It wasn't until I recently read a book by Patrick Lencioni, the well known author of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, that I was reminded about the family mission statement idea...
Lencioni, who runs a consulting firm specializing in executive team development and organizational health told his wife that if families were run more like businesses, they’d be much better off. His wife (who was home with their three young children) scoffed at the idea until he explained that businesses have mission statements and pay close attention to daily processes and goals fitting into that statement. Being a coach and teacher, I love learning about team dynamics, relationship building, and organizational structure. I picked up and thoroughly enjoyed his book called The Three Big Questions for a Frantic Family.
When beginning any project, these questions are typically asked. What's important? Where do we want to go? What are the rules, systems, and processes that will get us there? This idea and way of thinking really does translate to family. Ever find yourself in the "reactive" pattern of parenting? What if there was another way of purposefully laying out our plan?
Every family is unique and has different purposes, goals, and dreams. If we spend a few minutes thinking about it, we all know want we want for our families. What’s important? What do we want our kids to be learning and experiencing? How do we know what things are worth sacrificing and how our time should be best spent? Just like in any company, rules and systems make more sense when they are directly tied to missions and objectives. Our family started thinking about this - why do we plan monthly fun activities with the families in our neighborhood? Because we want to be the kind of family who loves their community around them. Why do we attend church regularly and are connected to groups that push us to spiritually grow? Because our faith is a critical center of who we are. Actually, from this thinking we determined the two words that we want our family to be about: love and growth.
Having your family purpose defined also helps with the decisions to be made around the ever increasing opportunities for various activities. Lencioni writes that family mission statements can drive priorities which make it easier and more clear to decide what things to take on and what to lose. For us, it might be - does this activity grow me? Is it about loving someone? If one of your family priorities is to spend quality time together, you can put that against the time that will be spent doing a prospective individual activity and make the decision with intent and purpose.
This past year, the five of us sat down and created our family contract together. It includes a mission statement that describes who we are and what makes our family unique. Then, we had the kids set long term goals and discussed short term objectives that may change our priorities and decisions to participate in activities. Lastly, we discovered a surprise bonus when the discussion turned to behaviors that were keeping us from being the family we want to be and how to grow in those areas. Sensing an opportunity, we encouraged the kids to come up with their own regular consequences for when those behaviors occurred (and then Mom and Dad added a few). We did this one Saturday night while we were having dinner at a restaurant and became so focused on the project that our server asked later...."What in the world were you guys doing???" It was created on the back of kids' menus with crayons, but we soon typed it up and it now lives on the side of the frig in the kitchen.
I've shared this with several friends and they have created versions of their own (because every family is unique!) and I've loved hearing the stories of how it has positively affected them - from behavior to goal setting to just having the discussion around what is important to them. I love how Lencioni says it... "I'm not suggesting that families can ever prevent or eliminate chaos and confusion completely from their lives. As long as there are sleep-overs and in-laws and book reports and Little League games and proms and college applications and weddings to deal with, we will have unpredictability and craziness in our homes. And that's a good thing, because complete control - even if it were possible - would not be desirable. Life should be an adventure. However, if we could achieve a little more sanity in the midst of that adventure, and transform our stressful, reactive, frantic families into more peaceful, proactive, and intentional ones, wouldn't that be worth doing?" This book is worth the read and provokes us to answer some important questions about our families.
The Rakestraw Family Contract
Lencioni, who runs a consulting firm specializing in executive team development and organizational health told his wife that if families were run more like businesses, they’d be much better off. His wife (who was home with their three young children) scoffed at the idea until he explained that businesses have mission statements and pay close attention to daily processes and goals fitting into that statement. Being a coach and teacher, I love learning about team dynamics, relationship building, and organizational structure. I picked up and thoroughly enjoyed his book called The Three Big Questions for a Frantic Family.
When beginning any project, these questions are typically asked. What's important? Where do we want to go? What are the rules, systems, and processes that will get us there? This idea and way of thinking really does translate to family. Ever find yourself in the "reactive" pattern of parenting? What if there was another way of purposefully laying out our plan?
Every family is unique and has different purposes, goals, and dreams. If we spend a few minutes thinking about it, we all know want we want for our families. What’s important? What do we want our kids to be learning and experiencing? How do we know what things are worth sacrificing and how our time should be best spent? Just like in any company, rules and systems make more sense when they are directly tied to missions and objectives. Our family started thinking about this - why do we plan monthly fun activities with the families in our neighborhood? Because we want to be the kind of family who loves their community around them. Why do we attend church regularly and are connected to groups that push us to spiritually grow? Because our faith is a critical center of who we are. Actually, from this thinking we determined the two words that we want our family to be about: love and growth.
Having your family purpose defined also helps with the decisions to be made around the ever increasing opportunities for various activities. Lencioni writes that family mission statements can drive priorities which make it easier and more clear to decide what things to take on and what to lose. For us, it might be - does this activity grow me? Is it about loving someone? If one of your family priorities is to spend quality time together, you can put that against the time that will be spent doing a prospective individual activity and make the decision with intent and purpose.
This past year, the five of us sat down and created our family contract together. It includes a mission statement that describes who we are and what makes our family unique. Then, we had the kids set long term goals and discussed short term objectives that may change our priorities and decisions to participate in activities. Lastly, we discovered a surprise bonus when the discussion turned to behaviors that were keeping us from being the family we want to be and how to grow in those areas. Sensing an opportunity, we encouraged the kids to come up with their own regular consequences for when those behaviors occurred (and then Mom and Dad added a few). We did this one Saturday night while we were having dinner at a restaurant and became so focused on the project that our server asked later...."What in the world were you guys doing???" It was created on the back of kids' menus with crayons, but we soon typed it up and it now lives on the side of the frig in the kitchen.
I've shared this with several friends and they have created versions of their own (because every family is unique!) and I've loved hearing the stories of how it has positively affected them - from behavior to goal setting to just having the discussion around what is important to them. I love how Lencioni says it... "I'm not suggesting that families can ever prevent or eliminate chaos and confusion completely from their lives. As long as there are sleep-overs and in-laws and book reports and Little League games and proms and college applications and weddings to deal with, we will have unpredictability and craziness in our homes. And that's a good thing, because complete control - even if it were possible - would not be desirable. Life should be an adventure. However, if we could achieve a little more sanity in the midst of that adventure, and transform our stressful, reactive, frantic families into more peaceful, proactive, and intentional ones, wouldn't that be worth doing?" This book is worth the read and provokes us to answer some important questions about our families.
The Rakestraw Family Contract
(Who we are) Our family is centered around our faith, loving our community and the people in it, and having quality time together. We believe in seeking out opportunities to learn and be creative, and are passionate about and emotionally invested in everything we do.
(How we live) We treat each other with respect and kindness. We have the right to state and back up our opinion, but accept the family’s decision and will contribute in a positive way. We allow room for mistakes and are accountable to each other for our personal
and spiritual growth.
and spiritual growth.
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