I wonder how many ministry leaders have their time in office cut short because their boards left them too much on their own? How many boards have ever discussed the question: Who is responsible for the leader’s success? Of course the leader is, but should the board let the leader sink or swim as they watch from shore? Do the directors not have a partial responsibility for the leader’s success?

Having selected a new senior leader for a church or ministry, it is in the best interest of the board and the organization for the board to do everything it can to improve the likelihood of its leader’s success. If the person doesn’t work out, just think of the cost of finding a new leader:

• Usually a lengthy and painful time as the board wrestles first with identifying the troubling issue, then raising it with the leader, then trying to work through the issue with the leader, and finally terminating the leader if it doesn’t work out
• After termination, there is usually another lengthy period of time spent doing a strategic review, redefining what is desired in a new leader, advertising the position, and then interviewing candidates
• A new leader who isn’t already very familiar with the ministry usually needs another year to sort things out before they really understand all the issues and nuances
• It may take several years before the new leadership team gels into a mature, smoothly functioning group
• There is also the turmoil that a leadership change can cause among staff, donors, and partners

It just makes sense that a board should invest in the success of the person they’ve chosen to entrust with organizational leadership.

I feel very well supported by the CCCC board, so I’d like to share how they invest in my success as a leader.

I’d also really like to hear what other boards do for their senior staff leader, so please, please comment.

Prayer support

Board members have let me know they pray for me, some daily. It means a lot to know that I’m not on my own. I feel a sense of community when others intercede for me. It leaves me feeling that we are in this together.

Frequent, honest appraisal

We have an in camera meeting at every board meeting which is devoted to only one topic – my performance. This is really great because it means I never have to wonder what the board thinks of me. It also means that if issues arise, they will be dealt with quickly instead of festering for months as directors wrestle with how to broach the issue. I find these in camera sessions confidence-building, affirming, encouraging, and helpful. If it sees ways to help me out, the board can use this time to offer its collective wisdom and advice in a mentor-like capacity. Should an issue arise, the board can also offer its correction. All of this helps a senior leader provide the kind of leadership that the board expects.

Professional development opportunities

I really appreciate that the board provides an amount in its budget for my professional development. Not only that, but board members are on the lookout for interesting educational opportunities for me.

• I have taken two courses at Harvard Business School for nonprofit leadership because a director found out about them and passed them on to me. I would never have thought of Harvard Business School as having any courses applicable to me, but as my Harvard series of posts shows, there are some great courses for nonprofits.
• I have my doctorate because a director thought I was capable of getting one and recommended a particular seminary. I thought I was finished my academic education when I got my second Masters degree, but now I have a Doctor of Ministry degree because of this director’s initiative.

Boundary expansion ideas

People don’t really know what their boundaries of imagination are until some external stimulus shows them that the territory of possibilities is larger than imagined. So a board can help its senior staff leader test the limits of his or her realm of possibilities.

• One way is asking probing questions that challenge a leader to dig deeper. Several directors have asked me excellent questions that triggered expansionary thinking. Sample questions regarding the ministry’s work might be:
  • What are you really passionate about?
  • What are you curious about?
  • What are you concerned about?
  • What upsets you?
• Another way of expanding the leader’s horizons is to provide a sabbatical to upset the habitual life of the leader. A sabbatical can jar a person out of a rut by exposing them to new people, new places, new education, and so on. Everyone gets into a routine after a while, and for a leader who is supposed to be generating possibilities, routine can be deadly. So a sabbatical should be something that switches things up. I was given a three month sabbatical after seven years (there is a series of posts on that too) that was truly transformational for me and is now transforming CCCC too.
• The board could ask the leader to:
  • share key insights they’ve had recently
  • outline what they do to stay fresh and on the edge

Reinforcing teamship between board and senior leader

Senior staff leaders will be most successful when there is a mutual sense of shared organizational leadership between board and staff leader. It is not “me versus them”, but ‘the board and I.” The board respects the leadership I give while at the same time keeping the accountability factors in place. There is a healthy sense of the hierarchical relationship that balances teamship between board and staff with the board’s oversight function. It means that I feel empowered to move our ministry forward.

