Saving Your Way to Prosperity

I know a company that was very good at centralizing common functions (accounting, personnel, etc.) between business units so that it could wring out redundancies; a practice also known as gaining synergies. This practice works for a period of time as the head counts and the corresponding costs are reduced. After awhile, the business must grow on its own merits to stay competitive.

Christian schools and other ministries have leaders who have business backgrounds and, when the financial times get difficult, tend to move quickly to the "slash expenses" mode to balance the budget.

Cutting expenses is easier and faster than raising funds or improving the "product". However, when we reduce expenses we are also eliminating some of the program or capabilities that caused people to come to the school in the first place. After all, we didn't intentionally hire non-productive overhead just so that it could be eliminated when the economic times get tough.

Here are a few questions that you might ask as you consider plans to "hunker down" or "circle the wagons" to achieve financial viability:

1. Is this a short-term or a long-term reduction? Do you plan to add this program or function back in the near future? Could it cost more to add later?
2. Is the current situation a statistical aberration? Or, is this a trend that you do not know how to correct?
3. How aware are the stakeholders? Have they been brought to the table to brainstorm ideas other than straight cost reduction?
4. Have you discussed this with other schools who seem to be strong and flourishing? Would you be willing to ask them for advice or counsel or prayer or help? Could you even partner with another school to combine a program, such as athletics, rather than eliminate it all together?
5. What if there is another school that needs something that you have? Would you be willing to help them?

Admittedly, these financial situations often seem to come up rather quickly. There may not be enough time to look at the more creative and complex ideas.

But, for the long-term good of the school (including morale), please look at solutions that do not cut out muscle from the school.

We can't save our way to prosperity every year.

Matthew 6:26 "Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?"