What We're Reading in 2022
Bryan Haley
Reading is a great way to grow, be challenged, and equip yourself as a communications leader. Here's what we're reading in 2022.
Show Notes
Episode Summary
In this episode, Bryan and Jeanette discuss their reading list for 2022. Reading is a great way to help you grow personally and professionally, so here are some books you might want to consider adding to your own list for this year.
Mentioned in this episode
- Church Juice's Insiders Facebook Group
- Support the work of Church Juice
- Check out Church Juice's Reading Lists on Bookshop.org
- Jeanette's 2022 Reading List
- Bryan's 2022 Reading List
Note: If you choose to purchase from one of our lists, Church Juice may receive a small commission.
Transcript
Bryan:
What are you planning to read this year? Do you have a list? Today, we talk about what we have added to our lists and why and how church communicators can grow by reading a wide array of books and topics.
Jeanette:
Welcome to the Church Juice podcast. We're here energizing church communications. I'm Jeanette Yates, and I'm with my co-host Bryan Haley.
Bryan:
That's right and I'm the producer of Church Juice and we are so excited. It's the end of January. We are kicking off a new year of the podcast, but before we dive into this topic, let's catch up a little bit. How was your Christmas, how was your New Year?
Jeanette:
It was really amazing. We had a great Christmas here in the house. I got two teen boys, so there were a lot of sneakers. We got some video game things happening, all that kind of stuff. Then for the first time this year, the boys actually got us as parents presents on their own, which was really nice.
Bryan:
Wow. Was it Air Force 1s, kind of sneakers? I know those were popular.
Jeanette:
I don't know what they were, but I know they were fancy pants sneakers that were-
Bryan:
If I remember correctly, you were also traveling north, right?
Jeanette:
Yes.
Bryan:
Did you do that? Okay.
Jeanette:
Yeah, so right after Christmas, we went up to Boston and it was a great time.
Bryan:
Wow nice.
Jeanette:
The weather was cold enough for us Floridians to feel like we got a season, but not so cold that we were miserable. So we were able to walk around. We did a lot of walking.
Bryan:
Was there snow?
Jeanette:
It did not snow.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jeanette:
It kept teasing us, but it did not snow while we were there. But yeah, we went to a Boston Celtics game.
Bryan:
Nice.
Jeanette:
We did some of the stuff, ate some of the food, it was great. It was great. So what about you? What about you?
Bryan:
Yeah, we hung out at home. We kind of laid low, so my wife and I are heading to Hawaii in January. So we kind of started laying low, trying to do whatever we can to not get sick, basically. I do not want COVID before traveling kind of thing. So we laid low, we did family stuff before the holidays, so Christmas and New Year's was just our family. So I have a wife and two young kids. So it was nice to be at home.
Jeanette:
I was going to say that's a special, precious time, right there.
Bryan:
Yeah. Relaxed.
Jeanette:
Yeah.
Bryan:
It was the first year where my daughter was asking about Santa. So we actually had to address that one, but yeah, it was nice. There was no snow here so that's kind of a bummer when you're in the north and it's cold and you don't have a white Christmas, but right now there's two feet of snow on the ground so it came right after Christmas.
Jeanette:
There's a lot of snow all, yeah, up there, even kind of down in the Southern parts a little bit. Yeah.
Bryan:
Yeah. I was talking to some friends in Nashville and they got two inches and the whole city shuts down, so it's fine.
Jeanette:
Well, and I heard this funny thing and if you're in Nashville, we love you. I love Nashville's one of my favorite place in the world of, but one of my friends tweeted out, do you even live in Nashville if you haven't posted a photo of a metric tape in the snow? Just it's so...
Bryan:
Yep, and I'm pretty sure I saw Jon Acuff post picture just like that.
Jeanette:
Yeah, exactly.
Bryan:
All right. So let's dive in. I wanted to just kind of kick off this new year. I know, I start the new year figuring out some goals for the year, but I also set a reading list of books that I would like to either read again or that I've explored and discovered and want to add to my list and hopefully get to this year. So I thought we'd touch on some of the books that are on our list this year. Why don't I start with you? What is one book on your list that you added?