Teamship creates an environment of mutual trust and respect between staff and board. It should eliminate manipulation, politics, defensiveness and all kinds of other negative behaviours that can creep in when teamship is missing.

To maintain teamship:

• The bylaws give me the right to attend and fully participate in all board and board committee meetings (except my own performance and compensation review of course)
• The board includes me in its social events
• The board respects the line between board and staff responsibilities

So what does your board do?

Please use the comments to pass along what your board does to support its leader’s success. Many ministries will be blessed by what you share.

In this series of posts about conducting a theologically sound strategic review for use by Christian ministries, I’ve written about using a theory of change to define what sorts of activities your ministry should engage in, and to document why you think they will work. I’ve also written about using strategy maps to build an organization that can support those activities.

What was missing was the linkage between

1. the missional strategy developed in the theory of change, and
2. the operational strategy developed in the strategy map.

I didn’t know how to link them and that’s why I wrote that you need two strategic plans: one for mission and one for infrastructure.

Well, the missing link has been found! And you only need one strategic plan. The theory of change is not a strategic plan, but just a process to help you develop a strategic plan.

The Missing Link

I found the link in a book I purchased several years ago and put in the library to read later when I did a strategic review. I forgot about it, but I came across it again last October and this time I read it.

Kaplan and Norton (the inventors of strategy maps) suggest nonprofits put customer needs (for charities, the term is beneficiary needs) at the top of the strategy map, but Paul Niven in Balanced Scorecard: Step-by-Step for Government and Nonprofit Agencies says you can add an extra line above that and label it Mission. Voilâ! There you go.

The theory of change takes you from your mission or vision (I prefer vision) through to the interventions you will make (your programs and services). The strategy map takes the interventions and inserts them at the mission level, then drills down into the organization to see what kind of organization and infrastructure you need to build to support the interventions. The rest of this post will show you how to develop a strategy map for your ministry.

Strategy Maps: Step-by-step how-to

Click on the image of our strategy map below to open it in a new window, and then open our theory of change in a third window. That way you can follow along the steps as I describe them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. Set the boundaries of the strategy map

• Our strategy map starts with the End statement at the top. Everything we do is done to make this vision for the future a reality. The point of all strategy and work at CCCC is to help our members be exemplary, healthy and effective Christian ministries. We spaced the key words across the top of the strategy map so we could later link all strategies to at least one of these words.
• We also put our value proposition at the top, as a reminder that these are the reasons why our members value us. Everything we do needs to fulfill our value proposition. Our value proposition influenced some of the strategy map content because we wanted to be sure we deliver the expected value!
• Our corporate values were added at the bottom of the page where they represent the foundation of our way of organizational life. Regardless of what we do, we must always be true to these values.

2. Create the rows of the map

The left hand column holds the name of each of the rows. Each row examines your organization from a different perspective. You may want to give a different name to a perspective if that makes more sense in your context, but regardless of the name the perspective should be the same. For example, we don’t think of beneficiaries. Our beneficiaries are our members, so we called the beneficiary perspective the member perspective. It means the same thing but uses our terminology.

• The mission perspective answers the question, “What area the essential things that we must do to fulfill our vision?”
• The beneficiary perspective addresses the question, “What must we do well to satisfy our beneficiaries?”
• The operational perspective examines the question, “At which processes must we excel if we are to meet our beneficiaries’ needs?”
• The assets perspective asks, “Do we have what we need in terms of people, technology and organizational climate?”
• The financial perspective addresses the reality that none of the foregoing will happen if you don’t have any money. Money, or the lack of it, is the constraining factor for nonprofits. This perspective has two components, recognizing that to improve your financial position you must do at least one of two things: grow revenue or improve efficiency.

Both Niven’s book and Kaplan and Norton’s guide you through the more detailed mapping within each perspective.

3. Work from the top row down

The key to developing a strategy map is to realize that it does not document everything that you do, but only those things that are most critical to achieving your vision. So there will be lots of ongoing things that are good and necessary that will not appear on the strategy map. The idea is to reduce the clutter so you can easily focus on the essentials. These will be either new things you need to start doing, or things you are already doing that need significant improvement.

