Organizational Change Action Plan: The Spiritual Care Advisory Team
Cody Noffsinger
LEAD 820: Organizational Leadership in the Church
November 30, 2025
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What follows is an organizational change plan for the Spiritual Care Advisory Team, a
sub-committee of the developing Family Justice Center of Yamhill County, Oregon. The plan is
structured to address the six characteristics of effective teams identified in MacMillan’s work:
common purpose, clear roles, accepted leadership, effective processes, solid relationships, and
excellent communication.1 This plan will provide both an assessment, and recommended actions
specific to each characteristic. Once the greatest opportunity for improvement is defined,
commentary will be provided on the current state of the attribute and the suspected root cause of
the present underperformance. Following these brief comments, two strategic actions will be
shared, of which will include an implementation schedule. Collectively, this plan will identify
organizational actions to take across the next year in order to advance the effectiveness of the
Spiritual Care Advisory Team. In the concluding remarks, these actions will be restated in a
condensed priority list to be transferred into the team’s 2026 strategic plan.
Common Purpose
Clarity and resolution of purpose is the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual Care
Advisory Team as it relates to “common purpose”. The team has aligned on a strong mission
statement and with it regularly through the employment of similar language, and even a
routine of explicitly stating it in the header of all team correspondences. Despite these
constructive interventions, the results from MacMillan’s survey suggested that the team
perceives there is a lack of specificity around how the mission is worked out and monitored in
practicality (goals, measures, and metrics). is is a fair assessment; team meetings are
disciplined in stating the mission and the annual goals, but little detail is provided about the
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Appendix
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1.
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Pat MacMillan, The Performance Factor: Unlocking the Secrets of Teamwork (Nashville, TN: B&H, 2001),
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strategic roadmap for each objective. Consequently, the suspected root-cause is an
underdeveloped action plan for team directives, causing ambiguity around goal status and
assessments. A related hypothesis is that the team’s current practices fail to sufficiently articulate
a strategic philosophy, and that more robust frameworks are needed to communicate the
trajectory from our current state to the realization of our mission/vision. Below are two proposed
actions to strengthen the team’s “common purpose” characteristics:
1.1. Define annual deliverables aligned to each strategic goal. The team’s goals for this
year have been categorized into three functional areas: clergy training, hospitality and
prayer programming, and charter development. In their current state, the goals are
closely linked in language and general alignment with the team’s mission, but it is
lacking specificity. The intent of this action item is to provide greater visibility to
deliverable progression, and identify quarterly milestones to test not just efficacy, but
mission attunement. This will be introduced in the team’s 2026 strategic planning
meeting in December.
1.2. Develop a “theory of change” narrative. Weiss interacts with the idea of a “theory of
change”, which is a conceptual framework for understanding the general outworking of
one’s mission, vision, and outcomes.1 This seemed like an appropriate addition for the
Spiritual Care Advisory Team since we are engaged in both theoretical/program shaping
activities and practical/feet on the ground ministry. This theory of change will specify
that even though our team is engaging in practical direct ministry, it is temporary and
explorative to fulfill our primary roll of theory/program development. The team’s
1 Carol H. Weiss, “Nothing as Practical as Good Theory: Exploring Theory-Based Evaluation for Comprehensive
Community Initiatives,” New Directions for Evaluation, no. 67 (1995): 65–92.
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mission is accomplished through the equipping of local leaders, but the realization of the
vision is dependent upon those leaders taking action in their communities. We are not
direct service providers, though we may temporarily fulfill that role locally. This will be
introduced in the team’s 2026 strategic planning meeting in December.
2. Clear Roles
his isn’t
Simple role definition is the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual Care Advisory
Team as it relates to “clear roles”. Frankly, today there are only two roles represented in the team:
one leader, and four advisors. T inherently problematic, especially within a year which was
largely focused on ideation. Maturation, however, necessitates greater granularity and diversity in
the team’s functions. Consequently, the suspected root-cause of the team’s perceived role
ambiguity is likely that they are sensing this need for an organizational change. This requires
integrative action across characteristics (accepted leadership 3.1, solid relationships 5.1, and
excellent communication 6.1). Below are two proposed actions specifically directed at the team’s
“clear roles” characteristics:
2.1. Create a one-page R/S/C/I role map. One of the most explicit practices being adopted
from MacMillan’s work is the R/S/C/I mapping activity.2 Essentially it maps out
individual contributions for each goal or deliverable. The types of
contributions/responsibilities are as follows: R = responsible, S = support, C = consulted,
I = informed. By mapping out individual functions the team can be assured in their
shared understanding of how team objectives are being pursued, as well as clarity about
2 Pat MacMillan, The Performance Factor, Chapter 5.
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the intended contributions they are personally expected to make. This will be introduced
in the team’s 2026 strategic planning meeting in December.
