“F3 is a national network of free, peer-led workouts for men. We plant, grow and serve these groups to invigorate male community leadership.” A HIM is a High IMPACT Man. He is a man who impacts his community for the better. Therefore, the mission of F3 is to plant, grow and serve male workouts for the purpose of creating HIMs. A HIM has a impact on his community because he leads. To be a leader a HIM must be an accelerating man. Acceleration is a marginal increase in the pace of movement. While deceleration is the opposite of acceleration, leveling off just as effectively stops acceleration. How are we supposed to impact the men in our community if we accept leveling off? How are sadclowns in North Fulton, Forsyth, and Cherokee going to become HIMs if we accept anything but acceleration?
A problematic workout is one that routinely has Pax over 18. Its a problem because it interferes with the the First F and the second F. Its hard to lead a workout with that many men, but its even harder to create true fellowship when the numbers get to large. F3 does not know why it is 18, it is just a fact. A problematic workout means you search for growth by division. The Q identifies a HIM and passes the baton to start another Beatdown and AO. We should never wait for it to level off. How do you invigorate leadership in the community if a problematic workout’s solution is to wait for a leveling off? You might as well turn it to a closed group. If that was the solution to the problem, Dredd and OBT would have stayed at the campos and F3 would not be. So, when a workout becomes problematic acceleration is all the more vital.
We are all one Pax and impact each other every day. The great thing about impact is it works like compound interest. YHC has joked about the Firehouse being a secret AO, but without it I know of at least one FNG who only knows F3 because of it. I worked on him for a little while, but he lived to far from Big Creek. Turns out The Firehouse was right by his house and he goes to church with Reuben. Thanks to Reuben and Dash accelerating, one more man has discovered F3. Dash and Reuben can thank Swiper and Darth Visor for accelerating to Big Creek. Many more FNGs at the Paragon have also now discovered F3 thanks to acceleration from Homeboy and Homeboy can thank Babyface for accelerating to the Kodiak. And we can all thank the faithful HIMs who accelerated and brought F3 to North Atlanta almost 3 years ago. You know who you are. You many not know each Pax but your acceleration, accelerated all of us. The Pax is connected because HIMs step up and Impact other men who then Impact other men. That’s compound acceleration.
Therefore, we should Always Be Accelerating. To do that, we need to train to be come Qs. While the Q is responsible for making sure the Pax get a good beatdown, the Q’s primary job is to encourage Pax Acceleration. That includes not only encouraging men to step up and Q but also identifying men to step up and accelerate by expanding new AOs. That is how Dredd and OBT launched the second F3 AO. They called on a Pax they knew was a HIM and an Accelerating Man. If they had not done that, F3 would be just another campos.
A Q sheet makes it hard to do that. A Q sheet does not call a man and ask him to lead. A Q sheet is passive. That is no way to invest in the Pax and create HIMs. Lets continue to invest in the Pax by investing in Quarterly Qs. YHC was given Quarterly Q responsibilities 3rd Quarter of 2016 at the Rubicon. I say given because Crack looked me in the eyes and asked “Law Dog you can take the Q on Thursdays right?.” I was posting regularly but not dependably. I drove 25 minutes to the Rubicon and if I did not wake up by 5am I fartsacked. That changed with Quarterly Q responsibilities. Now I had to take accountability for planning a beatdown every Thursday or make sure a Pax stepped up to help. There is something much more personable to reaching out to a specific Pax and asking to Q. Everyone finally says yes. It also encourages Acceleration because leading a workout requires the Q to push himself harder to ensure the gazelles get a good workout but still keeping the Pax together. Qing every couple of months by signing a Q sheet will never provide the on the job training to develop the leadership skills required to lead a beatdown. That comes from Qing consistently. If a man does not have the leadership skills to lead a series of beatdowns, he won’t have the skills to launch a new AO.
YHC writes this not because every AO and every beatdown need to operate the same way. That is why F3 is a Starfish not a spider. Q sheets do serve some good and may be working at different AOs. Maybe Monthly Qs work better than Quarterly. Regarldess the system, training men to be Qs is the most important guiding factor. F3 operates by having the Pax Q on a rotating basis because it teaches leadership. As long as men are being trained to lead and become HIMs, F3 will grow. I only point this out because I just know that the most explosive growth for the North Atlanta region has seen came after we switched to Quarterly Qs. During that time HIMs stepped up and started planting shovel flags from the mighty Hooch to the base of the Appalachian Mountains. A Pax can now get to multiple beatdowns Monday – Saturday in no more than about 25 minutes from home. YHC’s believes that happened because HIMs were training other men to become HIMs. Let’s keep that growth going. 2018 should be the year F3 North Atlanta shrinks that time to 15 minutes because our region is to dense a population not to have AOs at every park. But this is only going to happen if we Accelerate, Individually and as the Pax of North Atlanta by turning more and more sadclowns into HIMs. It is only going to happen if we accelerate problematic workouts by identifying new Pax to lead and become HIMs. It will not happen with we settle for good enough. It will not happen if we get complacent and stick to the same old thing.
If any of this does not make sense, read Freed to Lead by Dredd and OBT and the QSource Blog. They explain things much more clearly than YHC ever could.
I leave you with one more thought. Where would you be if a HIM had not accelerated you through F3? Who can you accelerate by giving back to F3?
SYITG because its the best time of the day to begin accelerating.
The Q sheet is not suppose to be a passive tool to say, “hey, it’s out there, go sign up if you can.” At the Wreck we personally ask, tell, bribe, pressure and anything else we can to get VQs.
F3 survives because of rotating leadership. I would say that 50% of the Qs we have now would not have taken a “Quarter Q.” Even I would have avoided a Quarter Q for the longest time and I had Q’d in SC and at the Rubicon before.
Personally, the Qs we have that rotate in “once a month” are some of the best Qs and HIMs we have. The Wreck Q schedule would probably look exactly the same even if we did a Quarter Q. My understanding of the Quarter Q is to find a Q or Q the WO yourself. Also, when launching a new WO we want the RNGs to see a rotating Q (never the same guy) so they can think to themselves, “hey, I could do that.”
When the Wreck had the “problematic” numbers, we added a day as oppose to branching out because of numerous boring excuses, but maybe as a Region we need to be more helpful in these problematic numbers. As a Region we have numerous HIMs that have stayed put at their “home” AO and became comfortable, that is what we need to change. As HIMs of the Region we need to see these numbers and reach out and offer to leap somewhere else close by. In Roswell, I’m ready to launch Riverside Park, I’m ready to launch Hembree Park, I’m ready to launch Waller Park. I agree that we can sustain a WO in every park and school. I always take Lexington SC as an example because of the success they have in launching WO and sustaining numbers. They use a Region Q sheet for their 23+ AOs, and to my knowledge they only have rotating AOQs.
We need a leader of the Region that communicates with each AOQ, knows whats going on and where we need to go. The vision for the Region is lacking. Vision is where we need to refresh.
Solid post coming from a man of the law, solid response from the man of steel, and good problems to have all around!
I am guilty myself, both for not accelerating as well as for staying “home” these days.
Thanks for calling me out boys! I will get in check.