On the Journey

A few pics from the past week.

Got a chance to recently interview Scott Harrison, the founder and president of charity: water, a leading organization providing clean water to people around the world. Founded in 2006, charity: water has already raised over $10 million to help fund clean water projects, wells, and filtration in locations all over the globe. You might know charity: water from the connection in 2008 with American Idol as part of Idol Gives Back. Scott’s story and ultimately the story of charity: water is inspiring.

You can listen via the Catalyst website or download from itunes.

Part two of the three part series on producing events.

4. Find talent everywhere. If you can’t hire someone full-time, then bring em in as a consultant, or at least just for a day to bring fresh ideas and different perspective. When you live in the middle of planning and producing every day, it’s good to have someone from the outside.

5. Understand the difference between producing, directing, and leading. For Catalyst, each of these roles are different people. And they require different kinds of people. (more on this later) It’s important to not just have the same person filling these strategic areas, unless your event is basic and not in need of a comprehensive production team.

6. In programming, focus relentlessly on transitions. Many times producers focus so much on the speaking, or the key production parts, that they leave the transitions to chance. It’s essential to have transitions that are seamless, experiential, and connect with the audience.

Part three coming on Saturday.

My good friend Joel Houston is leading the charge on a great project called The I-Heart Revolution. As part of this project, a feature film will be releasing next Wednesday, November 4 in 500 theaters across the US entitled “We’re All in This Together.” Blogged about this last week. You can buy tickets here.

Hear from Joel regarding the reason behind the film and what he hopes to see as a result of thousands of Churches and leaders unified together.

I’ll be doing a three part series this week on some of the basics behind producing great events.

So here you go, part one:

1. Content is king. It all starts with content. Without great speakers who can deliver, you’re climbing uphill.

2. Know your audience. Aim small in terms of your audience. Be VERY specific in terms of who you are creating an experience for. Aim big, miss big. Aim small, miss small.

3. Creativity many times requires conflict, complication and frustration. Everyone wants to know how to deliver creatively. But getting there is many times a course in patience, conflict resolution, and many hours of frustration. Great ideas and creative programming is the result most of the time of healthy tension and debate over many months. It’s a process.

Part two coming on Wednesday of this week.

I love John Maxwell. He’s impacted my life greatly.

And I love Tripp Crosby. Great friend. And part of our Catalyst creative team.

So enjoy this interaction between Tripp and John. A truly authentic interview…… brought to you by Tripp and Tyler Films.

A few end-of-week thoughts, highlights, links and notes of interest: 

- Vote now for Jamie Tworkowski, a good friend and Catalyst speaker, and founder of TWLOHA, to win the Woodie Award from MTV, given to an artist who is helping impact our generation through social causes. 

- Watch this interview with Mac Powell at Catalyst regarding adoption and the importance of the Church to lead on this issue. 

- Have you visited Lanny on Leno yet? Check it out. Still time to be involved in this campaign to get Lanny Donoho on the Leno Show. Tweet it up and put on your Facebook status. Not just for fun, but to help build awareness for the 143million Campaign. 

- Pebble Beach is heaven on earth. Got to spend a couple of days there earlier this week. 

- Phil Wickham’s new CD is really good. It releases middle of November. Thanks Phil, for sending me an advanced copy!

- The Catalyst Music Project album is now on itunes. You can download here. It released in the top 15!

- Working on the final speaker lineup for Catalyst West Coast. Wow, it’s hard to narrow down to the final lineup. Will be releasing the lineup in the next couple of weeks. 

- The Catalyst One Day event in Baltimore is officially sold out. Actually has been sold out for the last three weeks! Gonna be a blast to finally take Catalyst to the Northeast!!

- Got to hang earlier this week with the great folks from Alpha and Holy Trinity Brompton Church in London. They were all in Orlando for the Alpha USA Conference. The Alpha course  has impacted millions around the world.