Mission Perspective

We took the Interventions column from the theory of change which was from the perspective of what we would provide, and turned it around in the strategy map so that it was from the perspective of what our members needed in order for our End statement to be fulfilled.

For example, we identified faith and practice guidance as an intervention. We can provide guidance, but what our members need are faith-infused practices if they are to be exemplary Christian ministries. The theory of change identified what they need, and the strategy map created the category the need fits within. For example, providing guidance is a specific thing we can do, but if we think of members having faith-infused practices, we have created a category in which guidance is but one possibility. The category could stimulate other program and service ideas, making the strategy map a dynamic document.

The benefit using both a theory of change and a strategy map is that the theory of change produces an explanation of why we think a given intervention will work and it allows us to test the explanation for reasonableness. And by stating it from the beneficiary’s perspective in the strategy map, it means we take responsibility for the end result. In other words, if our guidance on faith and practice is ignored, then we can’t say “We’ve done our part” and be satisfied. Because we take responsibility for the external change, it means that if no external change happens, we have to ask why our guidance wasn’t accepted and acted upon. Was it relevant? Realistic? Persuasive? Affordable? If external change isn’t taking place, we must make the necessary internal changes that will produce a different external result.

Other Perspectives

Once you’ve got the mission perspective, the rest will flow out from it. We drew lines to connect each individual initiative to all the other initiatives that it supports, so we could see the linkages. Then we found which initiatives end up supporting four or five of our five key words from the End statement at the top. Those boxes we highlighted for special attention. Although we want to do everything on the strategy map, if we have to set priorities (which unfortunately time and money require us to do) then we will work first on the highlighted boxes because they provide the biggest bang for the buck.

Outcomes

The board approved our strategy map at the February board meeting, and since then we have drilled the map down to the departmental level so we now have operational maps as well as the strategy map. Allocation of resources, priorities, and other decisions will now all be based on our maps. This brings the strategy review to a close.

I wish you great success as you do your own strategic reviews!

 

What does it mean to be a servant leader? Whom should leaders serve? What service do they provide? How does one serve and lead at the same time? Great questions that deserve discussion, so let’s get started!

Servant leadership is probably the most talked about leadership model of our generation. It’s a term coined by Robert Greenleaf, a man who said he was always informed by the Judeo-Christian ethic and who (at mid-life) became a Quaker. He felt, though, that servant leadership has universal application.¹

Servant leadership is well-accepted in the corporate world where its benefits include closer contact with customers (because of decentralized decision-making), avoidance of greed-based behaviours (because the interests of all stakeholders are considered), and better innovation (due to its focus on empathy and listening that lead to greater open-mindedness).

But servant leadership particularly resonates with Christians leaders because of Jesus’ example and sayings:

• Whoever wants to be great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave – just as the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. Mat 20:26-28
• But it is not this way with you, but the one who is the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like the servant. For who is greater, the one who reclines at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who reclines at the table? But I am among you as the one who serves. Luke 22:26-27

Jesus as a model of servant leadership

Jesus’ most dramatic teaching of servant leadership occurs when he washes his disciples’ feet (John 13:1-17). If ministry leaders want to be servant leaders, should they act like domestic servants in imitation of Jesus? Should they serve coffee for the staff? At the end of the day, do servant leaders become valets, bringing cars to the door for their staff? No. A leader may do acts of service just as any person might do for another, but this is thoughtful kindness, not servant leadership. Jesus’ point was much bigger than this. We need to understand his teaching methodology to get it.

Jesus used hyperbole as a teaching tool. When he told people to pluck out their eyes and cut off their hands and feet (Mark 9:43-47), he didn’t mean that they should literally go and do so. He was reinforcing the point of how serious sin is: it is better to live eternally in heaven and suffer a disability in this temporary life than it is to go to hell forever in exchange for the short-lived pleasures of sin.

