One of the best things we can give to our volunteers is clear expectations. A clear, concise, well-written job description can go a long way towards communicating what we expect from volunteers. Volunteer job descriptions can also help you clarify your vision for the...
Did you know that most churches only keep about 10-20% of their first-time families? I don't know about you, but I definitely want to see our church do better. Recently, I've been researching what churches do to help encourage guests to come back. I have enjoyed...
Do you have a difficult time when you go to recruit volunteers for summer in children's ministry? Do you want to give your regular volunteers a break so they're refreshed and ready for a new school year? Could you use a yearly on-ramp for potential volunteers...
If you don't know what Orange is, it's a non-profit company that helps churches win with families. They help by creating strategies, curriculum, resources, leader training, conferences and more. You can find out more on the What Is Orange website. Registration for the...
Last week, our family ministry staff, along with about 10 volunteers, attended the Orange Tour stop in Lancaster, PA. We attend the Tour every year and it was a great experience as always. Unlike past years, we went north to Lancaster instead of south to D.C. and the...
Last week I had my annual trip to the Orange Conference. It's a week I look forward to every year. I posted notes from the first and second main sessions, but here are some general takeaways I had from the conference. It's a random list in random order. A Refocus on...
Almost a decade ago I was at a conference for churches who were thinking about going multisite. It was a small gathering of about 100-200 leaders, so it felt different than a typical conference. I'm not sure how it came up, but the speaker was talking about volunteer...
A couple weeks ago I was honored to speak to the amazing preschool ministry volunteers at Park Valley Church. The topic I was asked to speak on was How to Partner With Preschool Parents as a Small Group Leader. Here are the 5 points I shared, that I believe apply to...
In a previous post, I talked about the importance of being a habitual learner in relation to leading a growing family ministry. It is the most common attribute I see in great leaders. One of the ways I wrote that we can become habitual learners is to build it into our...
Some time ago our family ministry team read the book Creating Magic by Lee Cockerell. It was a great read with a lot of helpful leadership principles. The book Be Our Guest is another great resource, and while our family ministry team hasn't read it together, many of...
As everyone who works in ministry knows, it's hard. You never get it all done and every week there are urgent things that have to be balanced with the important things. In the midst of it all it's easy to fall into the trap of simply managing what we have going and...
In the survey I recently did, volunteer training was one of the top topics family ministry leaders were interested in. Training volunteers is crucial and I believe it is something many leaders struggle to do well. It's also something that isn't a one-size-fits-all...
Almost anyone who works in children's ministry or student ministry understands what it is like to be underpaid and overworked. That comes with ministry in general, but for various reasons churches often pay children and student staff even less than other roles in the...
In the previous post I wrote about our plan for developing Coaches within our family ministry team. Coaches are volunteers who lead teams of leaders, as defined in our leadership pipeline. Part of our plan for developing Coaches involves meeting with them regularly...
In a previous post I wrote about the importance of establishing a volunteer leadership pipeline in our ministries. Leadership pipelines provide a clear leadership path and a structure the entire ministry can be built on. As I network and work with other churches I'm...
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