2.2. Twice yearly stop/start/continue role check-in. Similarly, MacMillian’s role review
process is to be adopted by the team.3 Particularly within a year when role definition is
taking place and individual resource commitments are growing, it is appropriate to
provide space for role/goal adjustments. By taking time to calibrate the team’s roles and
goals by designating “stop/start/continue” to each effort the team not only guards against
burnout or unalignment4 but also invites efficiency improvements by validating and
identifying what the greatest value-adding activities are. Through this review resources
can shift towards higher priority efforts if needed. These check-in’s will take place at the
end of the 1st and 3rd quarter of each year with the team leader.
3. Accepted Leadership
Leadership delegation is the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual Care Advisory
Team as it relates to “accepted leadership”. As discussed in the previous section, the team's
current structure has provided minimal opportunity for delegation. So, despite high marks on
MacMillan's team survey overall for "leadership acceptance", the team expressed sentiments
which invite broader distribution of responsibilities. The root-cause is intuitive and is an expected
evolution of the team's function and capacity. Below are two proposed actions to strengthen the
team’s “accepted leadership” characteristics:
3 Pat MacMillan, The Performance Factor, Chapter 5.
4 Manuel London and James W. Smither, “Can Multi-Source Feedback Change Perceptions of Goal
Accomplishment, Self-Evaluations, and Performance-Related Outcomes?” Personnel Psychology 48, no. 4 (1995):
803–839.
5
3.1. Assign functional leads by goal. This is perhaps the largest change to be implemented
by the Spiritual Care Advisory Team. Pearce suggests that domain-specific leadership
increases ownership, coordination, and adaptive capacity in expert teams.5 By
implementing functional leads the organization is transitioning from an advisory panel
function, to more of an operational function. This change directly supports the efficiency,
sustainability, and scalability of the organization. The associated cost is that it requires
greater individual time commitments from each member. For the Spiritual Care Advisory
Team’s cadence this increases the current time commitment of 2 hours a month to
roughly 4-5 hours a month (2-3 which constitute independently driven work).
This will be introduced in the team’s 2026 strategic planning meeting in December.
3.2. Use rotating shared leadership in the execution of team meeting facilitation. Almost
an extension of the previous point, this action item is intended to exercise shared
leadership in the group setting, and not just in private ownership of functional areas. A
byproduct of this activity is also to free up the team leader to devote more energy
towards higher-level planning. Each team member will lead the facilitation of at least
one team meeting each year, schedule TBD.
4. Effective Processes
Similar to how roles simply need to be defined, so too processes need to be documented -
which is the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual Care Advisory Team as it relates to
“effective processes”. There are few, if any, processes which are well-documented or practiced
by the team today. Perhaps the only example is the adoption of a standard agenda template and
5 Craig L. Pearce and Jay A. Conger, eds., Shared Leadership: Reframing the Hows and Whys of Leadership (Thousand
Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 2003), Chapter 13.
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meeting minutes communication. This blind spot in the team's effectiveness is what MacMillan's
text revealed above anything else: “Unless the process is written down and made visible in some
way, it would be virtually impossible to evaluate how well the team is implementing it.”6
Unsurprisingly, the team was operating in a "founder's capacity" in their first year with many of
their activities engaged in the process-lite function of ideation. Additionally, this characteristic is
admittedly the least intuitive for the leader, which also enables process complacency. Together,
these two dynamics represent the suspected root-cause. Below are two proposed actions to
strengthen the team’s “effective processes” characteristics:
4.1. Implement a standard goal metrics and review template. Research from the Harvard
Business School validates MacMillan’s implication that shared metric frameworks
dramatically improve strategic execution and learning.7 The team leader will prescribe
end-state deliverables and invite functional leads to propose key performance indicators
by stage for each goal (stages include planning and research, pilot, and final execution).
Each stage gate will have a proposed target date, and four metrics: what success looks
like (one qualitative and one quantitative), and what failure looks like (one qualitative
and one quantitative). Reviews will take place in advance of each stage-gate closure.
4.2. Map “Provider Hospitality” workflow. MacMillian also spoke extensively about the
importance of process-mapping.8 The team’s first activity to go through a complete
process mapping exercise will be the “Provider Hospitality” workflow. This is one of
6 Pat MacMillan, The Performance Factor, Chapter 7.
7 Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton, The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action (Boston, MA:
Harvard Business School Press, 1996), Introduction.
8 Pat MacMillan, The Performance Factor, Chapter 7.
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three high-level team goals for the year, and is assigned to a dedicated team lead to plan
and execute end-of-year deliverables for this process map.
5. Solid Relationships
Personal equity and empathy demonstrate the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual
Care Advisory Team as it relates to “solid relationships”. Relationally the team exhibits
extraordinary trust and environmental safety. This can largely be credited to one of the team's
core internal values of "cultural humility". This value necessitates a posture of listening, and is
committed to affirming dignity through practices of respect and transparency. This value is
codified in the team's charter documents and is language the team adopts regularly. What hasn't
happened to the same extent is intentionally creating initiatives for team members to express
decisively personal ideas or motives. This represents the suspected root-cause for why the team
may have additional opportunity to cultivate equity and empathy on a personal, contextualized
level rather than in a general way (as is such with cultural humility). Below are two proposed
actions to strengthen the team’s “solid relationships” characteristics:
5.1. Missional ice-breakers. A low-investment initiative to be adopted is a 5-10 minute
“missional ice-breaker” at the start of every team meeting. Edmondson shows that
routine, low-risk personal disclosure builds psychological safety necessary for learning
and collaboration.9 Additionally, this invites socialization of the mission as well as an
opportunity to guarantee a venue for the personal expression of all team members. An
example is, “what poses the greatest challenge to you personally when you think of
trying to provide trauma-informed support to someone who is hurting?”