Jeanette:
One book? Okay.
Bryan:
We'll just go through a few, not...yeah.
Jeanette:
Yeah. So one of the books and I kind of have already started rereading it. So I did kind of started rereading it before the New Year's, but I'm going to include it in this and then add another one from that same author, is the book Boundaries by Henry Cloud and John Townsend. So now they have a whole collection of boundaries books, but I'm reading just the original Boundaries book again. I think I've read it over the last many years, a few different times, but it's kind of one of those things where gradually the boundaries get a little bit weaker, a little bit more faded.
Bryan:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jeanette:
So it's just a good reminder of boundaries and how boundaries are biblical and I think it's related to church communications because when we're working at home and when we've had such a strange couple of years, boundaries can get blurred in that-
Bryan:
Absolutely.
Jeanette:
...In the church ministry space with employees and volunteers and all this kind of stuff. So for me, it's just been a nice kind of circle back. Then recently he's come out with a book called Changes That Heal and just kind of, again, talking about we've all experienced a collective drama.
Bryan:
Absolutely.
Jeanette:
And just kind of thinking about healing is something that I find very comforting and so, yeah. So what about you?
Bryan:
Nice. So I'll start with, people probably don't know this about me, I love Disney. I love the organization, the corporation, I love what they do for guest services, that kind of thing. So I actually have two Disney-related books. One is called Creating Magic and the other is Be Our Guest and they are both on leadership principles and the customer experience. It sounds very businessy, but there are so many practical things that churches can take away from that. Just learning how Disney thinks through how to create an incredible experience for you every time you engage with our parks or, whatever. Yeah, so I think Be Our Guest is another one that I just mentioned that kind of walks through those, but I love taking our first impressions and guest services teams through that book because there are so many practical things that leaders can take away and it just makes you think through a first impression.
Jeanette:
So this is a question and you maybe you know if this is a thing, but have they written about... And maybe that's part of the Creating Magic book because I haven't read it so I'm going to add that to my list. But I have read Be Our Guest. Of course, that's something that on our team where I work something, we've also looked into as well, but have they written anything or is that Creating Magic? Do they talk about how they build raving fans, aka influencers?
Bryan:
So I added Creating Magic because it's been a while since I've read it and I know that I love it. I can't think of a book that talks about how they create the...
Jeanette:
Because there's that whole thing that you can do where you can become a person that helps people book their Disney vacays.
Bryan:
Oh, yeah, for sure. Right.
Jeanette:
And then of course they're getting ... and it's like, that would be an interesting thing. I think it really would be helpful even to churches because isn't that really what we want, church members to do is love the community that you're building at your church so much that you want to help people plan their visit, join, be part of the community and so I just think that would be an...
Bryan:
Well, and I think the argument or their statement on that would be like, it's the magic that builds the rapport and the love for what they do and part of that magic is both in some of the leadership strategies that they talk you through, but also the customer experience. I think that's what they focus on and that's why, because when you have a great experience, then you're going to fall in love with the organization or whatever it is. I would say that's kind of what they lean into. All right, what's next on your list?
Jeanette:
We're talking about the leadership principles from Disney. I'm going to go ahead and share this one, which I mean, again, this book did not come out two weeks ago. It's been out. So The New One Minute Manager, it's a very short book. You can read it in a day and we don't like to talk about this as church leaders.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
But you do have to be a manager of people and learning how to do that well and with compassion, but also with excellence is very important. So where I work, we read... I think when you join the team, this might be one of the books that comes in your welcome package, but then we use some things from it. So one of the things that the book talks about is kind of helping people lead themselves.
Bryan:
Okay. Yeah.
Jeanette:
As a leader, you're not micromanaging, you're teaching people to lead well and I think there's other books from some of the other authors that we're mentioning that also talk about leading, teaching people to lead themselves well.
Bryan:
I think I see that quite a bit, either in volunteers or in staff and paid leadership or whatever. We don't think through and maybe it's a ministry thing, but because there's books on business, I would imagine it's across the board, but we don't really think through like our personal development, right. So, being intentional as the leader, as the manager to help people create those ways to develop in a personal like, "this is what I would like to do," more than like you were saying before we started recording, more than just our social media goals for the year or what we'd like to get to in email subscribers. No.