Furthermore, he didn’t promise to wash the disciples’ feet every time they entered a room. It was a single act of hyperbole to teach a lesson, contrasting the ways of God’s kingdom and human kingdoms. In God’s kingdom, rulers rule for the welfare of the people, not their own.

Thinking that having his feet washed by Jesus would actually accomplish something, Peter wanted to be completely bathed to get more of whatever benefit washing provided. By taking Jesus’ symbolic act literally, he missed the point. At least he had a good heart!

Christian leaders serve Jesus Christ

Christian leaders, like all Christians, serve Jesus. Jesus likewise served his Father. Recognizing this, Henry and Richard Blackaby wrote in Spiritual Leadership: Moving People on to God’s Agenda that we should not dream up what we can do for God, but ask God what he has already planned for us to do (Eph 2:10).²

Christian leaders must therefore be spiritually sensitive to receive God’s leading. If you’d like to learn more about attuning yourself to God, a great guide is Space for God: The Study and Practice of Spirituality and Prayer. I also have a series “Hearing God Speak” which you can find on the right navigation bar under Series.

Christian service includes not only what we do, but also how we do it, so Christian leaders serve Christ by working on godly goals in godly ways.

Christian leaders serve their ministry’s mission

Ministry leaders must dedicate their leadership to the organization’s mission, which is the ministry’s raison d’être. Leaders serve the mission by gathering people and resources to work together on it. They:

• lead people in group discernment
• challenge people to be and do their best
• keep the mission in front of their teams
• watch for mission drift and keep the ministry on course

Christian leaders serve their boards

Boards are the guardians of their organization’s mission, values and risk tolerances. They may do more than that, but all boards have these three primary responsibilities:

• governing what a ministry does
• defining its character traits
• deciding when the ends do, or do not, justify the means

They also hire, oversee, and terminate the senior leader, so the senior leader is a servant of the board.

Senior leaders serve their boards by following their directions and policies, and accomplishing their goals.

Christian leaders serve their beneficiaries

We, the people of God, exist because God wants us to be a light to the world through whom all peoples will be blessed, so ministry leaders serve their ministry’s beneficiaries first by understanding them and their circumstances, and then by working for their welfare.

Christian leaders serve their organizations

Finally, leaders serve their organizations through excellent leadership by:

• pursuing their own personal and professional development
• modeling what the ministry values
• caring for the organization’s health, including the professional development of its staff and volunteers

Leaders must always be thinking about what is best for the organization - for its viability, performance, and reputation.

Servant leadership attitudes

Servant leadership is not just about doing, it is also about a way of thinking. It is about recognizing a higher authority than one’s self, and acknowledging that the goal of leadership is to benefit others. Here are some of the essential attitudes that support servant leadership.

Humility: Christian leaders realize they are serving in their leadership role not by right or by merit, but by the grace and call of God, which is jointly discerned by the leader and those who are in authority over the leader.

Gratitude: There is a healthy sense of wonder that comes with being appointed to a position of leadership, a wonder that keeps the focus on service and away from self. Leadership is never about the leader, but about the mission. When a leader makes it about the person, or allows others to make it about the person, the leader has strayed from true Christian leadership. Christian leaders serve with an attitude of gratitude (thanks to Zig Ziglar for coining such a memorable phrase!). They are thankful for the opportunity to serve and for the confidence that others have placed in them. Here’s a great post on having an attitude of gratitude that is well worth reading, especially if you are working on a Saturday (like I am right now!).

Sober self-assessment: Examining one’s own performance is a way of acknowledging accountability for service given to another. A leader might assess:

• Motives - what is driving me? Would I be willing to admit my deepest motives in public?
• Effect on other people - How do other people experience my leadership?
• Feelings - What causes me joy or hurt? Is it appropriate?
• Ego - I know I need a healthy ego, but are my ego needs driving my leadership behaviour?

