THE MOMENTUM WORKSHEET

Momentum can be a leader’s best friend, but the lack of momentum can be a leader’s worst
enemy.

The good news? Even if you’ve lost momentum in an area of your life, you can build it back again.

In this worksheet, you’ll identify the primary area of your life and leadership where you need
momentum. Then, you’ll work through five practical strategies to build up and sustain healthy
momentum.

Definition:
Momentum is the force that propels you forward and is greater than the sum of all your
leadership, strategy, and resources combined.

“We cannot do what we don’t define.” —Craig Groeschel

Think about the area of your leadership or life that needs momentum (financial, relational,
physical, spiritual, etc.) and name it:

Five Practical Strategies to Jump-Start Your Momentum:

Now that you’ve identified where you want to build momentum, keep that area of your life in mind
as you work through the exercises.

1. First, identify why you lost momentum.

Andy Stanley teaches, “If you don’t know why something is working when it is, you won’t know
how to fix it when it’s not.”

Let’s get to work figuring out why you lost momentum.

Newton’s Law of Motion:

An object in motion tends to stay in motion unless it’s acted upon by an outside force.

If you have momentum, it should stay in motion—unless it’s acted upon by an outside force.

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These four common forces kill momentum:
• Continuing what’s known
• Relying on what’s safe
• Defaulting to what’s easy
• Enjoying what’s comfortable

List one or two of your habits, patterns, processes, or perspectives that are potentially killing
your momentum, and list them under the common force they best fit under:

What’s known: _______________________________________________________________

What’s safe: _________________________________________________________________
What’s easy: _________________________________________________________________
What’s comfortable: ___________________________________________________________

Now, look at your calendar and set one hour aside to brainstorm new strategies to grow in
these areas.

Meeting time: ________________________

2. Create an inward burst of momentum.

You can’t pour from an empty cup.

John Maxwell teaches that you’ll never attract a leader more passionate, disciplined, or committed
than yourself. If your passion level is a seven, you’ll never attract another leader to your team
who’s an eight. You’ll attract fives and sixes. Hear more from John here: https://go2.lc/JohnM

It’s critical you keep your cup filled because you’ll never attract more than you are.

So how is your inward passion? If you’ve lost momentum, there’s a chance that you as the leader
need to create an inward boost of momentum.

Exercise: Write a statement that describes when you feel most excited about the area you’re
focused on.

3. Ask yourself if you need to develop a leader or replace a leader.

It’s difficult to get the right results without the right leaders. If you’re not experiencing the
momentum you desire, you might need to make a leadership change.

Consider the leaders in your organization. Do all of them pass “The Keeper Test?” (Thanks to Erin
Meyer for The Keeper Test!)

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To filter a leader through The Keeper Test, ask yourself;

“If this person were to leave, would I fight hard to keep them?”

If the answer is “yes,” you know you have a valuable contributor. If “no,” you know it’s time to
invest in helping that person grow, or it may be time to make a personnel change.

Remember: If you have a team member who creates problems, but you never address that team
member, you become the problem. In either case, that incongruent team member will likely kill
momentum. You might be surprised how quickly you see positive results when you replace an
ineffective leader with an effective one.

Evaluate your team or volunteers.

Take it further: It’s possible that the leader who needs to change is you. For two practical ways to
lead yourself to grow, listen to this episode of the Craig Groeschel Leadership Podcast:
https://go2.lc/lead-yourself-part1

Evaluate yourself.

4. Reallocate resources to the areas with the highest potential.

On average, companies allocate 90% of their resources to the same projects year after year. If you
do what you’ve always done, you’ll see the results you’ve always had. If 90% of your actions and
processes never change, it’s harder to see exponential momentum start to build.

When you have the courage to disrupt what exists now, you potentially create momentum for
what could happen tomorrow.

Consider moving some of your resources to invest them into a new strategy, and make sure it
feeds into your focus area (team culture, revenue, lives changed, family health, etc.)

If you’re having a hard time coming up with a new strategy, you can find 14 strategies for jump-
starting momentum for Businesses or Ministries at the end of this worksheet.

Question: What area of your organization is creating the most momentum right now? Could you
shift resources from low-yield areas to high-yield areas? Or, in your personal life, which actions
bring you the most health, fulfillment, or impact? Are you prioritizing those actions, or are they
neglected on your calendar?

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5. Do something you’ve been unwilling to do.