Jeanette:
Right.
Bryan:
As a person, this is how I would like to develop too. I think that's important.
Jeanette:
Right. Now, I've got some I haven't read yet.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
So far I'm sharing things I have read, but I'm going to reread this year because it's a good refresher every now and then to kind of circle back. We don't say, "Oh, I read the Bible once." I mean, I hope.
Bryan:
Well, right. Yeah, I read it one time. I'm good. So my next book is actually arriving today. So I'm pretty pumped about it. It is from Michael Hyatt, it's one of his new books. It's called No Fail Communication. So I would say that probably relates pretty well to our audience here. Basically the premise of the book, of course, I haven't read it yet, but is that it's talking about how to fix and improve your communication. So obviously Hyatt is kind of talking through business strategies, but there's so much that can be applied to the church and I think that... Yeah, I'm just excited to read through it and see what kind of principles and things that we can talk through to our Church Juice audience as well.
Jeanette:
Yeah. I'm going to add that to my list as well. I'm kind of surprised as a Full Focused Planner subscriber that I hadn't already jumped on that.
Bryan:
Let me just admit. So I subscribe to the whole year package of the planner, the journal, the notebook, whatever.
Jeanette:
Right.
Bryan:
So that's all arriving today and I am pumped. Let me tell you.
Jeanette:
You're going to love... This is not a Full Focused Planner podcast, but I'm here to tell you, it's really great.
Bryan:
So I actually went through my office, my Church Juice office, the other day. I've been working from home since the start of the pandemic. I realized I had a Full Focus Planner at the start of 2020 and it stopped in February. So, I'm excited to actually get back. I have no memory of even having it, but I looked through it and I saw you, I think, the week before the world shut down.
Jeanette:
Yeah.
Bryan:
We were starting our podcast, I think.
Jeanette:
Oh, yes.
Bryan:
Yeah. So No Fail Communication. I'm excited.
Jeanette:
That's seems like a million years ago.
Bryan:
Right? I know.
Jeanette:
So long. So now I'm going to tell you a book that I haven't read, but I'm looking forward to reading this year.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jeanette:
You're ready?
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
So one of the things on my list this year is Carey Nieuwhof's relatively new book, At Your Best: How to Get Time, Energy, and Priorities Working in Your Favor. As someone who definitely lacks time and energy, or maybe I don't lack time, but definitely energy.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
And priorities for me is very hard too, because I have a lot of important things on my plate.
Bryan:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jeanette:
So, it's like, when do you prioritize what important thing?
Bryan:
Absolutely.
Jeanette:
So I'm looking forward to kind of diving into that a little bit this year.
Bryan:
Okay. I might add that to my list.
Jeanette:
Is that on your list?
Bryan:
It might be now. I mean, I think a lot of people can probably relate to that too. A lot of irons in the fire and trying to figure out which priority takes precedence. So why did you add that to your list?
Jeanette:
Of course, if Carey Nieuwhof writes something, probably just going to put it on my list, just because.
Bryan:
That's valid. Yeah.
Jeanette:
But I will say that as I was reading little bit about the book, this idea, and we're all experiencing this now even more so than before, but all pastors and ministry leaders, you're never off. There's always something going on. So this idea of chronic exhaustion and how we have this mission, we have this calling, we have this push to do more, help more. All of these kind of things I think sometimes can be difficult for ministry leaders. So I really, I can identify with a chronic exhaustion thing for sure. Then another thing, what it says this book might help with, is this idea of mastering the art of saying no. I think, again, as people in ministry, and I know as a woman who has served in ministry saying no is sometimes not something we even consider as an option.
Bryan:
Right, absolutely.
Jeanette:
So I really like that and so just the idea of those kind of bigger changes and bigger things, but also the daily just kind of how you structure your day, knowing where your energy is in your day. Some people are better in the morning, some people are better in the middle of the day or some people are better in the evening and kind of doing your deepest work when you're at your best, is important instead of just like, well, this is work time because of the industrial revolution or whatever.
