Living In The 3rd Culture: Building A Healthy Team

The latest shenanigans on the Miami Dolphins are another reminder that talent alone does not make a winning team. A single player acting out in self-absorbed verbal abuse hurts the entire team. Several years ago we saw number one draft choice, professing Christian, Dwight Howard disrupt the Orlando Magic. History reminds us time and time again, whether it is a sports team, a business or a church, talent alone does not make a successful team.

Because healthy teams are essential to effective ministry in the church, it is crucial to take the time to build or re-build your staff or ministry teams. Before you start to build a team, it is important to understand possible reason for team ineffectiveness. An excellent resource on this top is Patrick Lencioni’s The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.

Below is a chart that lays out the dysfunctions which build upon each other.

Absence of Trust: For a team to be healthy and effective there must be complete honesty and vulnerability. Each team member must be open about their weaknesses and inform others when they make a mistake. Each team member must truly “get” the Gospel and not seek to find value and worth through accomplishments. The Gospel creates a community of grace, where the focus is Christ, not any individual team member.

Fear of Conflict: If a team does not trust and respect each other, a team will not openly engage each other. Lencioni writes, “Teams that lack trust are incapable of engaging in unfiltered and passionate debate of ideas” (188). If these types of debates and discussion do not go on there is the potential of missing important information. Moralism can promote artificial harmony as it values external and superficial love. The Gospel allows us to engage and be passionate because it is not about us, but the Kingdom!

Lack of Commitment: If the team is not rooted in the Gospel, resulting in a lack of trust, and no room for passionate debate, chances are, some team members will disengage and not fully “buy-in” to the decisions that are being made.

Avoidance of Accountability: “Without committing to a clear plan of action, even the most focused and driven people often hesitate to call their peers on actions that seam counterproductive to the good of the team” (189).

Inattention to Results: When you don’t hold each other accountable, the team is no longer attentive to results. Inattention to results “occurs when team members put their individual needs (such as ego, career development, or recognition) or even the needs of division about the collective goals of the team” (189).

How then do you build or re-build a healthy team? Here are a couple suggestions:

1. Cover the entire process in prayer asking that God would show you the right people for the team.

2. Build the team around a purpose or mission. Be concise on what you want the team to do, and recruit for that task. Don’t simply look for volunteers, or have series of guilt laden appeals, be selective.

3. Once you have recruited the team you need to train them. Don’t start the work until they are clear on their mission, as well as how to work as a team. Don’t just assume they know how to work together.

a. Remind them on how the Gospel is played out in community. This is essential for an environment of trust.

b. Do a brief personality profile to help the team understand how people naturally interact with each other. There are plenty of sources on line to do a quick Myers/Briggs or DISC test.

c. Walk through the dysfunctions that we just reviewed so they know in advance some ways the team can be ineffective.

4. If you are not the leader, make sure there is one. The leader’s role is to make sure the meeting is planned and operates properly. The leader keeps the team from moving into dysfunction.

Third Culture Defined

The term “Third Culture” has been used in various ways. One “Third Culture” group “consists of those scientists and other thinkers in the empirical world who, through their work and expository writing, are taking the place of the traditional intellectuals in rendering visible the deeper meanings of our lives, redefining who and what we are.”Another common use of “Third Culture” in fact describes my personal experience. The term was first coined by sociologist Ruth Hill Useem, professor emeritus of sociology and education at Michigan State University. She used the term to describe children growing up outside their citizenship countries because of a parent’s work abroad. A “TCK or Third Culture Kid has since been defined as, “someone who as a child has spent a significant period of time in one or more culture(s) other than his or her own, thus integrating elements of those cultures and their own birth culture, into a third culture" Though I am a TCK, it is my desire to use the term in referring to the people who make up the true Christian Church (Theologically defined as the “Invisible Church”). In other words, the Church is a Third Culture. Scripture teaches us that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law and the punishment of Hell, and through faith in Him we become citizens of His Kingdom, receiving not only the full benefits of citizenship in His Kingdom, but indeed the right to become sons and daughters of God. The moment, we step into this Kingdome we experience a new and different culture. We are no longer in the kingdom of darkness, but now live in the kingdom of light and that changes everything! At the same time we never went anywhere physically as we continue to work, live, and play with the same people as before, we see the world differently, we no longer truly fit – we are “in the world, but not of it” -- we have a new culture. For most of us this life changing experience occurs within our birth culture and our Christian experience is saturated by those influences. For those who grew up in non-Hispanic White North America, Christianity is uniquely different than those who grew up in an African American context. Our birth culture effects how we live out our faith in the Kingdom of Christ. Yet the Kingdom of Christ requires one more cultural shift and that is away from birth culture and into a culture made up of people of every ethnic and cultural group that has ever existed on the face of the earth. This Kingdom is no more North American than it is Tanzanian or Tibetan. It is a unique or shall we say a “Third Culture” that integrates elements of all cultures into one new and better one, where there is no Jew or Greek, slave nor free, male nor female“You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.” (Gal 3:26-298). In fact Revelation 7:9-10 gives us a description what this will look like one day:“After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice: "Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb." A Third Culture Perspective is one that understands and appreciates that God gathers people from every ethnic and cultural group and brings them into the new culture of His Son Jesus Christ. It is a perspective where birth cultures are appreciated and respected as coming from God, but none are superior. It seeks to have a deeper understanding of the Gospel, pays attention to culture, our own as well as others, and then attempts to bring them together. It is a perspective that “seeks first His Kingdom and His Righteousness” and lovingly and passionately enjoys and glorifies God in all we do. It is a perspective that welcomes immigrants….

Building A Healthy Team

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