The Metric Black Hole
I was introduced to the idea of the Metric Black Hole in the book “Deep Work” by Cal Newport.*
Simply put, the Metric Black Hole is the idea that there are many things that we do for which we do not have an accurate measurement of how they contribute to the bottom line. Newport is talking about the bottom line of a company (money) or your career (advancement). The book is a business/personal growth book, but the more I consider the Metric Black Hole, the more I think it plays a negative role as we pursue the Great Commission.
The first thing we need to be hyper-clear about is this: What is our bottom line? We know it’s not money or personal advancement. But we can easily miss it if we’re not careful. God’s glory is our bottom line. More specifically, seeing new disciples and new churches is what we want to celebrate.
If my job is to make bricks, you can measure how I’m doing by the pile of bricks I ship out at the end of a week.
If my job is to write computer code, I might not be able to show you a new app at the end of the week, but to avoid the Metric Black Hole I should be able to show you lines of code that I completed that week.
I think the computer code illustration might be a better one for us to consider in ministry contexts. Even when we’re doing the right things, we may not have a specific thing to show for it at the end of each week. The problem is that when we don’t have a pile of bricks to count or lines of code to show, we might not “have an accurate measurement for how to contribute to the bottom line.” What do we track to know that we are doing the right things toward seeing new disciples and churches? How do we avoid the Metric Black Hole?
Before we talk about what we count, let’s hear from Newport about two dangers we need to avoid. I’ll add a third after we hear from him. In “Deep Work,” Newport defines the “Principle of Least Resistance:”
In a business setting, without clear feedback on the impact of various behaviors to the bottom line, we will tend toward behaviors that are easiest in the moment.*
Let’s rewrite the Principle of Least Resistance for ministry: “In ministry (vocational or volunteer), without clear feedback on the impact of behaviors to the bottom line, we will tend toward behaviors that are easiest in the moment.”
What’s easiest in the moment? Connecting with another believer on social media is WAY easier than spending time with lost people. And without a clear reminder of what will actually help us see movement, we will tend toward the easy.
Newport then writes about “Busyness as Proxy for Productivity:”
In the absence of clear indicators of what it means to be productive and valuable in their jobs, many knowledge workers turn back toward an industrial indicator of productivity: doing lots of stuff in a visible manner.*
Let’s rewrite that one for ministry as well, although it doesn’t take many changes: “In the absence of clear indicators of what it means to be productive and valuable in ministry, many ministry workers turn back toward an industrial indicator of productivity: doing lots of stuff in a visible manner.”
We should not assume that looking busy or feeling busy equals Kingdom productivity. The problem is that we can seem busy (and even worse, actually BE busy) but not actually be doing things that will bring value to the end goal of seeing new disciples and churches.
There’s a third category we also need to be aware of that I will call the Principle of Comfort:
“Without clear feedback on what activities contribute to new disciples and churches, ministry workers turn back to the activities they are comfortable doing.”
It can be uncomfortable to let a new believer wrestle with Scripture on his own. If we’ve had any background in biblical education, we are way more comfortable giving that person the answer than letting them find it in the Word themselves. It can be uncomfortable to let a messy new disciple into my home (or bring my kids into their home!). What words will be heard and hopefully not learned? We can easily trend back toward comfort instead of the types of activities that will help us see new disciples and churches.
To sum up, the Metric Black Hole means that if we lack clarity on what contributes to the bottom line of new disciples and churches, we will fall into any or all of these three categories regarding our regular work in pursuit of movement:
1) We’ll do what is easiest (the Principle of Least Resistance)
2) We’ll do what looks and feels like activity (Busyness as Proxy for Productivity)
3) We’ll do what we are used to (the Principle of Comfort)
A lot has already been written about the types of activities that we need to do. (This Sent Ones blog post, for example: https://www.sentones.com/blog/the-pattern-of-jesus) And a lot has been written about tracking them. (Check out this post: https://www.sentones.com/blog/a-simplistic-look-at-mission-research). For simplicity, I think most readers would agree with these as starters for pursuing movement:
Prayer
Time spent with lost people
Clear Gospel conversations
Training believers to do the above
If I’m correct about those, how do you do at tracking them? Are you prioritizing prayer more than your email? Are you spending regular time with lost people? When was the last time someone heard the good news of Jesus from you?
It’s easier to talk about the weather and sports than to bring up Jesus in a conversation.
It feels like more activity to answer all of our emails than it does to pray.
It’s more comfortable for many Christian leaders (myself included) to prepare a sermon and speak to believers than to spend two hours with lost people.
Which are you most likely to fall prey to? Least Resistance? Busyness? Comfort?
What’s it going to take to get us to new disciples and churches?
*Notes:
This post originally appeared at: https://ontheroad.link/blog/the-metric-black-hole-in-ministry-work
I capitalized Metric Black Hole throughout this article because we need to understand how truly scary it is. Feel free to play scary music in the background of your mind whenever you read it. :)
Newport, Cal. Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World. First Edition, Grand Central Publishing, 2016.
Metric Black Hole - pages 55-56
The Principle of Least Resistance - page 58
Busyness as Proxy for Productivity - page 64