Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code : Book Review

Culture eats vision for lunch! You can change the look of the platform but nothing has changed until you address the culture.

Samuel Chand presents a great look at what prevents successful change and transition in “Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code.”

Chand presents the idea that it is a church’s culture that needs to be addressed even more so than an eloquently articulated vision or strategy. Culture is about the people, and deep lasting change will never happen unless the culture is addressed. Presenting vision, implementing strategy and not addressing the deep issues of culture will result in resistance to the vision and strategy.

He identifies five categories of church culture – Inspiring, Accepting, Stagnant, Discouraging and Toxic – and goes on to give some of the defining characteristics of each category. Once the category has been determined, Chand provides seven leverage points that can specifically be addressed to change the culture. He uses an acronym of the word CULTURE; Control, Understanding, Leadership, Trust, Unafraid, Responsive, Execution. Chand also anticipates many of the key issues that will arise during times of organizational culture shift.

Having served on two churches that attempted significant transitions, this book could have been used a few years before it was actually written! This is a book that every church leader who is looking to impact deep long-lasting change should have.

Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code from Leadership Network on Vimeo.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of the this book for the purposes of blogging about it from Leadership Network.