It’s Monday morning and the weekly debrief meeting is about to happen. You know the normal questions that are about to be asked. How many people showed up? How much money was given? Who was missing as a volunteer? How many guests did we have? How many views did we get on our online campus? How many likes or retweets did we get? How many people accepted Christ this weekend?

These are all of the measurements that your typical staff at a church will look at week after week. These are not bad indicators. In fact, I think that if you are not asking these questions then you should start. If you don’t measure and then evaluate these measurements then you will not get better as a staff. Which in turn means you will not get better as a church.

So, let’s answer these questions in a fake staff meeting and see how we are doing.

How many people? We are up 15 percent from this time last year.
How much was given? Up again but only by five percent.
Missing Volunteers? Follow up with those people.
Guests? We know we had six new families.
Online views? Even with last year. What can we do differently?
Likes and retweets? More than any other week. Let’s do this topic again.
Accepted Christ? I have great news! Follow up with those who made a decision.

The debrief is over and now we look to this coming weekend and see what needs to be done to make sure it is successful. The lists start to fly and everyone has their tasks to do for that week.

This is your typical week as a church staff member. It’s easy to get into a routine that doesn’t stop because Sunday is always coming. What if there was another question or another measurement that we talked about as we debrief? What if we got this routine down so much that we knew the normal measurements so well that we were able to step back and add a new one?

In basketball, you are taught to dribble. When you first start to learn how to dribble you look at the ball. You have to make sure that it comes up to your hand so that you can push it back down again. After a while, you learn to look up and dribble with your head up. You then learn to dribble with both hands. At some point, you can dribble with both hands and you don’t have to look at the ball. You can look at the court and see the floor. You can see your teammates. You can see the open person. You can also communicate with your team better. All of a sudden, you don’t even realize that you are dribbling a basketball anymore. You become more aware of the game around you. Each player on the team starts to understand what the other players are trying to do. They understand the plays and what is trying to be accomplished. They then celebrate when someone makes a basket. It’s no longer about dribbling.

Here is the measurement of success that I want your staff to try at least once over the next month: Have a meeting where you celebrate each other’s wins. Not because they told you that they won but because you noticed it. Your head was up. You were looking at the others succeed and you celebrated. A team that celebrates together will be more successful. Don’t just celebrate the numbers. Celebrate when you hear someone say “thank you.” Celebrate when you hear about how a fellow staff member stepped in to help during someone’s time of crisis. The new measurement of success is counting how many times your team can celebrate what other departments are doing. If you can’t celebrate someone else then you are looking at the ball while you dribble. Get your head up.