I was at a church meeting recently. The church wanted feedback from the congregation as to what kind of new building they wanted. In order to address this issue they broke it down into a number of different questions. One question that I noticed that they did not ask was that of what size of church do you want.
Size is a continuum. It starts at one, and goes to who knows where. But there are breakpoints in the continuum, which allow you to describe businesses and churches in terms of their size.
Concentrating on the business end of things, we'll start at the beginning. The beginning, from about one employee to about thirty-five, is the startup phase. In the startup phase, the boss knows everyone. Everyone talks to the boss. Everyone gets their orders from the boss. There is no management structure, and it's difficult to form any kind of management, because everyone talks to the boss. There are other characteristics at this size. For example there is a very high risk tolerance. As a matter of fact one even might say that startups are risk seeking. After all, what have they got to lose? They have very little in the way of capital. Lots of enthusiasm, lots of agility, lots of ideas, but very little in the way of capital.
The next level is the small business, starting at about thirty-five and going up to around two hundred. At this stage it is necessary to have a management structure, and that is probably the first problem that the business runs into. The boss can no longer speak directly to everyone. And the boss should not speak directly to everyone. The boss has to delegate to a management layer and allow the managers to talk directly to the line workers. At this point the business probably has some capital. It may be investors, it may be that good business has put some money into the bank, it may be that the company has been able to afford to buy their own land and build their own building. But they have some capital. Therefore they have something to risk. And, now that they have something to risk, they become more risk-averse. Risk mitigation, and risk transfer, become more important to the business at this point, and management starts to think in these terms.
(It's also at this point that the business should start thinking in terms of security, and risk management. But it's highly likely that they won't.)
If the business survives, and thrives, and grows, it eventually reaches the next stage, which is the medium size business. This starts when you get to about two hundred, and goes to about a thousand employees. At this stage the business very definitely does have capital to risk. Again, risk management becomes more important and the business is more risk-averse. The boss, at this point, is talking to a layer of senior management, who are, themselves, talking to a layer of lower management, who are talking to the line workers. Management structures, and communications, and the assurance of communications, become more important at this point. Auditing of management functions also becomes important at this point. The management structure itself becomes more complex. So does the business. That's just the cost of growth.
Finally, when you reach about a thousand employees, you get to the large or corporate level. The business has capital, and is protected from a number of problems that could have killed it at an earlier stage. However, the business is now even more risk-averse. It is hard to innovate at this size. Centers of innovation, within the company, must be created, and protected, in order for any innovation to take place. And innovation must take place, or, inevitably, the business will eventually fail, regardless of how much capital it has at this point. At the corporate level communication must be structured, management must be structured, auditing of various functions must be structured.
All groups, even churches, even non-businesses, go through these size changes, and the characteristics at each level are remarkably similar. Small churches tend to be evangelical, and run on a shoestring. They do not have much capital. If you think I mean capital merely in monetary terms you are only partially correct. There is, of course, human capital. Small churches mostly get by on human capital. People do the work. People find the space. People spread the word. New things are tried. New ideas. New ways to reach out. New ways to meet. Small churches run on new ideas, and very little money, and very little capital of any kind.
Of course, human capital, in churches, is directly tied to monetary capital as well. The more people you have, the more likely you are to have rich people in attendance, or people who are generous to a sacrificial level, and who are willing to give more than most. The more people that you have, over a long-term, the more people are likely to leave you some money in their wills when they die. So, yes, human capital does, somewhat, translate into monetary capital.
Most churches fall into the small church size, that is, up to 200 members. At this point, the church probably has some capital in property, and a regular, if small, donor base. It also has a regular fund of human capital, people who can be called upon for specific work functions for volunteer functions for technical functions to support the church or other such needs. And, at this point, new ideas are less important, and they might even be considered dangerous.
Medium size churches, those with over a thousand members, are not common. There might be a couple of dozen in any large city. They they will have large ministerial teams at the top, taking the place of senior management, and structures of small study groups, or project groups, reaching down to the masses. The church will probably have an important and valuable piece of property in the city, which it may have made an agreement with the developer to develop while still giving the church access rights in perpetuity. Offerings will be regular, and so will be quests. The church will have capital to risk, and a reputation to risk, and will be conservative in actuality, even if not in theological terms. Actual innovation and programs will be rare, although in some cases, some such churches will develop some kind of innovation structure and protect it.
Large churches are the rarest, unless you are watching Sunday morning television. These churches will have donor bases possibly in the millions, will have significant physical plant, and probably have investments bringing in a fairly regular income. They have the most to risk and will do very little in terms of innovation.
As you can see, there is a pretty direct correlation between size, and capital, and risk tolerance. Smaller organizations have less capital, and are much more tolerant of risk. They might even go looking for risk, since they don't have anything to risk. Larger organizations have more capital. This allows them to withstand variations in the marketplace that would sweep away smaller enterprises. On the other hand, some smaller enterprises may be taking risks that address the new market conditions. It's always a bit of a gamble. But larger organizations, with more capital, are more risk averse, and are also innovation averse. Change is bad.
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