Hillsong United’s brand new film “We’re All in This Together” will release on Wednesday, November 4 here in the USA, with a one-night viewing of the documentary film along with a live concert with the United band from Hillsong Church in Sydney. The film is being shown in over 500 theaters across the USA. Buy tickets and check availability in your area here. 

You won’t want to miss this experience. It will be an epic evening

Seasons of Service. We’ve talked about this story before on the blog, but it continues to get more press and be a great example of how the Church can be engaged in a community through service and partnership. 

Our friends Luis and Kevin Palau from the Luis Palau Association, along with John Bishop shared some of the story at Catalyst West back in April, and the buzz continues to build around the Seasons of Service project in Portland, Oregon. Basically, the Seasons of Service initiative is a follow up to the large festival held last year that brought together local government, businesses, the Church, and ministries like Palau. Kevin Palau put this partnership together, and is focused on a long term strategy to truly serve the city

Over 500 churches are participating from the Portland area, and 26,000 volunteers.

A great article and short video clip is currently on the PBS website, and PBS is running the story nationally on TV this Sunday. Check your local listings for times.

Been out at Pebble Beach the last two days. David Hoyt and I teamed up for a great score of 67 today playing Spanish Bay, which is one of 5 courses on the Pebble Beach/Monterey Peninsula. 

Hanging out with some great friends at the annual Equip gathering with John Maxwell and the Equip Staff. Equip is doing incredble work in training Christian leaders around the world, and now counts over two million leaders who have gone through the Million Leader Mandate training around the world in the last couple of years. Amazing work! If you are not familiar with Equip’s work, check them out for sure. 

So someone asked me recently to talk about the keys to being a great interviewer, which means conducting a great interview. 

I’ve learned lots on doing interviews from Ken Coleman, both in terms of the art and the science. He is my interviewing hero, along with Charlie Rose. I’m going to ask Ken to also answer this question here on my blog.

But in the meantime, here are a few thoughts:

1. Do your homework. You would be amazed how many people show up to do an interview and have no clue about who they are interviewing, and just try to wing it. It shows. Believe me. 

2. Ask the question behind the question. Get under the surface. Dig deeper. Not to uncover gossip or something that is not relevant, but because someone has probably already asked the question you are thinking about asking. So ask a better one. 

3. Shutup. No one wants to hear your answer to the question, otherwise the tables would be turned. Your job is to pull great content out of the interviewee, not to give your opinion. 

4. Create a conversation, not just a serve and volley. When appropriate, give the sense to your listeners that you are sitting in a living room having coffee and catching up. Creating conversation is different than just giving your opinion or an answer to your question. Conversations require context, which means you have to have 20 or 30 questions ready to go for an interview that would usually be around 10 questions. 

5. Don’t interrupt unless you need to, keep your hands off the table, and save your “ums” and “uh-huhs” and “oh-yeahs” for after you’re done. For audio or video purposes, your agreeing by saying something just muddies the water. It seems like the thing to do in person- giving your interviewee verbal feedback, but just stick with non-verbal. Sounds better when you don’t respond. And hitting or tapping the table is picked up by microphones- seems obvious, but everyone forgets…..

Please take the time to watch this entire clip. I promise it is worth it.

If you only have a few minutes, then fast forward to around 9:00. 

Now consider how you can be involved as a sponsor through Compassion.

I wrote a short article highlighting the 6 areas of social justice we focused on at Catalyst this year. 

The article is on CatalystSpace and highlights our areas of focus in regards to justice- not only at this past event last week, but also areas we’ll be focusing on throughout 2010.

Check out a recent interview I did with Rob Bell, teaching pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, MI. We discussed a number of issues, including what music Rob is currently listening to, as well as getting an update on the Drop Like Stars Tour. 

You can stream here or download from itunes.

These guys are big time college quarterbacks, but also great guys. Strong leaders. And doing their best to love God and follow Him. 

I of course am one of Sam Bradford’s greatest fans, and even though it is difficult, will cheer for Colt McCoy as well. It’s OU/Texas weekend. Boomer Sooner!

