I finished up Guy Kawasaki’s book The Art of the Start earlier this week. I have really enjoyed reading Guy’s blog over the last 6 months or so and have really grown to appreciate his insight, wit, and wisdom.

Guy was an “evangelist” for Apple in the 80’s and in the 90’s launched Garage Technology Venture, a venture capital company for business start-ups. Even before reading this book I had grown convinced that there is great import from business starting for church starting. But after reading this book I am convinced all the more.

Now I know for some that this is anathema, the business world providing any insight for the church world. I know because I once thought like that myself. I was cynical and jaded to anything that wreaked of corporate. It just didn’t seem “spiritual” to use business models because the church is not a business. And, yes, the church isn’t a business and not every model fits in the church world. But there is still a lot for us to learn from “best practices” in the business world.

I mean let’s consider Guy’s last chapter, “The Art of Being a Mensch” - a “Yiddish term ofr a person who is ethical, decent, and admirable” (211). Guy lays out three “simple concepts” for business entreprenuers. First, help many people (”you derive intrinsic joy from helping your fellow man”). Second, do what’s right (even when it’s hard). Third, pay back society (be a blessing to the world). These are extremely biblical concepts.

I don’t have time to fully argue for the value of extrabiblical sources for learning, growing, and developing leaders but suffice it to say this book will be a must read for any future leaders we develop in our church launching venture, it’s just that good and that important.

Back to the book. Guy addresses every aspect of starting a business, from positioning (finding your niche) to pitching (raising funds) to branding (getting the word out). I’ve already posted some of the great thoughts he had in the early chapters so I won’t reinvent the wheel here but I would like to point out that throughout the book I was continually reminded of our church launching venture.

In particular I’d like to highlight his chapter “The Art of Branding.” He begins the chapter, “proselytization, or evangelism, represents the core of branding for startups in today’s highly competitive world, in which information is free, ubiquitous, and instantaneous” (167). I love the way Guy speaks of promotion and publicity through the language of evangelist, he often refers to himself as an evangelist. It reminds me that when you love something you will talk about. Think about the Starbucks fanatic, or someone who loves a certain sports team, or someone who enjoys a certain car. They talk about it and become part of the marketing team for that brand.

It should be like this in the church as well. Now don’t hear what I’m not saying. I’m not saying the church is a brand like Nike. But when your church is on mission with Jesus then you will naturally want others to enjoy what has impacted your life, that’s all. And so as leaders in the church part of our role is help raise up evangelists of this kind as well. This creates viral marketing that we could never pay for if we tried. It’s stated in phrases by some like, “invest and invite.” It’s assuming you have something worth inviting people to, whether that be a small group gathering or a corporate worship gathering.

His section, “Lower the Barriers of Adoption” is a must read. Sure it doesn’t all translate, I don’t think as a church we’ll ever create an indexed users manual but conceptually there is a link, we need to make vital information readily available at minimal expenditures of time and energy. It reminded me of our need to provide tangible opportunities to get involved with us that are without a lot of prerequisites. For instance, one church invites people every week to help in efforts for the service and all they need to do is show up early, receive 15 minutes of instruction and then are set out. That helps to lowers barriers of adoption!

In all this book is an extremely valuable read, so much so that I know I need to work back through it again and again. I would highly recommend this book for any who are involved in ministry and especially those who are a part of church launching. As I mentioned before I can really see how this book could become a must read in our leadership development process.

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