gospel Light Worldwide announced this week that the publisher, Penerbit Gandum Mas, has just published the Indonesian edition of Mastering the Management Buckets.  This country of 17,500 islands (6,000 inhabited) has a population of 232 million. According to the book, Operation World, Muslims comprise 80 percent of the country and Christians represent 15.85 percent of the population. In this Buckets edition, the three legs of the stool, "Cause, Community and Corporation" are translated as "Alasan-alasan, Komunitas and Korporasi."

 

What You Do Best in the Body of Christ

Issue No. 233 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting suggests that the answer to the “engagement gap” could be an intentional focus on the 3 Powerful S’s. And this reminder: check out my Management Buckets website with dozens of resources and downloadable worksheets for your staff meetings.

The 3 Powerful S’s

All of your favorite business books deliver the dismal statistics on employee engagement. StrengthsFinder 2.0 author Tom Rath writes, “Over the past decade, Gallup has surveyed more than 10 million people worldwide on the topic of employee engagement (or how positive and productive people are at work), and only one-third ‘strongly agree’ with the statement, ‘At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day.’”

Also the co-author of Strengths Based Leadership, Rath adds, “In stark contrast, our studies indicate that people who do have the opportunity to focus on their strengths every day are six times as likely to be engaged in their jobs and more than three times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life in general.”

The authors of The Carrot Principle note that “according to a 10-year study of more than 200,000 employees, a whopping 79 percent of people who quit their jobs ‘cite a lack of appreciation as a key reason for leaving.’  Another 65 percent of North Americans ‘report that they weren’t recognized the least bit in the previous year.’” How tragic.

So…who’s gonna fix this problem—and how?

Next week, a dozen team members from a national association have invited me to invest a day with them and focus on what I call “The 3 Powerful S’s.”  Three cheers for a ministry CEO who understands the foundations of work and relationships!

The 3 Powerful S’s are: Strengths, Social Styles and Spiritual Gifts.  You know the strengths resources (StrengthsFinder 2.0 and other books).  You’ve probably taken one or more assessments like Myers-Briggs, DISC, Birkman, or even the four animals system. (What were they again? Muskrat, Chihuahua, Elephant and Platypus? I may have that wrong.) I prefer Social Styles (Analyticals, Drivers, Amiables and Expressives)—because those four words aptly describe the four styles.)

But the third "S" is the glaring gap in many churches and ministry organizations. We hammer folks who tilt towards bad theology, but don’t take seriously the delightful spiritual gifts distributed to every Christ-follower by our loving, all-wise Heavenly Father. We don’t pick our gifts—God does.

Pop Quiz!  Tell me the about the 3 Powerful S’s of your boss (or board chair): Top-5 Strengths, Social Style (or Myers-Brigg description) and Spiritual Gifts.  If you passed this test, then list the 3 S’s for your direct reports or at least three other work or volunteer colleagues. Did you pass or fail?

For years, I’ve offered a Starbucks card in workshops to anyone who can nail the pop quiz.  I still have the coffee card—and that’s a crime. Maybe even a sin.

What would happen in the Results Bucket, the People Bucket and the Team Bucket if everyone on your team knew and leveraged their own 3 Powerful S’s—and the Strengths, Social Styles and Spiritual Gifts of everyone else? It would be dramatic and God would be honored.

If you’re up-to-speed on Strengths and Social Styles, but have never invited your team members to take a spiritual gifts assessment, I recommend two books.  Both books include an assessment of about 135 questions covering 23 to 27 spiritual gifts, as described in the New Testament (Ephesians 4, Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, etc.)

To order these books from Amazon, click on the graphics below for:

Option #1: What You Do Best in the Body of Christ: Discover Your Spiritual Gifts, Personal Style and God-Given Passion (revised and expanded—with assessment tools and discussion questions), by Bruce Bugbee.

Option #2: Discover Your Spiritual Gifts: The Easy-to-Use Guide That Helps You Identify and Understand Your Unique God-Given Spiritual Gifts (includes the bestselling spiritual gifts inventory), by C. Peter Wagner.

Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
1) Bruce Bugbee writes, “God has created and designed us with a purpose in mind. We are ‘wired’ to care about some things more than others. We have been given spiritual gifts to competently accomplish ministry tasks.  We have also been designed with a personal style of relating to others and the world around us. We have been given a passion.”  So…knowing all of that, what has God designed you for?
2) If you have the spiritual gift of administration, it’s possible that you’re serving today as an administrator—but in an administrative area for which you have no passion. What do you have passion for? Are you leveraging the 3 Powerful S’s in your current career and/or volunteer role?

Chart Your Board’s Strengths - Insights from Mastering the Management Buckets: 20 Critical Competencies for Leading Your Business or Nonprofit

One of the big ideas in the Board Bucket, Chapter 14, in Mastering the Management Buckets is inspire board members to leverage the 3 Powerful S’s. When I consult with boards, I recommend that each board member take the StrengthsFinder 2.0 assessment and then we list the Top-5 Strengths of each board member on an 11” x 17” chart.  The discussion is always electric!

What if…committee and task force appointments were assigned based on the 3 Powerful S’s. Whoa—that’s radical!

In March, at a national association strategic planning retreat, we discovered that two board members both had all Top-5 strengths in the “Strategic Thinking” domain. I had never seen that before. (There are 34 talent themes within the four domains of Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building and Strategic Thinking.)

So, we suggested that Betsy and Ed leverage their strategic gifts for two days—and the rest of us could play.  Didn’t happen. We all worked very hard—but, trust me—the other board members listened when Betsy and Ed spoke.

Next week at the all-day ECFA Governance Forum in Colorado Springs, I’ll be giving more details on how boards can leverage the 3 Powerful S’s.  Visit ECFA for more information on the October 20 forum, hosted by Focus on the Family.

For more resources on governance, including six book recommendations, visit the Board Bucket webpage.

JOIN US AT THESE WORKSHOPS!

Oct. 20, 2011 (Thursday) - 9 Governance Essentials for Nonprofit Ministries Forum, with Steve Macchia and Dan Busby (sponsored by ECFA and hosted by Focus on the Family, Colorado Springs, Colo.)

Oct. 25-26, 2011 (Tues. & Wed.) – The Rolling 3-Year Strategic Plan Workshop (Sponsored by Neighborhood Christian Fellowship and Arrow Community Center, Covina, Calif., and hosted by Christian Community Credit Union, San Dimas, Calif.)