Exaltation: Rather than drawing attention to themselves, Christian leaders exalt Jesus by pointing to him and giving him the glory for the work of the ministry

Servant leadership metaphors

There are some great biblical metaphors (other than servant) that leaders would do well to reflect on. Each conveys an aspect of servant leadership. I’ll let you have the fun of exploring these on your own. They include:

• Shepherd (compare John 10:11-15 with Ezekiel 34)
• Steward (eg., Titus 1:7-8)
• Mother (I Thessalonians 2:7-8)
• Father (I Thessalonians 2:11-12)

Leading while serving

Leaders are supposed to get results, and some leaders may worry that servant leadership will jeopardize their ability to do that. Not to worry. Servant leadership is leadership for the benefit of others, not a specific leadership process. For example, Jesus, James, and Paul were all servant leaders, and yet each used a different decision-making process.

• Jesus didn’t recruit a group of disciples to problem solve how to get Israel to fulfill its purpose. He knew what had to happen and where they should go, and even when the disciples objected (for instance, going to Judea in John 11:1-16), Jesus went ahead and led them where he knew they should go.
• James led the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 allowing everyone to give their opinions. He then made the decision by himself for the Council and gave his reasons for it.
• Paul had a vision in Acts 16 which he presented to his team, and together they agreed on its interpretation.

Whichever way leaders choose to lead, if they do it in a godly way for the welfare of others, they can be servant leaders. Now it must be said that normally leaders will want to include as many people as possible in their leadership deliberations because it is so beneficial for everyone. It:

• draws on the wisdom of the group
• contributes to each member’s professional development
• improves buy-in to the decisions that are made
• allows team members to make better decisions in their own realm of responsibility because they have the big picture

Consulting with team members does not preclude giving them instructions. Consulting and directing are complementary activities.

The best example I can give of consultation followed by direction is the leadership process used by the Devil’s Brigade. This was an elite joint Canadian-American World War Two commando force in which my uncle, Graham Neilson, was a 1st Lieutenant. (He served in the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Regiment of the First Special Service Force, the official name of “The Devil’s Brigade.”)

When a mission was being planned, everyone contributed to the planning. The best ideas, no matter whose they were, floated to the top and a consensus was reached. But once the plan was put into action, the highly disciplined team instantly followed every command from the leaders.

Conclusion

Servant leaders find great joy working towards something much bigger than themselves. They are passionate about using their gifts and capabilities for the benefit of the world around them, and they draw others to that same mission, creating an organization in which all staff who are similarly motivated can find fulfillment.

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While in Milan for a board meeting,¹ I took a tour of the city that included a visit to the refectory of the Dominican monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazio. This is where da Vinci painted “The Last Supper“ on one of the end walls (painted between 1494 and 1498). On the opposite wall, another master painter (Giovanni Donato da Montorfano) painted “The Crucifixion“ in 1495. Both are huge paintings, each taking up the full wall. A doorway was later added to the dining hall and part of The Last Supper was lost (just below Jesus’ place at the table).

Here are the two paintings:

Da Montorfano painted a true fresco, which means he painted on wet plaster. This technique has its limitations:

• he had to paint a section at a time and complete it very quickly before the plaster dried, and
• he could not blend his colours.

Da Vinci tried a new technique – painting on dry plaster. This had the advantages that:

• he could take all the time in the world to paint as slowly as he liked,
• he could do preliminary work on the whole painting and then come back and work on the details, and
• he could blend his colours, have softer textures and paint the effect of sunlight into his work.

In addition, da Vinci used perspective in his painting, giving it a quasi 3-dimensional look. From halfway back in the dining hall, it looks like the dining hall carries on in the painting and that Jesus and the disciples are at the dining hall’s head table. The monks must have got quite a kick out of that!

But my main thought, in comparing the two paintings was to feel sorry for da Montorfano because he had the misfortune that his masterpiece, being permanently opposite to da Vinci’s masterpiece, would forever be compared unfavourably to it. I can imagine him looking over his shoulder as he was painting to see what da Vinci was doing!

And yet, if his painting could be moved anywhere else, it would be appreciated as the masterpiece it truly is.

Leaders and spotlights

It made me think about senior leaders and their executive teams. Senior leaders usually get the credit (and the blame) for organizational results. They also have a ceremonial or figurehead function to fulfill. Often they are looked to as the model for what the organization stands for and aspires to be. They are, in short, in the spotlight. But must they keep the spotlight to themselves? Not if they know what they are doing.

