Click here to return to Blog Post Intro
Mission Drift is a crisis facing all faith-based organizations
Slowly, silently, and with little fanfare, organizations routinely drift from their original purpose, and most will never return to their original intent.
The Harvard and Yale founders were unmistakably clear in their goals: academic excellence and Christian formation. Today, they do something very different from their founding purpose. Chris Crane, President and CEO of Edify observed, “It’s the exception that an organization stays true to its mission. The natural course—the unfortunate natural evolution of many originally Christ-centered missions—is to drift.”
In the Middle Ages, the church sponsored a charity similar to modern-day urban food banks. Created as an alternative to loan sharks, these charities helped poor people manage meager incomes. Today, we know them as pawn shops. Pawn shops evolved from a tool designed to care for the needy to an instrument often preying on families in distress. Something intended for good drifted from its mission. In the 1300s, people in poverty met caring friars when they entered the doors of pawn shops. The shops existed to help the poor get back on their feet, and these friars had their best interests in mind. Today, often the opposite is true.
In physics, a theory for drift exists. The second law of thermodynamics states that in the natural order of the universe, things degenerate, rather than come together. Here’s the reality: Mission Drift is the natural course for organizations, and it takes focused attention to safeguard against it.
Mission Drift is pervasive, but it is not inevitable
Wess Stafford, President of Compassion International from 1993–2013, reflected, “When I was the director of development at Compassion back in the 1980s, I brought in outside experts to study our marketing and donor base. I asked, ‘What do we need to do to grow?’ I’ll never forget their answer: ‘Well, you’ve got the best name in the business, Compassion International. Who doesn’t want to be a part of something called Compassion? But you’ve got this Jesus stuff mixed in there. Not everyone compassionate cares about this Jesus that you keep putting out with every piece of material. Our advice is really raise up the name Compassion and sort of soft sell the Jesus stuff. Then watch what can happen.’ We thought for ten seconds, and said, ‘No, not now, not ever.’” Compassion remained Mission True. They figured out how to protect their mission.
What is a Mission True organization? In its simplest form, Mission True organizations know why they exist and protect their core at all costs. They remain faithful to what they believe God has entrusted them to do. They define what is immutable: their values and purposes, their DNA, their heart and soul. To remain Mission True is to adapt and grow, so long as that adaptation and growth does not alter the core identity.
Remaining Mission True is a constant pursuit. As in the second law of thermodynamics, cooling is inevitable unless leaders regularly infuse heat and energy into fueling and safeguarding their missions.
Mission True organizations believe the Gospel is their most precious asset
There’s an ugly secret of global poverty, one rarely acknowledged by aid groups or U.N. reports. It’s a blunt truth that is politically incorrect, heartbreaking, frustrating and ubiquitous: if the poorest families spent as much money educating their children as they do on wine, cigarettes and prostitutes, their children’s prospects would be transformed.
Education and training alone will not do. In Africa, Christianity has proven to change people’s hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good. Matthew Parris, a British journalist, wrote in the London Times, “As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God.”
Secular relief is just that—relief; it does not and cannot address those issues that are most fundamental to the human condition.
Mission True organizations make hard decisions to protect and propel their mission
“Getting eaten by a whale or nibbled to death by minnows results in the same thing,” said Steve Haas, vice president at World Vision, “although one demise is typically more difficult to diagnose.”
Do you know who you are? Are you protecting your identity?
Most organizations have a statement of belief, mission statement, and core documents that explicitly describe their full mission. Mission True organizations know who they are and actively safeguard, reinforce, and celebrate their DNA. Staff members know and believe the core tenets of their organization’s mission. Leaders constantly push toward higher levels of clarity about their mission and even more intentionality about protecting it.
“You can’t just assume that a mission will take care of itself,” stated Dr. Gene Habecker, president at Taylor University. “It will atrophy if you don’t aggressively manage it in an ongoing way and continually reaffirm and integrate it into everything that you do over and over and over again. Mission management is never over. It’s never done.”
Mission True leaders assume they will face drift and build safeguards against it
Mission True organizations remain mindful of cultural trends. Sensitive to the cultural climate, they have the wisdom to build guardrails and don’t assume that successors will inherit and maintain the founder’s vision.
Mission True organizations intentionally train and educate the next generation and attend to the details in constructing safeguards.
Mission True organizations have clarity about their mission
George Williams started a Bible study for displaced young men in 1844, which became a movement later known as the Young Man’s Christian Association (YMCA). As its name indicated, Christ was at its core. Williams said, “Our object is the improvement of the spiritual condition of the young men engaged in houses of business, by the formation of Bible classes, family and social prayer meetings, mutual improvement societies, or any other spiritual agency.”
