Here are a few things you’ll learn if you google it.

• HBCU = Historically Black Colleges and Universities.
• An institution established for the education of African Americans.
• It’s historic in the sense that all HBCU institutions were established by 1964
• Why 1964? That was the year of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
• Most founded shortly after the Civil War.
• How many are there? A little over 100, mostly located in Southern states.
• How many are in your Area, Tim? Harris-Stowe State in St. Louis. Lincoln University of Missouri in Jefferson City

Last week I spent 4 days in Atlanta with my Regional Staff Team. That’s us on the stairs (about 35 out of a total of 60 paid and volunteer staff in our 17 state Region). We met in the heart of Atlanta on Georgia Tech’s campus. We talked about HBCUs. And we talked about Evangelism. In this post I’d like to show you some pics from our prayer-walk tour of 6 HBCUs on an interconnected mosaic known as the Atlanta University Center. We also watched and discussed a terrific documentary you can find on You-Tube called Tell Them We Are Rising – The history of HBCUs in America.

We heard from several of our African American team-mates who helped us understand the significance of GFM ministry on HBCU campuses. When people tell their lived history, the documentary learning really starts to sink in and as a Region we have the chance to deepen our identity and commitments. While HBCUs historically and currently have a huge hand in the rise of the middle class for African Americans, InterVarsity is only on a small handful of these campuses. Pray for us as a region to attract, recruit and retain more Black staff! Pray for God to raise up a witness for himself on these campuses through godly students and faculty members. Pray for our Region to own the opportunity we have by representing 85% of America’s HBCUs in our 17 states. Pray for my Area Team to find a place for Harris-Stowe State and Lincoln University in our vision for ministry growth.

Here are a few pics of recent Omaha Area GFM faculty happenings. It was a small, but select few that gathered for pie and pour-over coffee a few week’s back at Megan and Alex’s place. Here in Omaha we’re trying to bring together faculty from UNMC, UNO and Creighton. I’m in dialogue with about 30 or so Christian faculty members here in the metro. We’ve met mostly via zoom. But you just can’t do pie and pour-over via zoom!

Throughout the 21-22 academic year, we met and studied through a 10-part study on themes of redemption. This summer the group thought it would be great to meet for a book discussion. We’re reading Sandy Shugart’s Leadership in the Crucible of Work. After reading and discussing the book with my staff team, I pitched it to the faculty group. Almost anything is an easy sell when you’re having peanut butter pie and dark roast!

A few thoughts on Letting Go

Shugart writes his chapters in antagonistic pairs. Listening followed by a chapter titled Not Listening. The alternative roles of listening as a leader, and also the wisdom of not paying attention to everything you hear. Currently we’re on a pair of chapters about leadership and control. Getting a Grip was all about what happens with a leader loses his/her grip on vision and purpose with the experience of stagnation being the result. Letting Go – is about how NOT to cling so tightly to control. Here’s an extended excerpt.

“I recall another senior leader, expressing dissatisfaction with her team’s performance, telling me she felt she could do the job of every team member better than they could. It was a shocking comment but an honest one. She really believed this. The consequences of such hubris can be severe. To begin with, she has rendered herself unable to learn from others in the team. And a leader who can’t learn from her team already has an unhealthy relationship with them, one that is bound to get worse as resentments grow and trust erodes. At best, her colleagues will refocus their energy on pleasing her rather than achieving excellence in their shared work. (I lie awake at night sometimes with the fear that my team would rather satisfy me than do the right thing. This is the deepest of pathologies that can infect the executive suite, leading ultimately to spectacular failures.) At worst, her team, feeling disregarded and distrusted by their leader, will engage in all manner of behavior worthy of distrust: turf mongering, sabotage, self-interest, pandering, or going underground. This serves only to confirm the leader’s hypothesis that the others “just don’t get it,” and her habits of micromanagement are justified and reinforced, her arrogance growing by the day.”

Leadership in the Crucible of Work pg 78

The metaphor throughout Shugart’s book is that of a crucible – an industrial smelting device in which metals are heated and alloyed. The workplace is our crucible. It can affect us, but we must learn to leave our influence on it. His corrective for micromanagement is the improvisational art of collaboration and vulnerable leadership.

We’ll be reading the crucible of work all summer. I’ll get a few insights posted here from time to time.

Thanks

tim.perry@intervarsity.org