Good senior leaders will make sure they include others in the spotlight of attention. They can do this because:

• If they are any good, they will have hired or promoted the very best people to the leadership team. The executive team should be full of top performers, highly capable in their fields, and at least one should be a credible candidate for the senior position. Each of these highly qualified executives deserves their own place in the spotlight.
• Sharing the attention with the executive team members demonstrates the strength of the team, and consequently, the organization. The shared spotlight acknowledges that organizational success is not dependent on one person alone, but on the combined capabilities of the executive team. It is the organization, not the individual that is the main thing.
• Certainly for topics related to the ministry’s programs, individual executive team members will likely have greater experience and hands on knowledge of a particular issue than the senior leader does, so they would best serve as the spokesperson for that area. When it comes to the ministry as a whole, I would expect that any of the senior leadership team would do a good job representing the ministry.
• Allowing others to share the spotlight enhances their leadership development and expands their ability to lead, because they develop their own contacts, referral sources, etc. and become stronger leaders.
• Sharing the spotlight shares the workload of being in the spotlight. It can be a lot for one person to bear.
• Sharing the spotlight also smooths the transition to a new leader when that time comes. Think of the transitions from Moses to Joshua, Elijah to Elisha, and Paul to Timothy and Titus (eg., Titus 1:5).

Organizations with active founders or strong personalities in leadership can find it hard to include others in the spotlight, even when the leader is willing to share the spotlight, because the public often wants to see or hear the person they identify the organization with. This is why senior leaders should encourage members of their executive teams (actually anyone within the organization) to have their own speaking engagements, give interviews, and publish articles. Let them build up a following because it all benefits the organization by raising its visibility and expanding the channels of influence for the sake of its mission.

In what ways do you encourage your executive team and other staff to have visibility inside and outside the ministry?

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The most wonderful project has just been made public and I’m sure readers of this blog will want to know about it. It is a digital, all-Canadian, daily devotional that will take you through the Bible in about a four-year cycle.

Scripture Union says this will be the first Canadian daily devotional series. It is written entirely by Canadian Christian leaders and thought leaders. I am so excited not only to have participated as a writer in this project (Genesis 12-18 and John 12), but to be able to read what my peers across the country have to say on their portions of scripture!

You will likely either know or know of many of the writers. I’ve included the writers list at the bottom of this post so you can check out who’s writing. You won’t have to wait long to get started because the launch will be May 19, 2013 and you can subscribe now.

You can follow theStory on Facebook and Twitter.

Here’s a short teaser video:

 

The writers are:

