Committed to Helping One Another

A look back at the birth of CMA

On March 20, 1976, a group of 20 people met for the first time at the Rodger Young Auditorium in Los Angeles. That became the first of many meetings of the Christian Financial Executives Association (after two more name changes, it was renamed the Christian Management Association in 1991). We recently talked with three of the founding members.

Alan Bergstedt, President, Visionary Ventures, and first CMA board chairman and president

Dr. James (Jim) Canning, Associate Professor of the School of Business at Biola University, and second CMA chairman/president

Dean Hazelton, Vice President of Finance, World Vision, and third CMA chairman/president

CMR: What was CMA responding to in the beginning?

Jim: Alan Bergstedt was the chief financial officer of World Vision and I was the outside auditor for World Vision. We'd talk with each other about finance and management issues, and we thought it would be wonderful to do this on a more formal basis with more people.

Alan: Before CMA, I'd always been a part of some formal or informal professional networking group. When I was CFO of a national advertising agency, we had a professional group of CFOs from Chicago. Then, when I was the financial officer with Wycliffe in the Philippines, Bob Reynolds [currently serving as treasurer of the CMA Los Angeles Chapter] invited me to be involved in a missions association in Manila. Now, fast-forward about 6 years: I was CFO at World Vision and Bob was treasurer at Far East Broadcasting, also in California. I called Bob and asked, "Is there any group meeting in LA like we had in Manila?" There wasn't. So I talked to Jim [Canning] to see if we could get a group together. We contacted Dean Hazelton and about 30 other people from organizations in the area.

Dean: At the time, there were specific accounting and reporting changes impacting nonprofit organizations which we were all trying to understand how to implement. As we started getting together, we found a real desire to learn from each other, which resulted in our first motto from Living Proverbs: "Good men (and women) long to help each other."

Jim: In the 1970s, I worked with several Christian organizations. I found that many of the people in those organizations were not aware of certain financial principles or modern management issues and techniques. Part of the reason was that they simply were not exposed to these topics in the Bible schools and Christian colleges where they were trained. One of the real reasons for starting CMA was to try to provide practical training from a biblical perspective on how to run Christian organizations.

Alan: Several of us had come to nonprofits from the business world, and we were all struggling with how to convert our business knowledge to ministries. What brought us together was that we didn't want to be lone rangers or to reinvent the wheel.

The First 20

These are the attendees of the first CFEA (CMA) meeting on 3/20/76:

• Jim Adams, Moody Institute of Science
• Beth Altig, Trans World Missions
• Bill Altman, Ernst and Whinney
• Alan Bergstedt, World Vision
• Jim Bramer, Bramer Accountancy
• Jim Canning, Ernst and Whinney
• Don Hamilton, William Carey Institute
• John Harrell, Coordinated Security Cons.
• Victor Hausmaninger, World Wide Pictures
• Dean Hazelton, World Literature Crusade
• Fred Hilst, The Bible Tabernacle
• Lew Humphrey, Moody Institute of Science
• Jack Kerr, Personal Christianity
• Lee Merritt, Fuller Theological Seminary
• Dick Monsma, Campus Crusade for Christ
• Ivan Pendell, World Literature Crusade
• Linda Pritchett, Trans World Missions
• Bob Reynolds, Far East Broadcasting Co.
• James Schmook, Christian Resource Org.
• Oran West, Wycliffe Bible Translators

CMR: So, tell us about that first meeting in Los Angeles.

Jim: In March 1976, Alan and I set up a dinner and invited a number of people to the Rodger Young Auditorium in downtown Los Angeles. Twenty of us came together. We had a speaker and also discussed things that were on our hearts.

Alan: At that gathering, I asked the others whether they thought we should get together regularly, and what they saw as the benefits of meeting. We considered topics such as nonprofit taxes, governmental regulations, budgeting, hiring staff, and other management-oriented topics. This was also in the era when computers were coming on the scene, and we exchanged ideas about adapting software.

Dean: We were very excited about meeting together. We talked about a number of current issues and specific management topics. We wanted to find out how each of our organizations approached them. So we scheduled a second meeting a couple of months later, and about 40 people attended. Even more came to the next meeting. There was a real desire among these financial and other management types to fellowship and to learn from each other.

CMR: What would you say were the biggest challenges facing Christian organizations when CMA started?

Jim: They weren't too different from today. The biggest question was and is: How do you run a Christian ministry more effectively and efficiently? We know more today than we did back then. The parachurch movement really took off after World War II. There were many ministries being formed and growing into large organizations. We were going through a significant period of growth in the nonprofit world. One problem, however, was that people were elevated into management positions who, in some cases, didn't have a lot of background in management.

Dean: There were a lot of specific issues nonprofit organizations weren't addressing very well. Perhaps the biggest issue was the attitude that tended to come from the founder/leaders that because we're a mission, God will provide, and good business practices aren't something to waste time and money on. Sometimes, "top management" was afraid to share "their secrets," but we next-level folks knew we needed help.

CMR: What lessons did you learn from starting CMA?

Jim: The verse, the guiding principle we took was from Proverbs 12:12: "Good men long to help each other." I think CMA was truly an example of the body of Christ coming together. We weren't in competition; we met to encourage one another, share our knowledge and share ourselves. The first lesson I learned was to recognize the importance of fellowship around a topic even as mundane as management. The other thing we realized is that we could all learn from one another.

Alan: The biggest challenge I saw in Christian organizations [vs. corporate] was that some ministries didn't budget for income. They budgeted for expense very carefully, but not income; you trusted in God to supply. We all wanted to improve budgeting. That was one of the first things we wanted to adapt to the nonprofit world through CMA.

Dean: We discovered that each of us had things to learn and things to share. No one had a corner on "the best way." The big organizations learned from the small ones and vice versa.

CMR: What would you say are the top benefits of CMA membership?

Jim: First, it affiliates you with a professional group which provides regular information and makes available training and resources for you as a manager. It connects you with a body of fellow professionals you can learn from, associate with, and with whom you can identify. You also have an organization that looks out for you and brings to your attention important issues.

Alan: The CMA Conference is a huge benefit. Members can make contact with outside services and get quick access to resources they might use.

Dean: There are a number of important benefits: The annual conference, a very well-done magazine, the opportunity to connect with other professionals in or serving nonprofits, etc. The conference has to be the number one thing we provide, with many opportunities for learning and growing professionally. But I personally have found the number one benefit of all of CMA, and especially at the annual conference, is the networking opportunities—meeting others from all around the country with similar goals and challenges.

While some of those who attended the first meeting in 1976 have retired, moved to different ministries or passed away, a number of the founders are still actively participating in CMA. After 30 years, the need for CMA still exists and the benefits have grown even stronger. We're grateful to CMA's founders for their vision and wisdom, and hope that, as young managers and new members join CMA, they'll continue to carry on its vital mission.