ARE:A Renewal Enterprise

Don't Wait 100 Days

It's an epidemic spreading more quickly than the swine flu - everybody everywhere it seems has been infected with an itch to evaluate, critique, and comment on President Obama's first "100 days." And they can't stop scratching it. Is this unfair to the new president? Maybe. We all know the challenges he - and we all - face are going to take more than a few months to address. It does seem a little unfair for a bunch of armchair quarterbacks to be second guessing the guy on the field who's doing his best to keep the ball moving down the field under the worst possible circumstances.

But we hope the president himself is doing a little reflecting on these first "100 days." In fact, we hope he's taking stock of how things are going in order to readjust, recalibrate, and redirect a lot more often than every 100 days.

The World Has Changed

"What kind of faith communities and religious organizations do we need in a world where we don’t control the message and don’t have the authority to 'instruct' and 'evaluate' but we do have the opportunity to accompany people and clarify their journey?" - Bob Fisher

Bob Fisher is our special guest on tonight's "4th Tuesday" webinar:

Title: Creating a Web of Relationships 

Date: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 

Time: 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM CDT 

Cost: Free!

Click here to register

Leadership: What One Group Is Trying

No matter what you do, you know that a key to your group being effective includes good leadership. Leaders who find ways to operate using renewable practices, help people see what they have in new ways, and actually get something done are rarer than they could be. Some assume that leaders are born and wish more leaders showed up with certain traits in place. But we are seeing that leadership can be caught/taught and that everyone can increase his or her effectiveness as a leader.

The Gift that Keeps on Giving

If you have read these postings for a while you know that one of A.R.E.’s commitments is to giving. You can click links to all the organizations we are supporting this year at our web site. And one of our recent webinars was on continuing to give even in the midst of economic struggles – giving is an important part of keeping our humanity in place, even when we feel pressed.

Are You Relational Enough to Get Things Done?

Some of the members of our team are trained coaches who are working with people to help them be their best. The coaches on A.R.E.'s team are part of groups like CoachNet and the International Coach Federation. These groups provide high quality training and tools to insure coaching standards and effectiveness. If you are reading this, you may want to contact us and inquire about getting a coach to assist you in thinking through the work you do.

Do You Have The Help You Need?

At a time when almost everybody is thinking about cutting back on whatever seems non-essential, it might seem like a bad idea to look outside of your organization for help. Well, not necessarily. In fact, now is exactly the right time to be making decisions that will help your organization become more vital, more purposeful, more impactful. That doesn't necessarily mean you need outside help to do it. But it might. 

How do you know if you're ready for the kind of help a consultant or a coach can offer? 

What Do You Have?

Increasingly, during this economic downturn, we see stories of folks across the board tightening their belts, cutting their budgets, terminating employees and programs, and commenting on what they’re having to go without to get by.  But what if all that was needed to weather this changing economic climate was a new mindset? What if all you needed to do was focus on the assets you have so that you can use them in a way that matters- to your community, to your employees, to enhance your bottom line? 

That’s what Brent Green, owner of GreenArt Landscape Design in Southern California, has done and it’s making a HUGE difference in his communities (and we’re willing to bet on his bottom line too!). 

Have a Good Easter!

We know that not all of you necessarily celebrate Good Friday and Easter, but many (most) of you do. We are at the heart of the story for many of you – a simple message that God has invested everything in the world and goes to great lengths to be with each and all of us in the midst of life. The basic message includes a simple reminder that you have been given everything you need and then some. If you are from another faith tradition or perhaps no faith tradition at all – that message that you have what you need still pertains to you. For those of you from the Christian tradition, treasure the gifts that you have been given. We’ll taking Friday and Monday off here but we’ll be back at it next week! Have a good Easter.

What Are You Doing to Innovate?

Looking through Fast Company’s Top 50 Most Innovative list shows a list of amazing ideas, well thought out and well implemented. It is a who’s who of new ideas put into practice. These groups have each done amazingly well at not only adapting to new situations – they are causing the very situations everyone else is reacting to! Amazingly, Amazon shows up in the top 10. Their new Kindle reader is a whole new way to read books and distribute them to the world. And in the midst of a recession, Amazon had its best December ever. How did a company once ridiculed and questioned get to this point? And what can we all learn from what they’ve done so far?

What About Justice?

If you’ve been reading our material for a while you have seen our writing on microloans – the way that people with resources can provide interest free loans to small business entrepreneurs in developing places. These small loans enable people to buy the basic things they need to start a business, earn a living and repay the loan principle interest free. In most cases, the money from the repaid loan is cycled back and loaned to someone else and the cycle repeats itself over and over. Kiva, a leader in microcredit, is one of the groups that A.R.E. supports with our donations as a company.

But sometimes it takes more than money to make a change.