voting – We go to hard places and do hard things for the Church and community

Christians must render unto God what is God’s, but also render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s. In our representative democracy, that means that every Christian must vote, and be informed and prayerful. Many will be called to be poll workers, a few activists, and a tiny minority…candidates.

By Mark D. Harris, MD, MPH, MBA, MDiv, ThM, PhD, DBA

Primary elections are fast approaching, and the political storms are surging in this presidential election year. West Virginia’s primary elections are on May 14^th. Many people are just now beginning to pay attention to the races, and many do not know who they should vote for. National races, like Trump and Biden, swallow up media time and space, and local candidates rarely gain publicity.

For Christians, the question of who to vote for is secondary to the question of why and how to vote. Christ-followers are first citizens of heaven and only second citizens of our earthly nation. Our allegiance lies first with Jesus and only second with the United States (in our case). The direction of believers’ allegiance is not new. Followers of Jesus refused to worship Roman emperors and perform religious duties that would put Rome above God. Often, these Christians were killed for their “disloyalty.” Killing Christians was a bad move for Rome. Christianity was spreading like wildfire through the Empire regardless of the persecution. Further, the sterile and abortive Romans needed to have their failure to make more Romans offset by the fecund Christians.

Continue reading “How Should I Vote?” →

The Republican National Committee (RNC) has struggled to capitalize on some big advantages in the elections of 2018, 2020, and 2022. The Balanced Scorecard is a widely used tool to help businesses, non-profits, and governmental organizations achieve their goals. Perhaps by looking again at their operations, the RNC can prevail in 2024.

By Mark Harris, MD, MPH, MBA, MDiv, ThM, PhD, DBA

Introduction

The Balanced Scorecard (BSC) is a proven tool for organizational evaluation, strategy, and improvement. Typically, it includes factors such as “financial,” “customer,” “internal processes,” and “learning and growth.” According to Blocher et al., 2021, BSC financial goals include increasing profitability, growing revenue, and reducing costs. BSC customer satisfaction goals address improving the profitability of each customer, raising customer satisfaction, and reducing the time required to fulfill a customer’s desire. Internal process goals would be improving quality and productivity. Finally, learning and growth goals should focus on developing employees, using technology more effectively, and communicating strategy better to all stakeholders.

The BSC was developed in the 1990s, and since then has been adopted by thousands of organizations in a wide variety of fields. The BSC has found a home in the public sector, as I used it in the US Army Medical Department for over 20 years. Miller, 2017 wrote that the public sector, especially when reelection depends on organizational performance, has widely adopted performance measures such as the BSC. Private sector companies of all sizes have capitalized on the BSC, and it has proven itself valuable in non-profit organizations as well. I worked in the past with the Republican National Committee (RNC), so this work will discuss how the BSC might look in the context of the RNC.

Continue reading “The Balanced Scorecard and the Republican National Committee” →