The 10-90 Rule of Crises

It’s the age old worry rule. Joe Durham, a mentor in my younger days, taught this to me at some point – 90% of everything that you worry about never happens, and the 10% that does happen you can do nothing about. You see, if we could do anything about the 10% then we wouldn’t worry about it. Get it? If we have control, we generally don’t worry (if you can control something and still are worrying, get help now!).

God is really clear on this matter when He tells us that we did not set the world into motion, and we do not control it today. He is also very clear when He tells us not to worry because He did set it into motion and can control it today.

There is a very similar rule for crisis management called the 10-90 rule. Prepare and plan for the 10% of crises that will occur and prepare and plan to disable the 90% that don’t have to happen. In other words, 10% of all the crises that happen in management are unavoidable, but the other 90% can be avoided if leaders do their jobs well.

We have said before [Watch Out Captain, She's Gonna Blow], “If we understood life and people, if we knew exactly what God wants us to achieve, if we understand His proven principles (4,000 years of documented success for his people) – most “crises” would never happen, and we would see and prepare for those that truly must happen.” John Maxwell once said in a seminar, “Leaders see further and farther than followers.” This is the idea of successfully avoiding the 90% of crises and handling the 10% of them that will occur. Let’s take a look at some examples of crises that don’t have to happen.

There is no more feared act than firing a volunteer. Will they stop serving and supporting? They're a volunteer, what right do we have to fire them? These and many other questions plague the Christian Leader when faced with a bad volunteer. Our ministry had a bad teacher. Actually he had great truths to communicate and could communicate them pretty well, but he was militant, inflexible and had no concept of appropriate leadership talk. He was teaching a class on self worth once and yelled at them because they were late and told them how wrong and inconsiderate they were. He never understood why his class went from 15 to 5. One of his students was standing in the hallway devastated because of a death in her family. He remarked, “If you had listened to what I taught you, you wouldn’t be having this problem.” This happened again and again with people constantly making excuses for him and saying things like, “He is a great teacher but…” and “We have to have compassion…” It never got better.

Yes! We finally fired him. Yes! He left. Yes! It turned into a disaster. Yes! People took sides. Yes! The disaster was our fault. Why? We could have qualified him better, checked with his previous church (yes, it was a life trend for him), listened to students and not made excuses. We also could have stood up and given this example. This crisis did not have to happen.

The budget freeze is another of my favorite crises that doesn’t have to happen. Are you saying that we can’t control the budget? Why the freeze? Why the panic? Because only in a church will people spend money that they don’t have simply because it is in the annual budget! No one does this at home or in business and survives. Everyone with a brain knows that if your income budget projections do not happen then your expense projections need to go down long before you run out of money. Simple money management, planning and communication avoid the two-hour church conference. Better yet, not borrowing millions of dollars but being wise results in the ability to teach the Gospel rather than fundraise to meet the budget crisis. Crises averted.

Speaking of church meetings and all the conflict and crisis that develops and must be managed as a result of these meetings – has anyone ever asked if church votes are Biblical? What if Biblical Study does not have the constitutional republic voting clause? Are leaders afraid to take a stand for what God clearly tells them? Are the people afraid to follow? Regardless of the answer, if churches picked leaders well and leaders led well and both groups studied the Bible – the church conference crisis could be entirely avoided. Has anyone tried to see further and farther?

I could go on and on. There really are only a fraction of any situations that we call crises that have to occur if leaders would simply keep their eye on the ball and do what they know they are supposed to do. In the church building, budget crisis example, the Christian Leader is rarely supposed to build a huge building but rather is supposed to reach the world for Christ. Why not build many small buildings or fill up the many empty ones already existing? Simply, we want the people with us. We don’t want to intentionally send them out like Jesus said to do.

We have to keep our eye on the ball. The goal is to achieve what the Father wants us to achieve. The Bible is full of instruction. We need to be looking ahead at the implications of avoiding conflict today or of failing to take the time to plan for the future. The implication will most certainly involve many crises that don’t have to happen. Then we will be trapped managing instead of teaching and serving.