Micah Caronna

Breakfast w Barry

Every once in a while I have breakfast with my great friend Barry. He runs a large software solutions company. He says I “never ask him for anything” but I always walk away with so much wisdom. We talk a lot about leadership, effectiveness, structure, strategy, and management. Here are a few gold nuggets that came from his years of experience and wisdom this morning. Who do u want on your team?
Those who are taking classes, strengthening their skills, outside of their work resources and work hours.
Those who are constantly reading to become better outside work resources and hours.
Those who are bringing new ideas of large change to make things better. Who do you not want on your team.
Those who depend on their knowledge and skill of past years to get them to the future.
Those who can’t/won’t learn new things to go to new levels. Those who compete with the people on their team instead of coach and mentor them.

Thanks Barry. Can’t wait till next time.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

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things I’ve learned - @edyoung at wave conference

———————- @Edyoung —————-
things I learned by being the sr pastor
1. U will deal w crazy people
Stop trying to fix them. They will get worse.
How do u know the crazy people?
A. Always play the “God told me” card
B. They don’t take your advice after asking for it
C. Everything is about them (people r after them)
D. 1 issue people - they have pet issues (worship, teaching, etc) Surround yourself with the right they
Tough, Honest, Encouraging, Yielded yes (wo)men

2. must remain creative
Must do this with a team to remain creative.
Doing it yourself will wear u down.
Schedule time4what relaxes U so the ideas will come.
Creativity is change.
Change causes conflict causes growth
Small tweaks can take us to giant peaks 3. It takes lots of cash to finance ministry
Don’t be afraid to talk about money
Use vision, not need when u talk about money

4. Talk about the vision “too much” never stop.
People get mission drift constantly 5. The power of delegation
Delegation w/o investigation is an abomination
Make sure u manage what u delegate.

6. No matter what u do people will leave
“Not deep enough” (teaching or worship)
“Its getting too big”
“Its too entertaining”
It will hurt but it will happen. Let them go.

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Willow Arts Conference - How to make your ideas “Sticky” - #wcawonder

Willow Arts Conference - How to make your ideas “Sticky” - #wcawonder
Chip and Dan Heath are the authors of “made to stick” a great book that i would recommend. http://www.madetostick.com

This was a great lecture, and they are from Raleigh!!

6 traits to a sticky idea
1. simple - easy to understand

designer knows (s)he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add but when there is nothing left to take away
simplicity is only concerned about communicating the core of the idea.
art is about finding the heart of what you want to communicate
facts and elements are only tools they are negotiable to use or not use
most artists have the curse of knowledge

we know the details of our art form way more than the people we impact with it.
we can spend tons of time on things that don’t matter to those who are impacted by our art
what are your pet elements that you MUST get right that most of your audience will never notice.

2. unexpected - surprising

must break a pattern that people preconceive
Atkins diet was popular because it broke peoples preconceived notions of a died.
sticky ideas break the pattern of what you think a thing should be.
Jesus did this in the sermon on the mount…”you have heard it said…but i say to you”
you must find what is unexpected in your idea and highlight it.
try make your services/art unexpected.
do people already know your service/art routine?
nothing wrong with routines but people disengage when they think they know what comes next.
every time you watch the same movie you have less and less interest because you know what will happen next.
invoke curiosity in order to get people to engage.

3. concrete - you can visualize it.

Most messages don’t give you a concrete mental image of the subject matter.
Jesus was a master at this.
subway “Jared campaign” vs previous “7sandwiches under 6grams of fat” you can visualize Jared.
find the visual behind each story/message and anchor what you want to stick in peoples heads to that visual

4. credible - convinces us to believe it

it has to be believable and logical
a credible idea makes people believe

5. emotional - evokes emotion

an emotional idea makes people care
only using the facts kills emotion.
make sure it makes people happy, sad, angry, scared, etc

6. stories - often told as stories

people are moved by stories.
information with no story to stick to us.
put peoples stories. this is why “Impact” is so popular.
5 in 100 people will remember the facts after 10 min. 6 in 10 people will remember a story after 10 min.

when communicating through your art form as these three simple questions.

what do you want them to know?
what do you want them to feel?
what do you want them to do?

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Building an Arts Team from the Ground Up #wcawonder

Building an Arts Team from the Ground Up
make sure that constant prayer is part of your arts teams.
1. build trust into your team.

doesn’t just happen. you have to work at it.
let them know that you will work along with them sometimes.
delegate to and empower your people
you have to trust others with your “baby”

2. build respect in your people

work hard for them - no one respects someone who is lazy
take risks - people will criticize you at the beginning of risk but will respect you on the other side.
be honest with each other in love even when it may hurt your relationship.
risk things that you may fail at.

3. build vision in your people.

repeat it until they are tired of it
aim everything you do with your vision

4. Make sure everything points to the great commission

road blocks to building a great team

negative comments (volume, style, lighting

don’t consider anonymous comments
don’t always give your church what they want. it’s our job to know what they want/need more than they do
don’t turn down the music for individuals
usually the people that have been in the church the longest have the biggest opinions and know the least about contemporary art forms (how often have they seen bands/dramas outside of the church? that determines how much you listen to their advice.
keep your personality. you can’t be great at many things. you will be average if you try to cater to all styles.

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Q&A session w/ Darlene Zschech & Joel Houston #wcawonder

Q&A session w/ Darlene Zschech & Joel Houston #wcawonder
how do you develop your team?

must have joy in your teams as you work hard together (Ps 45 God will anoint you with joy and set you above your companions)
serve the Lord with Gladness - keep out the wining and complaining
tell people when they can/should do better (velvet covered brick)

how do you insure excellence in music ministry?

be honest with some people that music isn’t their gift! (play the their music back)
if someone joins our team it should mean that they are open for coaching.

advice for developing song writers?

must teach people that song writing is from God.
all songs are listened to by many people and honed to make sure its word based, musically massaged, etc. songs go through a grueling process before they are ever released.
don’t let people submit songs with an unfair “God gave this to me. it’s going to be great.”

how do you personally maintain your hearts with such a pace.

maintain the amount of time we spend in the Word
find what feeds and refreshes your spirit and soul. do things you enjoy and excite you.

Darlene - Make sure that you are constantly pouring into other peoples dreams. You are trying to build a masterpiece every weekend but make sure you take time to build the people in the process.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Willow Arts Conference 1st Main Session. How to produce Wow

Today is our first day at Willow Arts Conference.
First session was with thier Creative Arts Pastor Nancy Beech

all children are creative, ask lots of questions, test all boundaries.
when we get older we trade creativity for mental apathy and status-quo
much of this is because we become afraid to fail. afraid to try.
must have a childlike spirit of openness and creativity.
if we do this we can cultivate a spirit of wonder and wow.

arch enemies of “wow”

hurries
stress
too much technology
noise
information overload
unrealistic job descriptions
lack of solitude
absence of celebration
boredom of routine

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watching the original 1969 dr. dolittle with the family

getting ready for a great day!!!

please pray the prayer of faith with me for my friend carol who is having a heart proceedure tomorrow. love her much!

on my way to #lwfc leadership update excited that ed ainsworth is teaching on leadership tonight