A compelling case for an entrepreneurial approach to ministry and mission, exploring its biblical basis and potential benefits.
Michael Volland is Director of Mission at Cranmer Hall, Durham. His previous publications include Fresh! An Introduction to Fresh Expressions of Church and Pioneer Ministry (SCM Press, 2012), Through the Pilgrim Door: Pioneering a Fresh Expression of Church (Survivor, 2009), Going to College: Bible Readings for Special Times (BRF, 2006) and God on the Beach (Survivor, 2005).
Entrepreneur is a word which people often find difficult when
applied to religious organisations and this is something Michael
Volland is well aware of. This ministerial trainer on mission and
diocese missioner's latest book The Minister As Entrepreneur:
Leading and Growing the Church in an Age of Rapid Change published
by SPCK devotes some time and space dealing with this apparent
problem.
One of the problems which is identified in this text, which is
based largely around a piece of fairly small scale qualitative
research he did amongst Anglican Clergy within the Diocese of
Durham, is the association with the language of business and the
market. He gives a quote from CMS head and Fresh Expressions expert
Jonny Baker indicating why many within the church feel there are
problems with this language; they link it with negative aspects of
capitalism.
Whilst Volland clearly seeks to go beyond this business approach in
his examination of the subject and use of the term it has to be
recognised that this book feeds into wider debates within the CofE
on theological education and training. The language and ethos of
the business environment has been central to the GreenReport
(Talent Management for Future Leaders and Leadership Development
for Bishops and Deans: A New Approach). This small book I think
would best be seen as part of this wider discussion around how we
identify gifts and vocation and how we encourage those who might
have specific gifts of leadership or callings into specific types
of ministry, both lay and ordained.
Language and it’s use is the focus of the first part of the book
which takes the familiar form of operationalising the terms being
used and going through the literature review. Within the first few
chapters Volland also engages in some interesting theology
particularly in chapter three which is titled "An entrepreneurial
God?
In this first part of the book Volland is clear to lay out the
limitations of this text and the research sample it is based upon.
The discussion questions around each chapter at the end of the book
together with his initial comments show that this book is intended
as a discussion starter. This is indeed how it should be viewed,
being somewhat brief in nature.
Having read previous work by Volland, such as Through the Pilgrim
Door, it is clear that writing in a less academic form is his
preferred medium and this is why some parts of the book read better
than others. In the preface he appears to be using his natural
voice whilst later it reads slightly more awkwardly as he moves
away from using the voice of the storyteller wrestling with complex
academic questions and more into the more usual formal academic
style. I much prefer the former style which has emerged from
Volland, Baker and their pioneer contemporaries. The natural style
they have developed is one which is clearly rooted in their
experiences as practitioners who engage with academia and I think
it is very readable. The sub-headings are a useful feature which
are well used in this book, guiding the reader well and it is
notable that these disappear during the second half of the
book.
The first 65 pages are distinctly different in tone to the second
where he presents his research findings and conclusions as I have
indicated. This is perhaps because he identifies the two halves of
the book being written for different audiences. The first half is
focused on and addresses a broader audience than the latter which
not only focuses on his ordained Anglican sample but seems to be
addressed those living within a similar occupational bubble. It is
clear from his comments that time has led to this restriction but
it is a shame as because it means one feels as if they have walked
into local debate around resources and recognition.
Of course there is wider application or this book would have not
been published and that needs to be taken into account. Pages 101 –
103 in chapter 8 are perhaps the most central within this second
half of the book because within them Volland outlines what his
respondents felt aided the exercise of entrepreneurship in their
ministry. These 19 points not only relate to entrepreneurship, I
would argue, but what is central to healthy churches, mission and
ministry more broadly. I believe they form the basis of what our
discussions on the future should be.
As I say this is a useful, easy to read, short text which should be
taken as a discussion opener or way into engaging with a number of
difficult questions which need to be grappled with more widely than
just within the CofE.
*IMHO Blog*
Michael Volland’s book has an admirable aim: to contribute to the
emergence of a
culture in which entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship are properly
understood and
recognized as gifts of God to his Church – especially in a time of
rapid and discontinuous
cultural change. He begins with the bold statement: ‘I am a
Christian
minister. I am also an entrepreneur’ (p. 1). By this he means not
an ability to make
money but an attitude of relentlessly and energetically wanting to
improve things.
This is characteristic of many, like Volland, who are advocates of
pioneer or fresh
expressions ministry.
Volland has written up a research project based on Bill Bolton and
John
Thompson’s influential book Entrepreneurs: Talent, Temperament,
Technique
(Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann, 2000; 2004), whose online tool for
assessing
entrepreneurial potential is used by the Church of England for
selecting OPMs
(ordained pioneer ministers). He adapts their definition of an
entrepreneur to
produce a more ‘Christian’ version: ‘a visionary who, in
partnership with God and
others, challenges the status quo by energetically creating and
innovating in order
to shape something of kingdom value’. It is notable that this is a
rather different
definition than that which appears in the subtitle (‘leading and
growing the
church’). Kingdom value might sound a bit vague, but Volland uses
it to mean
the furtherance of God’s coming kingdom of justice, provision,
wholeness, peace
and reconciliation. Armed with this definition, his local bishop
helped him to find
eighteen parish priests in Durham diocese who display
entrepreneurial traits. He
then focused on interviewing seven who achieved outstanding results
in the online
test. The summary of his resulting research is interesting without
being riveting.