With revenue declining, the YMCA decided to emphasize its fitness programs and downplay its biblical training. During the 1970s and 1980s, the YMCA reinvented itself: It became a family fitness center. Funding pressures, bad leadership decisions, and poor mission management gave way to a changing of the “why.” By 2010, the YMCA had dropped everything but the “Y.”
The Y changed with the currents of culture, adapting and morphing on their core. They are Mission Untrue. They bent on their immutables. Mission True organizations, on the other hand, distinguish between guarding the mission and guarding the means. Knowing who you are is the first line of defense against drift.
One company had a reputation as the most reliable stagecoach company in the Wild West, but their leaders always knew they weren’t a stagecoach company. And knew they weren’t even a transportation company. To connect people and protect and transport their most valuable possessions—this was why they existed. The company stayed afloat by refocusing on its ability to connect people, money, and goods. Wells Fargo eventually left the transportation industry entirely to become the Fortune 100 banking giant it is today. As bankrupted stagecoach companies began to dot the western plains, Wells Fargo flourished. It thrived because its leaders knew why the company existed.
As the Wells Fargo example demonstrates, sometimes change is necessary to stay on mission. Being Mission True isn’t synonymous with being unchanging. On the contrary, remaining Mission True will demand you change to continue to fulfill your mission. Andy Stanley, senior pastor of North Point Community Church in Alpharetta, Georgia, cuts straight to the heart of the difference between change and drift when he writes, “Be stubborn about the vision. Be flexible with your plan. Strategies and timelines are always up for grabs.”
Mission True board members understand their top priority
“Boards of faith-based organizations are often filled with well-meaning people,” shared Lowell Haines, a lawyer, board member at Taylor University, and consultant to many other boards. “But most boards don’t realize it is their fiduciary duty to remain loyal to the mission of their organizations. . . . This is the law.”
Terry Looper, board member for a number of large nonprofits, believes the biggest weakness facing boards of faith-based organizations is their unwillingness to make hard decisions. Even in cases where the leader is clearly taking an organization off course, genuine accountability is rare. Board members must be willing to ask difficult questions and hold the executive leader accountable to the full mission of the organization.
Don Wolf, a seasoned business executive who serves on a number of boards. “A great board keeps the executive leadership team accountable and ultimately ensures the organization fulfills its potential.” But if board members aren’t bleeding for the mission, drift will always trickle down. They must be the most passionate about the full mission of the organization. If they aren’t, conflict about the Christian distinction of the organization will eventually surface. If the board isn’t composed of folks who live out the values of the organization they lead, the organization will drift. The organization will secularize. It will only be a matter of time.
Mission True boards recruit carefully and prayerfully. They hold the chief executive responsible for the mission and are unafraid of making hard decisions to remain true to the mission. They keep the core values, history, and purpose of the organization central to their meetings and model these values in their own lives.
Mission True leaders set the cultural tone for the organization
A leader not deeply grounded in prayer and spiritual disciplines is a leader susceptible to Mission Drift. Incremental, slow, personal mission creep often leads to organizational mission creep. Mission True leaders not growing in Christ lead their organizations with feet on shaky ground. Yes, they may get a lot done, but without a healthy dependence on God, it is futile striving. Psalms says, “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain.”
In How the Mighty Fall, business writer Jim Collins says the first step toward a company’s destruction is “hubris born of success.” It’s an attitude, not an external factor.
When we forget to feed our faith and cement our foundation, we become vulnerable to burnout and overextension, which will inevitably harm the mission. We need to build our lives on a firm foundation. Mission True leaders admit vulnerability and invite close friends and family to speak honestly and candidly into their lives. They welcome and cherish challenges and accountability from their circle of trusted friends. They create safeguards against impropriety.
They know their fruitfulness and success depends entirely on the One who sustains. They prioritize their faith and practice spiritual disciplines with regularity.
Mission True organizations hire first and foremost for heart and character
The founder’s passion rarely translates to subsequent generations of leadership. Too often, the passions of the first generation become the preferences of the second generation and are irrelevant to the third generation.
Leading organizations are patient in hiring and believe an open position, no matter how painful, is still better than a position filled with the wrong person. Mission True organizations tend to have a “hire slow and fire fast” mentality and grasp the consequences of having the wrong person representing the mission. They also have a diverse selection committee and always included “mission fit” as a key part of the interview process.
When making hiring decisions, there are two questions we suggest faith-based organizations ask about their approach: Is it prayerful? Is it intentional?