Bryan:
Right. Yeah.
Jeanette:
Just kind of trying to be more intentional with that. So that's what I'm looking forward to in this.
Bryan:
Yeah. I can see, obviously, this is kind of a recurring issue in the books that you've mentioned, but the issue of creating solid boundaries, especially when more people are working either hybrid or fully remote or whatever, but on top of that ministry is a 24/7 job, no matter what, and yeah, I can see the need for creating better time management and better boundaries and those kinds of things. It'll be interesting to see in a year or two, how those things have kind of evolved because I feel like there was such a shift too at the beginning of the pandemic. Everyone was kind of work life balance and then realizing, "Eh, that's not really a thing."
Jeanette:
It's not a thing.
Bryan:
"Let's figure this out a different way." So, yeah, that'll be interesting to see how that works itself out, I guess. All right, I have a couple communication centric books that are on my list and neither of these have I read before. The first one is called Human Centered Communication. So it's actually talking about the byline is a business case against digital pollution. So, the idea there is how do we center our communication on the person rather than just creating content and then alongside that is a book called Digital Storytelling and it kind of the same thing.
Bryan:
So they talk about how user generated content is 10 times more impactful than scripted marketing, scripted content that we create. So in both of these books, I'm hoping to kind of figure out how do we, either as church communicators or even as Church Juice what can we create to help churches do this, but think through the content that we create, how do we center on the human part. I'm telling the story well and doing that in a good and beneficial way that people will engage with, people will row from.
Jeanette:
I feel like that's something I've heard about and talk about and know about, but at the same time I... So I was wondering if I had heard of the book, Digital Storytelling, but I think I've just heard that concept.
Bryan:
Right. Right.
Jeanette:
And not the book.
Bryan:
I found this book on a list that I was going through trying to find books that I wanted to add to my list this year and yeah, the more I dug into it, the more I thought it would be beneficial. It seems like it's a pretty quick read. Once I to read it, I'll let you know. The other thing that I guess I should say here too, is we'll add our full lists on the podcast page and probably make a podcast post or whatever. So-
Jeanette:
Yes.
Bryan:
I have a ton more books that we're not talking about, both in theology.
Jeanette:
I don't.
Bryan:
I also have fiction.
Jeanette:
He has way more books than I do.
Bryan:
I'm just giving my full list because those are two communication-centric books that I'm kind of excited to, I guess, expand what I have read because I haven't heard of either of these authors before. So rather than reading another book from someone who I already know what they think and what they say, I'm hoping to learn a little bit beyond that too.
Jeanette:
Have you noticed a trend with content from... I just am noticing the power of repurposing content and also just kind of slightly shifting the content from one book and turning it into another book.
Bryan:
Yeah, true.
Jeanette:
Which I'm not saying is a bad thing because if you kind of restructure it, reframe it, repurpose it in a sense, the way you told the story the first time and you tell it this second time differently, it might hit somebody differently. Does that make sense? So it's not a bad thing, but sometimes I think, like you said, once you've heard X person talk five times, you probably know what they're going to say-
Bryan:
Absolutely.
Jeanette:
... Even if they say it in a different way or name their talk something different.
Bryan:
Right, for sure. The founding principles are your convictions remain the same, right.
Jeanette:
Yeah.
Bryan:
Yeah. It's an interesting little world of book publishing I think.
Jeanette:
Yeah, yeah.
Bryan:
Yeah. I think people see it, but people still buy them apparently.
Jeanette:
Well, and sometimes when you are reading... I just was thinking about I just have listened to 39 two hour audio books, Cozy Mysteries, their fiction, but the same thing happens. It's Murder She Wrote in an audio book.
Bryan:
Well, that's why you have, if you think about really long running TV shows, like Law and Order or Grey's Anatomy, it's the same thing every episode, right. But people still watch it.
Jeanette:
Don't get me started on... You know about me and Law and Order, right?
Bryan:
No.
Jeanette:
You know this?
Bryan:
No.
Jeanette:
I have seen every episode of Law and Order the original recipe Law and Order. Every-
Bryan:
Is it still on?
