PBG Reflections Inspired by Bill Hybels' Axiom

Bill Hybel's 2008 book, Axiom, recently reminded me of a challenge I've experienced in putting PBG theory into practice in the church.

In writing about his experience in managing church staff, Hybels says,

"For years I wondered how closely I should lead our staff, how tightly I should manage people. After lots of experimentaton, here is where I have landed.

If staff members are doing their jobs really well--meeting or exceeding my expectations--then I give them more freedom and look over their shoulders less. I explain my spirit of liberty to them by saying, 'You've earned this latitude with solid performance. Your diligence and thoroughness and 'win' rate have bought the privilege of my looser management style.'

But if performance begins to sag--the monitoring increases--quickly...

Performance buys freedom." (Axiom, p. 137)

That sounds a lot like how I anticipated PBG would work in the church. But my experience so far has been that the monitoring level of our Board doesn't change very much. I submit the same reports whether "performance" is good or bad. My suspicion is that Boards are much better at increasing monitoring when performance is poor than they are are decreasing monitoring when performance is good.

I guess I'm not surprised by that. When monitoring is done face-to-face, as in Hybels' illustration, changes are easier to make. But PBG Boards do accountability largely through policy, not inspection. And once policies are written down, most Boards are reluctant to remove them, even if they don't appear to be needed.

I'm curious if others have experienced this too. Any wisdom to share?