I’m not sure if it’s the smell of baked goods, or freshly ground coffee, or the dim lighting, or the leather couches that beckon you to bury yourself for an hour or a morning, that I love so much about coffee shops.
I’ve been to a million coffee shops in my life. Some I’ve loved and some not at all. The difference for me is never the coffee. it’s always the environment.
When a place goes out of its way to give me an experience while I’m there that goes way beyond the taste of my latte, they’ve won me.
In leadership these days, there seems to me a lot of healthy discussion happening about environmental approaches to leadership. Where the goal is not to see how we can most effectively use the technology of compliance that is management, the goal is to create an environment where people are inspired to bring their best. An environment that inspires people to achieve new dimensions of performance.
In the church circles that I’m in these days, we are continually thinking, not about how we can funnel people through a 4 step program or around a base path to full devotion, but about what kind of environments inspire people to really engage the faith part of their lives.
I need to confess that my theology of discipleship is leaning farther and farther in the direction of environment over efficiency and inspiration over structure.
I’m not anti-structure or efficiency. I love my latte hot and with just the right amount of vanilla. But I can get that anywhere. Create for me an environment that inspires me to stay and you’ve won.
Every once in a while you come across a story of a brand or group that gets the power of environment to inspire and to change the whole experience.
Those creative story tellers are the ones that win hearts and define what’s really possible.
Where have you experience the power of environment to transform your experience?
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