When Beth Schuette, Director of People Operations, learned that New Life Ranch had improved from healthy to a flourishing score on their Employee Engagement Survey, she pushed the “dance party” button on her desk for a spontaneous celebration in the office. It was a fitting way to acknowledge the journey to flourishing that included people across the organization.
With consistent attention to workplace health over the years, New Life Ranch, a camping and retreat ministry in Oklahoma, has a team that is living out its values and experiencing Life-Giving Work.
New Life Ranch ministers from two distinct properties, each with its own culture and leadership. While they share the values and vision for camp and retreat ministry, there are unique opportunities for healthy employee engagement at each site.
In reflecting on their journey to flourishing, Beth notes that diving deeper into the data at the team level has helped make action plans more concrete for the realities of each site:
“We have had stability in leadership over the last five years, which helps each team understand and own their results. I meet with team leaders to help them be comfortable with interpreting their data. Then the culture team at each site is accountable for specific goals related to employee engagement. These culture teams include decision-makers and influencers, so they have the authority to implement changes.”
The site-level culture work is supported by periodic workshops related to their specific challenges. In addition, there is cross-team communication between sites to share what they are learning.
Aimee Hodges, Best Christian Workplaces consultant, notes the value of broad participation: “Ministry Partners like New Life Ranch who include several layers of leadership in survey debriefs are able to celebrate the wins together and also take the opportunity to create effective team-level action plans.”
Consistent attention to workplace health is a hallmark of New Life Ranch. They have used Best Christian Workplaces’ Employee Engagement Survey annually since 2017. And as they have moved from a healthy to flourishing culture, Beth knows that regular assessment is still important.
“Change is constant, and people are complicated,” Beth shares. “We are never done. I use the farming analogy, where you have to keep assessing the soil, dealing with weeds, fertilizing, watering, and addressing external challenges. Annual Employee Engagement Survey data catches issues that might be brewing under the radar and helps us respond in a timely manner.”
Cary Humphries, Best Christian Workplaces Consulting Director, who worked with New Life Ranch for many years, notes the strength of this approach: “They have stayed the course and stayed curious. This provides great continuity of data. They also keep listening and learning at both the overall staff and team levels.”
The journey of continuous improvement in workplace culture doesn’t happen through one big program. It is faithfulness in attention to seemingly small details that add up over time.
“Small steps lead to big change,” is Beth Schuette’s philosophy. The leadership team at New Life Ranch has faithfully taken small steps year after year.
These small steps are not necessarily easy. Sometimes a team will intentionally focus on one aspect of their culture work, and the effort doesn’t yield the expected results. Beth shares, “I’m proud of our teams that keep on working on solutions and take the time to ask inquiry questions to give a nuanced view of underlying issues. At one point, our accountability scores were low, and we realized that we weren’t sure that we had a shared definition of accountability, so we did a deeper dive to gain understanding.”
For nearly 70 years, New Life Ranch has been dedicated to proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ and equipping believers for ministry. Despite evolving methods, the mission remains the same: introducing people to Christ and strengthening their faith through teaching and discipleship. With a flourishing workplace culture, New Life Ranch is poised to continue reaching future generations with the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Resources
• Assess the health of your organization so you can take steps to improve employee engagement. Best Christian Workplaces’ Employee Engagement Survey is research-based and provides actionable data.
• Listen to Best Christian Workplaces’ Called to Flourish podcast for inspiration and practical tools to lead a flourishing workplace.