Sometimes, you already know what you need to do to move your team or project forward, but
you’re afraid to do it.

It’s easy to avoid giving hard feedback, shutting down a division, or letting an underperforming
team member go. If you want to build positive momentum, stop delaying that decision and do the
hard-right thing.

Questions:

1. Is there something about your organization that needs to change?

2. Is there something in you that needs to change?
3. Is there something you know you need to do that you haven’t done?

It’s likely that you answered yes to at least one of these questions. What is the hard decision you
need to make? Set a time to do it.

Set a time: ________________________

Remember: Momentum is the force that’s greater than the sum of all your leadership, strategy,
and resources combined. Learn the four factors that fuel momentum here: https://go2.lc/4factors

KEEP BUILDING MOMENTUM

Congrats! You’ve done a lot of thinking and self-assessment.

In Strategy 1, you identified any forces that may be killing your momentum.
In Strategy 2, you reminded yourself what you’re most passionate about.
In Strategy 3, you evaluated if you need to make any personnel changes.
In Strategy 4, you decided to reallocate resources to areas with highest potential.
In Strategy 5, you made up your mind to do the hard, right thing you’ve been avoiding.

These steps won’t happen overnight, and momentum starts slowly like a rocket firing up to leave
the atmosphere. Stick with it, stay encouraged, and measure performance. Because everyone wins
when the leader gets better.

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 14 FRESH STRATEGIES TO
JUMP-START MOMENTUM

IN BUSINESS

Change your marketing strategy.

Target a new market or niche of your existing market.
Change your pricing model.
Create an incentive program for people in your market who use your service.
Try a new customer acquisition strategy—turn over new rocks, get more relational, etc.
Add customer retention benefits.
Offer existing customers additional products or services they aren’t using.
Create a referral program and incentivize referrers.
Make a change to a product or service—modernize, simplify, update, etc.
Streamline the sales process, the checkout process, or the signup process.
Change your sales team or the sales manager.
Evaluate your online presence. Are you visible in search engines, map apps, industry ratings
tools, etc.
Study the data. Have your metrics changed over time? Have key markets dropped or
grown?
Interview your customers. Find out why new customers came and why expired customers
left.

IN MINISTRY

If you haven’t already, create a mission statement, vision statement, and core values that
galvanize and focus your church staff and attenders.
Get out into the community. Become a presence at schools, local events, the farmer’s
market, street fairs, parades, etc.
Create friendships with neighboring local pastors. We’re all on the same team, and the
churches in your community are not competition.
Try advertising through social media ads.
Post on social media that you’ll meet anyone for coffee. “Have coffee with a pastor” is a
surprisingly great way to meet up with new people in the community.
Address language toward new guests and the things they’re facing in life. Shift your
language to welcome guests, address their “felt needs” like anxiety and loneliness, and
create easy ways for them to feel needed and known.
Consider changing your membership structure. Is it off-putting to newcomers or
inaccessible to new Christians?
Add an additional service at a completely different time. A Saturday night service or a
Monday night service may be just the timing people in your community need.

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 Evaluate your online presence. Is your website up-to-date? Is the church visible in search
engines? Are you findable in map apps, etc.?
Study the data. Have your metrics changed over time? What trends do you see in weekly
attendance, engaged volunteers, small groups, kids attendance, first-time attenders, giving,
salvations, baptisms, etc.? If you’re not tracking these areas, start today.
Create a culture of inviting. Inspire your attenders to invite others in the community to
church. Give them language to use, examples of how, and be a role model yourself for
inviting like crazy.
Release some control. You can have growth or you can have control, but you can’t have
both. If you lead an area of ministry, loosen your grip and empower gifted staff and
volunteers to start making decisions.
Evaluate your staff and yourself. If a team member wouldn’t pass The Keeper Test, develop
them or help them find the right role.
Do an “Excellence Walk”— Imagine you’re new. Start in the parking lot of your church and
enter the church. Were you welcomed with a smile? Is it easy to find the kids’ classes? Is
there clear directional signage? Is there insider verbiage and internal jargon everywhere? Is
the facility in the best physical shape possible?
Consider online ministry. At Life.Church, we work to show up “pastorally everywhere we are
digitally,” meaning that we don’t just stream a sermon, we pray, answer questions, have
video calls, send cards, and more with our online community.

Question: What fresh strategy from the lists above can you implement in your focus area? Name it
and set a date:

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