Issue No. 5 of Your Weekly Staff Meeting is a gentle reminder about the kingdom power of thank you gifts. This powerful devotional book, by the way, is a perfect gift to encourage your team members in their walk with God.
John Baillie (1886 1960) understood servant leadership when he prayed, “I would hold myself in readiness today for Thy least word of command. Give me the spirit, I pray Thee, to keep myself in continual training for the punctual fulfillment of Thy most holy will.”
Will Your Donors and Volunteers Remember Your Gifts 20 Years From Now?
The next time your team brainstorms donor gifts, volunteer appreciation gifts or seemingly insignificant thank you gifts‹pray first!
I received a powerful thank you gift in the 1980s from Lloyd Ogilvie¹s television ministry, Let God Love You. In response to a very small gift, the team sent me John Baillie's devotional classic, A Diary of Private Prayer. (Ogilvie studied under Baillie in Scotland.)
I've given the book to dozens of people. It's a classic flywheel-it perpetually gains steam year after year and colleagues continue to tell me how much they read it. The simplicity is brilliant. There are 31 morning prayers and 31 evening prayers‹and a blank page next to each. I've read them regularly for more than 20 years and they consistently connect me with our Father. It's a gift, as they say, that keeps on giving with more than one million copies in print.
More Must Reads
Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
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1. Tell us about an inexpensive gift you received that continues to be meaningful to you.
2. How effective is our organization in thoughtful and appropriate gift-giving?
3. To sincerely express our thanks to special people, do we need to raise the gift bar?
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Insights from the Management Buckets Workshop Experience
At this week's staff meeting, arrive extra early and store any extra chairs. If it's a meeting for 15, don¹t have 18 chairs. If five are coming, use only five chairs. The negative effect of empty chairs can torpedo the best planned meeting.
A messy room clutters the mind. When the leader or facilitator arrives early to create an inviting and business-like meeting atmosphere, half the battle is won. You know all this‹but when was the last time you arrived extra early so the room was set and you were ready to pour coffee for the early arrivers? Try it.
Click: 10 Commandments for Conducting Meetings.
In our Management Buckets Workshop Experience, we pour creativity into The Meetings Bucket so what you¹re taught is also caught.
Your Weekly Staff Meeting Questions:
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1. Okay, team! If you've been sitting in the same chair for more than four weeks in a row‹it's time to switch to a new view!
2. What do you enjoy most about our staff meetings‹and what would you like to toss out immediately?
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