Thi
s
9 Amy C. Edmondson, Teaming: How Organizations Learn, Innovate, and Compete in the Knowledge Economy (San
Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2012), Chapter 4.
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5.2. Quarterly context briefs by functional areas. Each member shares current priorities,
why they matter, constraints, and solicits one clarifying question to the team. is a
practical outworking of previous action items (3.1 and 3.2). intended to allow functional
leads to present on their work, and also foster shared understanding amongst the team
about their collective efforts.
6. Excellent Communication
like
Codified communication practices are the greatest area of improvement for the Spiritual Care
Advisory Team as it relates to “excellent communication”. The posture of humility detailed in the
previous section also points to the team's general communication effectiveness. Good habits are
byproducts of the team's stated values and relational expectations. Yet, sentiments shared
above, there is opportunity to advance from general principles to truly personal and relational
levels of communication. Thus, the disparity in individual-focused proactive interventions is the
root-cause behind the team's opportunity to mature their communication practices. Below are two
proposed actions to strengthen the team’s “excellent communication” characteristics:
6.1. Annual one-on-one retrospective and personal vision casting. This action item has
already taken place for the 2025 year, and was major input for both the functional lead
assignments of the team, and the development of this action plan. London demonstrates
that individualized reflective feedback significantly improves role clarity, engagement,
and future performance.10 To take place near the end of each operational year.
6.2. Adopt SBAR as the standard communication framework for operations. Situation,
Background, Assessment, and Recommendation: this is the operational framework
10 Manuel London, Job Feedback: Giving, Seeking, and Using Feedback for Performance Improvement (Mahwah, NJ:
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003), Chapter 6.
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introduced by Haig.11 The team already demonstrated highly effective communication in
practice, but this model adoption is proposed to ensure continuity of practice as teams
grow and change – so not to rely on, “tribe knowledge” or individual rapport. This will
be introduced in the team’s 2026 strategic planning meeting in December.
Conclusion
In closing, the proposed organizational changes detailed above points toward one
predominant consideration for the future of the Spiritual Care Advisory Team:
scalability. Twelve proposed action items are a lot for a small volunteer team that meets monthly,
so the actions are grouped and prioritized below to inform a follow-on assessment of what an
appropriate scope-of change is for the Spiritual Care Advisory Team this year:
1. Essential: Annual one-on-one retrospective and personal vision casting (6.1). Define
annual deliverables aligned to each strategic goal (1.1). Develop a “theory of change”
narrative (1.2).
2. Transformational: Assign functional leads by goal (3.1). Create a one-page R/S/C/I role
map (2.1). Map “Provider Hospitality” workflow (4.2)
3. Best Practice: Implement a standard goal metrics and review template (4.1). Twice
yearly stop/start/continue role check-in (2.2). Use rotating shared leadership in the
execution of team meeting facilitation (3.2). Missional ice-breakers (6.1). Quarterly
context briefs by functional areas (5.2). Adopt SBAR as the standard communication
framework for operations (6.2).
11 Kathleen M. Haig, Brian Sutton, and Julie Whittington, “SBAR: A Shared Mental Model for Improving
Communication Between Clinicians,” Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety 32, no. 3 (2006): 167–
175.
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Bibliography
Edmondson, A. C. (2012). Teaming, How Organizations Learn, Innovate, and Compete in the
Knowledge Economy. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Haig, K. M. (2006). SBAR: A Shared Mental Model for Improving Communication Between
Clinicians. Joint Comission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, 32, no. 3: 167-175.
Kaplan, R. S. (1996). The Balanced Scorecard: Translating Strategy into Action. Boston, MA:
Harvard Busines School Press.
London, M. (2003). Job Feedback: Giving, Seeking, and Using Feedback for Performance
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London, M. a. (1995). Can Multi-Source Feedback Change Perceptions of Goal
Accomplishment, Self-Evaluations, and Performance-Related Outcomes? Personnel
Psychology, 48, no. 4: 803-839.
MacMillan, P. (2001). The Performance Factor: Unlocking the Secrets of Teamwork. Nashville,
TN: B&H.
Pearce, C. L. (2003). Shared Leadership: Reframing the Hows and Whys of Leadership.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publishers.
Weiss, C. H. (1995). Nothing as Practical as Good Theory: Exploring Theory-Based Evaluation
for Comprehensive Community Initiatives. New Directions for Evaluation, no. 67: 65-92.
