How we treat volunteers

“If you treat an expert like a novice, you’ll fail.” — This is how Seth Godin ended yesterday’s blog post about the Dreyfus model of skill acquisition. If you’re not familiar with the Dreyfus model of skill acquisition, you might have run into Ken Blanchard’s One Minute Manager, which is another system that gets at the same basic idea — that you have to treat a rank beginner differently than you treat someone who’s been on the job for years. This is more than an idea; it’s an essential rule for any effective organization.

Unitarian Universalist congregations routinely break this rule. On the one hand, we take rank beginners, people who are new to Unitarian Universalism and new to volunteering in a congregation, and shove them into important committee slots and Board positions that really should be filled by long-term, committed Unitarian Universalists with experience in running our kind of congregations. In so doing, we break the rule by sticking novices into positions that should be filled by experts. On the other hand, we often treat experienced volunteers as though they are imbeciles, and the perfect example of this is when we give one of the Unitarian Universalist Association’s curriculums (which are all written to be “teacher-proof,” to support rank novices) and hand it to someone who is a skilled and gifted teacher and expect them to follow that curriculum. In so doing, we break the rule by treated an experienced volunteer like a novice.

In many Unitarian Universalist congregations, volunteer management consists of trying to find warm bodies with no real skills to fill volunteer job vacancies. Instead, we could think of volunteer management as a way of equipping and transforming persons over time so that they acquire valuable skills that will help them carry our larger mission in the world. Take the example of Sunday school teachers: We would still offer the UUA’s teacher-proof curriculums to all teachers, but we would set the expectation that the more experienced a teacher is, the more we expect them to draw on their own skills to create transformative experiences that will help their classes live out the larger mission of our congregation.

To quote Seth Godin once again: “If you treat an expert like a novice, you’ll fail.”

Balancing the equalitarian and libertarian impulses

“The two main elements of which American democracy is compounded may be seen united in the familiar phrases of the Declaration of Independence: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.’ One element is the idea of equality; the other is the idea of liberty. These are not only different ideas — they are in some ways quite contradictory. Equalitarianism implies the individual’s responsibility to and dependence on the community; libertarianism implies the community’s responsibility to and dependence on the individual. … Although the equalitarian and libertarian tendencies were each predominant at one or another period in our history, neither alone defines American democracy. Rather, it is their imperfect fusion, their interconnection, and their interaction.” — from “American Democracy and Music (1830-1914)” by Irving Lowens, in Music and Musicians in Early America (New York: Norton, 1964), pp. 265-266.

The problem with American democracy in the past three decades, it seems to me, is that the libertarian impulse has been slowly swamping the equalitarian impulse.

This problem pervades our society, and our congregations are not immune from it. The question facing us, then, is simple: How can we promote a better balance between the equalitarian and libertarian impulses within our congregations?

In the long run

“In the long run we are all dead.”

So said economist John Maynard Keynes in “A Tract on Monetary Reform” (1923). That’s a delightful statement in and of itself, taken completely out of context. It’s even better in context. Keynes is making an argument reductio ad absurdum, pointing out that it’s rather too easy to take the very long view. If you really want to take a long view as an economist, you can simply say that in the end everyone’s going to be dead, which means it’s really easy to make economic predictions, e.g., in a hundred years the current economic crisis won’t seem so bad, because we’ll all be dead.

It’s easy to make this kind of mistake in your local congregation. In a hundred years, it won’t matter if the roof is leaking. Compared to the infinitudes of Transcendentalist theology, it doesn’t matter if the grass is all dead on the children’s play area at church. Both these are true but pointless statements. This kind of attitude doesn’t get you very far.

It’s also easy to make the opposite mistake: only paying attention to the problems that are staring you in the face right here and now. Don’t fix the roof until it leaks, and then wait a couple of year until we have enough money in the operating budget. Don’t worry about the lack of grass in the children’s play area until the rainy season begins, until the children’s favorite game becomes mud wrestling. As with the previous attitude, this kind of attitude doesn’t get you very far.

In my sixteen years of working in local congregations, I have found one of the hardest tasks is finding a good balance between these two extremes. It’s easy and ultimately useless to take the very long view that we’ll all be dead. It is equally easy, and in the end equally useless, only to pay attention to problems that hit you in the face. It’s really hard to try to predict problems far enough in advance to deal with them in a timely manner, but not so far in advance that you’re wasting your time solving them now.

New eco-blog

A big welcome to a new eco-blog, Flowscapes: Everday Adventures for Ecological Resource Solutions. It’s not your average eco-blog. There are thoughtful posts considering ecological issues you’ve never even considered, like why the World Toilet Organitzation’s “Big Squat Day” might not be a good idea. There are posts offering different perspectives on topics you’ve probably been thinking about, like whether wind turbines are too loud or not. There are posts on bigger issues, like the importance of “followership.” And there’s fun random stuff, like a photograph of an art car. Did I mention this new blog is written by my sweetheart, Carol Steinfeld? So what are you waiting for? Go check it out.

“I think it might be a crisis…”

Carol and I were talking about the ongoing trend of civic disengagement.

“I think it might be a crisis,” she said.

I think she’s right. There are fewer people than ever before who understand how to be good institutionalists. Most people don’t belong to more than one or two voluntary associations. There are many people who spend all their non-work hours doing nothing more than passively consuming entertainment.

We all know that civic disengagement has an adverse effect on democracy. But in a democracy, where religious organizations are voluntary associations, civic disengagement also has an adverse effect on organized religion. I’d be willing to say that of all the social factors that are pushing organized religion into decline, civic disengagement may be the most powerful such force.