Jeanette:
No.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jeanette:
But it's kind-
Bryan:
Now they just have the spinoffs or whatever.
Jeanette:
Yes. But also it's coming back, but don't get me started. But my point is-
Bryan:
Is it a streaming only thing?
Jeanette:
... I have seen all of the episodes multiple times.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
I used to schedule my college classes around when they were going to pop up on TBS or TNT or whatever it was on when I was in college.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jeanette:
Also, people always used to get arrested at the halfway mark. So the first half was law and the second half was order.
Bryan:
Oh, that makes sense. But again, it's a recipe. You did every episode and they've done it for 30 years or whatever.
Jeanette:
Fun fact about the original Perry Mason, and then we'll move on. I know guys, you didn't come here for this content, so we're going to let go of it in a second. But speaking of recipes, Perry Mason, the original black and white people, you have to go way back, who only ever lost one case and there was such an uproar they had to come back and fix it. They had to do another episode where it was like, "Just kidding. The guy really didn't do it because he was the defense attorney."
Bryan:
Fun facts about Jeanette.
Jeanette:
Yeah. Sorry. If I can only pick one more I'm going to go with Hero On a Mission.
Bryan:
Okay.
Jeanette:
By Donald Miller because it's new.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
I haven't read it. I want to read it but of course I am going to stipulate that if you have never read Donald Miller before you should probably read something that's on your list, which is Marketing Made Simple or Building a StoryBrand.
Bryan:
Yeah.
Jeanette:
But Donald Miller is a great storyteller and you can learn a lot about storytelling. There's a lot out there, lot of story brand certified guides that work with churches and help churches learn how to tell the story of what God is doing in and through their church and that is the key that Jesus is the hero.
Bryan:
Absolutely.
Jeanette:
You as the church are the guide and you're leading people that way. So anyway, Hero On a Mission is his newest book. He talks about bringing clarity to what your goals and what your meaning is in your life and moving toward that being productive so I think it's relevant to leadership, to ministry. So that's why I'm including it, but you're going to love it. He's a great writer and you can learn about how to communicate by just reading how he communicates.
Bryan:
Absolutely. Right.
Jeanette:
It's like meta.
Bryan:
He puts out some really good stuff and it's worthwhile and I think if I could narrow it down, these are three or four or maybe five people that you should read. Everything that they have written, he's probably one of them. But yeah, it's good for communicators and there's a lot of content there that I think will prove helpful too. So good. All right, so we will publish our list. I gave you less than a handful of books on my list, but we will publish our full lists so that you can read through them and pick and choose what might be good for you.
Bryan:
What we didn't go through I have some fiction on my list. I have some racial reconciliation books that are on my list. I have some theology, some other leadership-type books. So, yeah. So I'll throw that out and we'll add yours too. I think there's one more quick hitter. If you are just starting in church communications, we also have a list that I created, I think, last year with five books that I think every church communicator should read. So we'll throw that in the show notes as well but we'll talk about this more in our Facebook group this week too. I think that it would be good to hear what other people are-
Jeanette:
We should kind of check-in with each other during the year and see if we've actually read any of this list.
Bryan:
True. That's true.
Jeanette:
Hold us accountable in the Facebook group you all. We need accountability. Let's do it.
Bryan:
Absolutely. Well, thank you for taking the time to listen to our banter here on the Church Juice podcast. If you haven't already, make sure that you subscribe wherever you're listening today, then you will never miss a future episode. If you're listening on Apple podcast, it would really mean a lot if you took the time to leave us a review. That helps other church leaders find the podcast as well. By the way, like we were just talking about, we will continue today's discussion in our Facebook group and we would love to hear about what you are reading this year too. You can find the link to our group along with the show notes from today's episode at churchjuice.com/podcast.
Jeanette:
Church Juice's podcast is a listener-supported production of ReFrame ministries, a family of programs designed to help you see your whole life reframed by God's gospel story. Church Juice is produced by Bryan Haley with post-production by audio engineer, Nate Morris in Grand Rapids, Michigan. For more information about Church Juice, visit churchjuice.com. For more information on Reframe Ministries and our family of programs, visit reframeministries.org.