These priests were not necessarily doing things that were
strikingly new, but they
had a positive ‘glass-half-full’ attitude. One said that ‘the sheer
weight of bread
and butter stuff can be a hindrance. And yet, we need to find the
perceived
opportunities in the bread and butter stuff’ (p. 104). None
complained of church
buildings as a problem, even when they caused difficulties or
proved very expensive.
I expected therefore that Volland would identify resilience as a
key entrepreneurial
trait alongside the familiar ones of vision, creativity and
innovation. And
while I don’t have problems with his use of the image of an
entrepreneur in an
analogical sense about God, I’m surprised he didn’t support this by
reference to
the biblical wealth of occupational metaphors that are used about
God: potter,
gardener etc.
Volland notes that entrepreneur is a contested term in the Church,
citing one
prominent church leader who ‘loathes it’, and arguing that we need
to reverse a
negative image of entrepreneurs that emerged in public
consciousness in the 1980s,
based on associations with greed. In fact, as Bolton and Thompson
show, for
many entrepreneurs generation of wealth is a by-product of their
activity rather
than the primary motivating factor. I wish Volland had taken this
further to recognize
the huge contribution that many contemporary UK Christian
entrepreneurs
make to furthering the kingdom in the course of their commercial
activities,
through the provision of innovative goods and services, providing
employment,
and generally making the world a better place. It’s disappointing
that when he
comes to list notable Christian entrepreneurs in Christian history,
they are all
saints, church leaders or social reformers who displayed
entrepreneurial traits.
The great nineteenth-century Nonconformist entrepreneurs like Titus
Salt,
George Cadbury and Joseph Rowntree don’t get a mention.
Entrepreneurs need
to be welcomed for the essential work they do in business, not
simply because
they’re a source of useful funds or even a useful metaphor for
church pioneers:
many even have useful suggestions to make for innovative approaches
to church
life and growth. That reservation apart, this is a valuable book
which deserves to
be widely read.
*Theology journal*
One of the tensions of modern day ministry is that between the
desire of the pastor to be ‘soul friend’ to the congregation and a
seemingly irresistible push towards being seen as the managing
trustee. The chief executive of the local church, in other words.
This is particularly the case among current approaches to mission
which adopt a social enterprise model: a holistic approach in which
churches are integrating mission with the delivery of goods and
services. The rationale underpinning this approach is that fewer
and fewer people are likely to drop-in to an Old Time Gospel
Service, no matter how faithful the preacher or fervent those
praying. Much more likely – and appropriate to this society, at
this time – is that people whose immediate needs are addressed in a
focused way by Christians reflecting the love of God will be drawn
towards the motivation of those who have helped them. If undertaken
with respect and not solely as a pretext for proselytising, then
this is a wholesome and godly model.
In The Minister as Entrepreneur Michael Volland offers the concept
of entrepreneur as both a gift of God to the church and a model for
others to emulate. Resisting the idea that the only value of
enterprise in a church setting is to seek funding to repair the
roof or to make up a shortfall in the funds to continue to employ
the youth worker, the author proposes that many kinds of ministry
and mission would benefit from a more entrepreneurial outlook.
Most of us will be able to identify key players in our churches or
denominational structures who we might properly describe as
entrepreneurs. These are the people with seemingly boundless
energy, superb networking skills and the capacity to envisage (and
realise) what few others might dare to dream. Such folk are quite
rare – perhaps helpfully, since they can be quite hard work!
Volland brings together biblical and theological analysis and
offers us some worked examples to demonstrate that the concept has
a good grounding in Christian understanding. He also offers a range
of potential applications. He argues that in times like ours – of
discontinuous change – an entrepreneurial approach is not merely
warranted but essential.
Volland is Director of Mission at Cranmer Hall, Durham. He is also
a practitioner in the field, working as missioner to a number of
local parishes. This helpfully links scholarship with practical
experience. He hopes to persuade ministers and others engaged in
provoking and nurturing missional activity to function more as
entrepreneurs. It seems to me that this book will further convince
those who already tend towards his understanding but that it will
make much less impact among those who are more introverted or
traditional in their outlook. By including small group discussion
questions, here is a chance to open up the theme for wider
discussion among PCCs, diaconates and circuit meetings.
*Regent's Reviews*
Volland is strong and clear in trying to dissociate the profit
motive linked to an entrepreneur style from the creative and
innovating energy to grasp opportunities which he wants to be
central to the life of the Church.
*Church Times*
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