Research Mentoring
One Challenge is thrilled to have been chosen as the recipient of Global Mapping International's Breakthrough Mentoring Suite, which includes the GMI Fellowship Program and other mentoring resources. The Global Research Team of One Challenge serves as the primary steward of this program. We are excited to add these tools to our training and mentoring repertoire.
No matter where in the world you might be serving, your ministry may be facing an especially difficult question or obstacle right now. Whatever that thorny issue might be, research mentoring aims to help you cut through it, in full dependence on God’s Spirit and with the goal of greater fruitfulness.
The Global Research Team’s mission and passion is to assist field workers, churches and ministry partners to gather and analyze information to develop effective ministry strategies. This is what our friends at GMI called "knowledge stewardship," that is, the Spirit-led process of acquiring and insightfully using information for God’s glory and according to His purpose. This process involves gathering data, applying it to organizational decisions, and evaluating the results of those decisions. That mission and passion of knowledge stewardship guides the entire process.
Although One Challenge has over 40 years of experience in various kinds of mission research and members of the Global Research Team are skilled researchers, mentoring is not about the research we can do. It is about what you can do by the grace of God when we come alongside to assist you.
The Breakthrough Mentoring Suite offers two approaches. The two-month version is called SearchLite, which is designed to investigate a simple question for a Benefiting Organization. The one-year version, called Breakthrough, allows a researcher to investigate a larger issue informing decision-making for the Benefiting Organization.
SearchLite and Breakthrough both involve a partnership between your organization and the Global Research Team of One Challenge. In both approaches, the project starts not with the researcher, but with his/her supervisor, since the One Challenge’s partnership is with the Benefiting Organization, not the individual doing the research. The Benefiting Organization supervisor plays a key role in defining the focus of the project and following through on the insights. The three-way interaction of the researcher, the supervisor, and the research mentor produces projects that lead to real Kingdom impact. In this process, research mentors will first come alongside to help your organization sharpen its focus on the question or obstacle you are facing. Your organization will designate a staff person who will be coached in researching your issue and discerning what the Lord wants you to do about it. Then, research mentors will assist your organization in following His guidance toward greater Kingdom impact. Financially, whatever project costs there might be are shared. One Challenge's financial grant does not include salaries. This point will be further clarified later in the application process.
The Breakthrough manual is available for a suggested donation of $20 USD plus postage and handling ($5 USD in the continental United States, other locations to be determined). Email us at research@oci.org to order the Breakthrough manual. A student version of SearchLite is under development, which students can use as a part of their academic programs.
You may already know which approach best fits your issue, or you may discuss it with us before deciding. In either case, there is prayerful, three-way collaboration among your organization’s researcher, your organization’s project supervisor, and your research mentor.
The application process is divided into four short steps to lay a healthy foundation for a fruitful research project. The steps cover your choice of a research issue, your organization’s spiritual readiness, your organization’s schedule, and a clear partnership agreement, including finances and expectations. Click here to download the Application for Steps One and Two. To start the process, complete the Application for Step One and return it to us at research@oci.org.
In addition to the SearchLite and Breakthrough mentoring partnerships, the Global Research Team also offers consulting, on-line training and research internships. Pictured at the left is one our our recent research interns from Mongolia. Find out more about research internships here. A quick search of this site for the keyword Training will give you a good overview of the training we offer. And in a given year, we provide consulting services for numerous ministry partners, assisting with research design and other technical issues.
If you are interested in prayerfully taking the first step of establishing a research mentoring relationship, by all means contact us at Research@oci.org.