Will be posting several thoughts on Catalyst 2009 over the next week, but for now, just wanted to share a few pics. 10 Pics from behind the scenes. 10th year anniversary. More to come later. 

I’ve worked on some great teams over the past several years, and seen great customer service in action. One of the places I learned the most about great customer service was Lost Valley Ranch, an incredible guest ranch in Colorado. Serving the guests was part of the DNA of the staff. We took great pride in our ability to create a great experience for our guests through unmatched customer service. Here are a few of the ways we did that:

1. Treat someone like you would want to be treated- the Golden Rule. It really does work. And it makes sense. Common sense. Use it.

2. Remember someone’s name. Always. Especially when you’ve met them before.

3. Let your actions speak way louder than your words. Don’t just talk about it. Make it happen. Your work can be a great example of your attitude and commitment to service.

4. Anticipate. Stay a step ahead of your clients or guests. Don’t wait for them to ask for something. Figure it out before they even need it.

5. Engage in meaningful conversation. Serving creates opportunity for impact- it builds a bridge. So make sure to connect with your guests or clients through conversation when it’s appropriate. Understand who they are by understanding what they read, what they watch, where they travel and what their interests are. And look them in the eye when talking. Little things add up.

Make sure to stay up to date with Catalyst all this week by hanging out on the Catalyst Backstage site. Carlos Whittaker and Anne Jackson will be hosting the backstage experience.

You can keep up with me through Twitter here.

thanks!

If you are planning to attend LABS, here is a list of recommendations for sessions you should consider. This list is based on a conversation with Jeff Shinabarger, creative director for Catalyst.

DISCLAIMER: This doesn’t mean I am NOT recommending other LAB Speakers. Just wanted to highlight a few that you may not know about or be aware of. These are under the radar.

Session 1: Bishop John Rucyahana: Hearing him talk about grace and restoration and forgiveness related to the genocide in Rwanda is powerful.

Session 2: Matthew Sleeth: A renowned expert on how Churches can get involved in the Creation Care conversation. His book Serve God, Save the Planet has created some great traction around this topic.

Session 3: Scott Belsky: (According to Jeff Shinabarger: If I could recommend one session for every person that I know to attend, this is the one. I listened to his talk in New York City at The Feast Conference one year ago and it is the most important content I have heard all year. He studies how ideas happen and will share with you how to make your ideas come to life. Brilliant. I will be attending this in the midst of preparation for the next day). Enough said. And I agree.

Session 4: Nicole Baker Fulgham: Teach for America is an important organization to our urban schools. You will learn something from this presentation and be encouraged as church leaders to engage schools in new ways. An important voice to consider.

Session 4: Ian Cron: His book Chasing Francis is a great read. Get ready to be challenged in a fresh way.

And if you are not able to attend LABS or any of Catalyst this year, make sure to check out more on these speakers.

Put this list together yesterday based on a conversation with Jeff Shinabarger as we were watching the rigging go up in the Arena for Catalyst. Hopefully this is helpful.

1. Go to Labs (see above post for recommendations on “unknown” lab speakers that we think you should consider hearing).

2. Bring Gift Cards, towels, socks, and cleaning supplies for flood victims in Atlanta. Specifically, gift cards to Lowe’s or Home Depot.

3. Stay for dinner at the arena on Thursday night. First ever “Catalyst Cookout.” You can pay right on site and not have to leave and fight traffic. Entertainment will be provided and then at 8 pm we’ll start the session with Francis Chan.

4. Visit the Social Justice tent outside the main arena. 14 amazing organizations in the tent. Take time hearing their stories and invite them to share at your church.

5. Show up early. Otherwise you’ll be sitting in the upper deck and by early I mean before 7 am.

6. Make sure to fill up your gas tank before you get here- they’ll be long lines at the gas stations.

7. Bring your LUNCH for both days. Tailgate in the parking lot.

8. Sign up for a TWITTER account before you arrive at the event. Trust me- it will enhance your experience.