In 2020 the Executive Board will lead the Southwest Conference in a SOAR visioning process, a profoundly positive approach to strategic thinking, planning, and leading. SOAR stands for Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, and Results and is intended to be a positive approach to strategic conversations that allows an organization to construct its future through collaboration, shared understanding, and a commitment to action. The focus is on what is the system doing well, what does the system want more of, and how do we move forward from positive images to positive action and results. SOAR leverages the Appreciative Inquiry paradigm to shift and amplify the energy and dialogue of stakeholders to strengths, opportunities, aspirations, and results.
We’ll begin to SOAR January 31 through February 1 when the Executive Board enters a time of retreat and discernment about the future of the Southwest Conference. The SOAR conversation will widen on March 7 to include our Mission and Church Vitality Committee (MCVC) representatives, authorized clergy, and the SWC standing committee members. Board members and MCVC representatives will collaborate to include local churches and communities in the conversation in the months following our annual meeting. Our ecumenical, interfaith, and wider church partners will also have ways they can participate in the SOAR conversations.
The MCVC SOAR event will happen on Saturday, March 7 from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at Beatitudes Campus, 1610 W. Glendale Avenue, Phoenix, AZ 85021. Registration and light refreshments from 8:30 to 9:30.
Travel Pool funds are available to help defray travel costs for lay members, and for clergy who do not have a travel reimbursement from their ministry settings. The day meets requirements for continuing education for ministerial standing in the SWC. Still not sure? Ask the SWC Executive Board member in your area about their recent experience with SOAR.
SOAR conversations will center on four questions:
Strengths: What are our capabilities? What can we build on?
Opportunities: What are our stakeholders asking for?
Aspirations: What do we care deeply about?
Results: How do we know we are succeeding?
At the conclusion of the SOAR experience, the Executive Board will have been trained to facilitate these conversations within the SWC and our ministry settings; local church leaders and clergy will have built a visioning/strategic conversations skill set to use within their own ministry settings; and our understanding as a conference regarding our why, our shared mission, and our commonly held values will have become clear so that we can live into our preferred shared future together while supporting one another in our own ministry settings.
In preparation for this initiative the executive board is inviting the entire conference to read two books with them:
Conversations Worth Having: Using Appreciative Inquiry to Fuel Productive and Meaningful Engagement
Thin Book of SOAR: Creating Strategy That Inspires Innovation and Engagement 2nd Edition
The conference office also needs the name and contact information of each congregation’s MCVC representative.
“The MCVC bears the responsibility for celebrating what's working in our congregations; encouraging one another to go beyond our comfort zones; supporting one another in our advocacy; listening to and appreciating our differing perspectives; discovering new ways to address our common and differing challenges; and advising the Executive Board regarding the mission of the Conference. It shall undertake an annual evaluation to discern both whether or not that mission is in keeping with the call of the Holy Spirit in our time, and whether or not that mission maintains our relevance as an agent of transformation.” (Southwest Conference Bylaws)
Dr. Jacqueline M. Stavros (Jackie) has been contracted to consult with and train the SWC to engage in SOAR conversations. She will lead the Executive Board Retreat and the MCVC meeting in January and March respectively. Jackie’s passion is working with others to discover their strengths, identify opportunities and create a plan with meaningful results for positive change! She is internationally recognized for her creation of SOAR, a positive approach to strategic thinking, planning, and leading that focuses on strengths, opportunities, aspirations, and results based on strategic conversations. The heart of her work is using Appreciative Inquiry (AI), one of the most popular approaches to positive change – that is bringing out the best in people, their organizations, and communities to fuel conversations worth having that produce meaningful engagement and results. Her latest books are Thin Book of SOAR: Creating Strategy that Inspires Innovation and Engagement (www.soar-strategy.com) and Conversations Worth Having: Using Appreciative Inquiry to Fuel Productive and Meaningful Engagement (www.conversationsworthhaving.today).
Jackie earned her Doctorate in Management from Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University. Her dissertation: Capacity Building Using an Appreciative Approach: A Relational Process of Building Your Organization’s Future. She earned her MBA at Michigan State University and BA at Wayne State University. She lives in Brighton, MI with her husband, Paul, their kids, Ally and Adam, and lovable dog, Rex.
May God’s Spirit truly be the wind beneath our wings as we begin to SOAR in 2020!