• Jeff Anderson (President, The Evangelical Covenant Church of Canada)
• Kent Anderson (President, Northwest Baptist Seminary)
• Carolyn Arends (Singer, song writer)
• Laura Barron (Evangelist, Jews for Jesus)
• Bob Beasley (Conference Speaker, Broadcaster, Bible League)
• Glynis Belec (Writer)
• Jeremy Bell (Executive Director, Canadian Baptists of Western Canada)
• Jim Beverley (Prof. Christian Thought and Ethics, Tyndale Seminary)
• Peter Black (Writer)
• Denys Blackmore (CEO, Every Home for Christ International)
• Arthur Boers (Associate Professor, Chair of Leadership, Tyndale University)
• Bill Bonikowsky (Writer, Alpha Canada)
• Deborah C. Bowen (Professor of English, Redeemer University)
• William Brackney (Prof. Christian Thought and Ethics, Acadia Divinity School)
• Mark Buchanan (Pastor, Writer)
• Merv Budd (National Director of Equipping Evangelists)
• Phil Callaway (Humorist, International Speaker)
• Jim Cantelon (Host, 100 Huntley Street)
• Pierre Constant (Chair of New Testament Studies, TBS)
• Laurie Cook (CEO, World Relief Canada)
• Carla Anne Coroy (Speaker, author)
• Jody Cross (Singer, song writer)
• Lorna Dueck (Host and Executive Producer Listen Up TV)
• Jacqueline Dugas (Every Home for Christ)
• Donna Dyck (Author, speaker)
• Keith Elford (Bishop, The Free Methodist Church in Canada)
• Janet Epp-Buckingam (Director Leadership Centre, Trinity Western University)
• Roy Eyre (President, Wycliffe Canada)
• Bill Fietje (President, Associated Gospel Churches)
• Mel Finlay (Nation at Prayer)
• Susan Finlay (Nation at Prayer)
• Grace Fox (Author, International Speaker, Co-Director International Messengers Canada)
• John Franklin (Executive Director, Imago)
• Lola French (CEO, Canadian Association of Pregnancy Support Services)
• Thomas Froese (Reporter, author)
• Margaret Gibb (President, Women Together)
• Kathleen Gibson (Author, speaker)
• Sheila Wray Gregoire (Author, speaker)
• Wendy Gritter (Executive Director, New Direction Ministries)
• Bill Hockin (Retired Anglican Bishop, Writer)
• Ron Hughes (President, FBH International)
• Renee James (Canadian Baptist Women of Ontario and Quebec, Editor The Link & Visitor)
• Paul Johnson (Executive Director, Open Doors)
• Wayne Johnson (President, OneBook)
• Stephen Kennedy (Editor “Testimony” PAOC)
• David Kitz (Bible Dramatist, author, storyteller)
• Doug Koop (Writer, Former Editor Christian Week)
• Marcia Laycock (Author, speaker)
• Claire MacMillan (National Director, Church of the Nazarene Canada)
• Peter Marshall (Executive Director, Gideons)
• Gord Martin (Executive Director, Vision Ministries Canada)
• Scott Masson (Professor of English, Tyndale University)
• Roy Matheson (Prof. Emeritus Theology, Tyndale Seminary)
• Jamie McIntosh (Executive Director, International Justice Mission)
• Heidi McLaughlin (Author, speaker)
• Dorene Meyer (Author)
• Scott Moore (Area Director, Youth Unlimited)
• Gary Nelson (President, Tyndale University/College/Seminary)
• Jon Ohlhauser (Hope College, Previously President of Prairie Bible Institute)
• Patricia Paddey (Freelance Writer)
• Jim Patterson (Artist, Writer)
• John Pellowe (CEO, Canadian Council Christian Charities)
• Larry Perkins (Professor of New Testament, Northwest Baptist Seminary/ACTS)
• Elaine Pountney (International Speaker and Author)
• Michael Pountney (Former Principal Wycliffe College, University of Toronto)
• Carson Pue (Executive Director, First Baptist Vancouver)
• Murray Pura (Author, Pastor)
• Franklin Pyles (President, The Christian and Missionary Alliance in Canada)
• Annabel Robinson (University Regina, Prof. Emeritus Classics)
• Geri Rodman (President, Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship)
• Terence Rolston (President, Focus on the Family Canada)
• Denise Rumble (Director, The Word Guild)
• Jayne Self (Author)
• Ted Seres (Executive Director, Canadian Bible Society)
• Jo Lynn Sheane (CBC Journalist and Reporter)
• Adele Simmons (Speaker, writer, musician)
• Barry Slauenwhite (President and CEO, Compassion International)
• Lynn Smith (Next Level)
• Karen Stiller (Editor, Faith Today)
• Mags Storey (Editor, Christian Week)
• Bill Taylor (Executive Director, Evangelical Free Church of Canada)
• T.V. Thomas (Director, Centre of Evangelism and World Mission)
• Dave Toycen (President and CEO, World Vision)
• Rikk Watts (Professor New Testament, Regent College)
• David Wells (General Superintendant, Pentecostal Assemblies Of Canada)
• Kirk Wellum (Principal, Toronto Baptist Seminary)
• Steve West (Adjunct Prof, Toronto Baptist Seminary)
• Irving Whitt (PAOC Global Educational Coordinator)
• Mim Wickett (Writer)
• David Williams (President, Taylor College and Seminary)
• Rod Wilson (President, Regent College)
• Ray Wiseman (Author, Editor)