Dissertation Outcomes

It is a great feeling when the final draft of a 200 page dissertation is sent in to be bound and placed on a shelf...never to be read again. If that doesn't give one a sense of achievement, I don't know what does. I will post however a few relevant finding. Every dissertation has seven mandatory chapters--the last chapter contains an evaluation of the project outcomes along with recommendations for further research and applications to those in the field. My DMin is in "Transformational Leadership for the Global City. My dissertation topic was:

TRANSFORMATIONAL POWER OF LEADERSHIP COMMUNITIES:
ASSESSING LEADERSHIP NETWORK’S EFFECTIVENESS IN ACCELERATING THE DELOYMENT OF CHURCH VOLUNTEERS IN MINISTRY AND SERVICE TO THE COMMUNITY

Here is part of my conclusion:

Project Outcomes
In answering the research question, “How effective is Leadership Network’s Leadership Community process in accelerating the deployment of church volunteers?” the research is quite conclusive. Measured in terms of ministry outcomes, the LC process is very effective in accelerating the deployment of church volunteers in service and ministry in the community. If indeed, “Leadership brings about real change that leaders intend”[1] then transformational leadership theory has been validate in this study. As noted in chapter six, cumulatively the thirty-three churches increased the involvement of volunteers from 21 percent of their average weekly attendees in 2003 to 45 percent of their average weekly attendees in 2006. Furthermore, they increased their hours of service from 466,866 hours in 2003 to 1,151,861 hours of service in 2006. The hours served in 2006 alone are the equivalent of 576 people working 40 hours a week for 50 weeks! The financial impact is equally impressive. The economic value of volunteer service increased from $8,025,427 in 2003 to $21,620,412 in 2006. The cumulative economic value of volunteers from these 33 churches serving in the community from 2003 to 2006 is a staggering $62,579,468. Personally, I am very proud of the way the church leaders led so effectively in mobilizing believers. They mirror James McGregor Burn’s view of effective leaders:

For creativity to become leadership, however, conceptual transformation is not enough. As scientists must go beyond ‘revolutions on paper’ and put their ideas to the test in a struggle to win acceptance by their peers, all the more so must creative leadership. Leadership is a social phenomenon, and leaders are ‘intimately tied to other people and the effects of their actions on them.’ According to Wolin, the groundbreaking political theorists were motivated by ‘the ideal of an order subject to human control and one that could be transfigured through a combination of thought and action.’ They intended ‘not simply to alter the way men look at the world, but to alter the world.’[2]

These leaders, have indeed, altered the world—if only the world around them.

[1] Burns, Leadership, 415.
[2] Burns, Transforming Leadership, 168