It’s that month again

Of course you already knew that October is Clergy Appreciation Month. If you’re wondering whether to bother observing it this year or not, Parsonage.org offers their reasons why you should:

Pastors and their families live under incredible pressures. Their lives are played out in a fishbowl, with the entire congregation and community watching their every move. They are expected to have ideal families, to be perfect people, to always be available, to never be down and to have all the answers we need to keep our own lives stable and moving forward. Those are unrealistic expectations to place on anyone, yet most of us are disappointed when a pastor becomes overwhelmed, seems depressed, lets us down or completely burns out.

I’m one of the lucky clerypersons who gets a lot of appreciation already. My ministry here in the Palo Alto church is primarily with children and teens, so I get hugs and warm smiles and friendly waves from dolls and stuffed animals nearly every week, and it doesn’t get any better than that. On top of that, the lay leaders here in Palo Alto are supportive and appreciative and just plain good folks. But what is true of me is not true of every clergyperson. So maybe it’s worth considering whether your clergyperson needs appreciation or not.

If you decide to appreciate your clergyperson, the Parsonage.org Web site has a few suggestions. Below are three additional suggestions:

  1. If you are moved by a sermon, tell your clergyperson so. (Three years ago, someone told me that one of my sermons changed her life, and just thinking about that improves my mood — wow! someone actually listened to me! and paid attention! and that was a good thing for them!)
  2. If you are a lay leader and you think your clergyperson is looking stressed, call them up and ask if things are OK. (Thanks Kathy, it made all the different when you did.)
  3. If your clergypseron does something worth thanking them for, send a thank-you note. You know, a physical note, using paper technology. (I keep every thank-you note I have ever received from a parishioner, and every year or so I re-read them and have warm memories of the people who sent them.)

As I said, I don’t need any extra appreciation this month, and yes I will delete your comment if you try to appreciate me here. Furthermore, I figure you’re a responsible human being, and can figure out on your own if your clergyperson needs your appreciation or not. (Note to Palo Alto folks: Just a reminder that Amy’s a good preacher, and it would be good practice to tell her when her sermons move you.)

A rural moment

Camp Meeker, California

The retreat center I’m staying at for a couple of days is in the middle of second growth redwood woodlands. This morning, I walked around a bend in a trail , and there were two mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) standing in the middle of the trail They both froze and looked at me, although they were obviously not particularly afraid to see a human being. I froze and looked back at them. The three of us stood there frozen for four or five minutes until the mule deer decided that I was either not a threat, or stupid, or both. They twitched their big ears, and started browsing again.

They were bending their heads down and eating something that lay on the path. There was no greenery for them to browse on; all I could near them see was old redwood cones; so I couldn’t figure out what it was they were eating. I watched their jaws move sideways as they chewed. Little bits of stuff fell out of the side of their mouths as they ate. They were not very attractive eaters.

At last I got bored, and started walking again. They looked at me as if surprised that I was moving, and then bounded away in a leisurely fashion. When I got to the place where the deer had been, I saw what it was they had been eating: acorns from the tan bark oaks (Lithocarpus densiflorus or, according to some taxonomists, Notholithocarpus densiflorus). The bits of stuff I had seen falling out of the sides of their mouths were bits of the outer husk of the acorns.

An urban moment

We were out walking a couple of nights ago. As we crossed one street, I realized there was a raccoon looking up at me. It was standing inside a storm drain. “There’s a raccoon,” I said in surprise.

Carol didn’t see it at first — you don’t necessarily expect to see a raccoon in a storm drain. It kept bobbing up and down: it would poke its head up above the grating, then duck down back under the grating, then back up, then down.

Carol said something like, “Hello, raccoon,” and gave it a wide berth. So did I. It was not a cute raccoon; it was a little creepy.

Ταυτ ειδως σοφος ισθι, ματην δ'’ Επικουρον εασον
που το κενον ζητειν, και τινες αι μοναδες.

— Automedon

Samuel Johnson includes this as the epigram preceding his essay “The Study of Life” (Rambler 180, Saturday 7 December 1751). Johnson provides the following translation:

On life, on morals, be thy thoughts employ’d;
Leave to the schools their atoms and void.

This is a nice commentary on the current disagreements in our society about whether science provides all answers. Clearly, these disagreements have been going on at least since the time of the ancient Greeks. Johnson, addressing the same problem in the eighteenth century, provides the following anecdote, in which no one comes out looking perfect:

“It is somewhere related by LeClerc that a wealthy trader of good understanding, having the common ambition to breed his son a scholar, carried him to a university, resolving to use his own judgment in the choice of a tutor. He had been taught, by whatever intelligence, the nearest way to the heart of an academic, and at his arrival entertained all who came to him with such profusion, that the professors were lured by the smell of his table from their books, and flocked around him with all the cringes of awkward complaisance. This eagerness answered the merchant’s purpose. He glutted them with delicacies, and softened them with caresses till he prevailed upon one after the other to open his bosom and make a discovery of his competitions, jealousies, and resentments. Having thus learned each man’s character, partly from himself and partly from his acquaintances, he resolved to find some other education for his son, and went away convinced that a scholastic life has no other tendency than to vitiate the morals and contract the understanding. Nor would he afterward hear the praises of the ancient authors, being persuaded that scholars of all ages must have been the same, and that Xenophon and Cicero were professors of some former university, and therefore mean and selfish, ignorant and servile, like those whom he had lately visited and forsaken….

“A man of learning is expected to excel the unlettered and unenlightened even on occasions where scholarly attainments are of no use; and among weak minds loses part of his reverence by discovering no superiority in those parts of life in which all are unavoidably equal.”

Alas, I still have no way of including the diacritical marks with ancient Greek — those of you who are classicists (which I emphatically am not) will notice that I had to include a couple in the above passage, but many more are missing. Sorry, classicists!