Chick-Fil-A’s Vice President of Talent, Dee Ann Turner, describes their hiring strategy this way: “It’s quite simple. First, we look for character. We are looking for someone who has a track record of good strong moral and ethical behavior and people who value serving others with a bias toward growing themselves and others. Second, we look for competency. . . . Third, we look for chemistry, the ability to fit in with our team.”
Mission True organizations partner with donors who believe in their full mission
Dale Carnegie gave significantly to a variety of organizations. When making a donation, he made it clear that any religious schools requiring students to adhere to a statement of belief or under a religious governance structure would be excluded from his foundation’s grants. Especially for schools facing financial challenges, the economic incentive caused administrators to put a dollar value on their church relationships and historical Christian identity.
Many organizations compromised on their core values to woo these institutional funders, who could rescue them from financial difficulties. Unfortunately, they didn’t recognize the silent majority of donors who believe in these organizations and want them to remain Mission True. Many individuals are willing to partner with organizations not despite of their faith but because of it.
Mission True organizations track metrics reflective of their full mission
Focusing on the wrong metrics can be a cause of Mission Drift. When drafting assessments, organizations should measure ways to best advance the mission, as well as identify issues that could threaten it.
Mission True organizations make an effort to measure more than just the “easy” stuff. They do not use metrics to toot their measurement horns. They measure with open hands, acknowledging their dependence on God and others for their success.
Mission True organizations understand the Gospel demands excellence in their work
In the beginning, Harvard hired first for mission fit. When interviewing faculty members, they looked preeminently at character, well before examining academic credentials. The curriculum and extracurricular content included Christian worldview training, promoted a “sacred regard for truth,” and emphasized the study of virtues. But as time passed, these commitments began to shift…
Mission True organizations maintain the highest levels of quality. “Poor quality” and “Christian” should never be used to describe the same organization. Excellence undergirds Mission True companies. They understand that their mission is too important to settle for mediocrity. Our faith demands we lead “best in class” organizations, regardless of what type of work we do.
Mission True organizations are fanatics about rituals and practices
Mission True organizations get this. They focus on the little things. They understand how important practices and norms are to the living and breathing cultures of their organizations. The small decisions each and every day may seem inconsequential, perhaps even trivial, but these little things protect against Mission Drift.
As a rudimentary definition, culture is just “what happens.” It’s what you feel. It’s how an organization practices its values and bylaws. Culture predicts behavior.
Beyond policies, Mission True organizations recognize that culture is composed of all the “little things.” The Crowell Trust trustees read aloud the charter of their foundation at the start of board meetings. Taylor University gives towels, along with diplomas, to its graduates, to signify the servant leadership of foot washing. InterVarsity reviews their vision statement piece-by-piece at their annual leadership conference.
More than anything else, culture predicts the attitudes and actions of their staff. They realize small things matter, and minor practices go a long way in setting the organization’s tone. “My pleasure.” Two words—a simple act and just one of the many ways that Chick-Fil-A builds a culture of hospitality.
Consistency counts. Exemplars of the culture should be celebrated: When staff members exhibit organizational values, be sure to call it out!
Mission True organizations boldly proclaim their core tenets to protect themselves from drift
If you regularly talk about who you are, you invite scrutiny and accountability. Publicly proclaiming who you are strengthens your identity and empowers people to point out inconsistencies.
Mission True organizations recognize that it is not just what they do, and not just how they do it, but how they talk about it that matters. Mission True organizations proclaim their full mission to create accountability. Customers and donors easily discredit organizations if they see inconsistency in messaging.
Mission True organizations recognize that the local church is the anchor to a thriving mission
For organizations who desire to protect against Mission Drift, one of the most powerful anchors is the local church. In God’s wisdom, the local church is God’s Plan A. There is no Plan B.
Unity is the central characteristic of the body of Christ. And it’s this unity, Christ says, that will compel others to pay attention to the message of grace. In essence, we have the opportunity to fulfill Christ’s mission when we partner with the local church in a spirit of friendship and mutual dependence.
Mission True organizations invest relationally; over-communicate; and are generous. They worship and pray communally. Fellowship through worshiping and praying together strengthens connection and reminds us of our common position as men and women united in Christ.
In researching for Mission Drift, Greer and Horst discovered there is another key choice made by courageous Mission True leaders. The more they learned their stories, the more the authors were encouraged. From their founding, these leaders have stood unwaveringly upon the Truth of the Gospel. In all areas, Mission True leaders have demonstrated intentionality and clarity in retaining Christian distinctiveness. They are committed to Christ, first and foremost.
That’s the best way to remain true to your mission, as you shoot for the stars!