When is a fabulous event a bad thing?

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by Carol

When is a fabulous event a — well, maybe not bad, but — less than 100% good thing?

History

I knew a church that had an annual outreach event every year.  All of the children’s games, signs, food-prep stuff, etc., etc., were brought out of storage when the time rolled around.  Every church member (it seemed) had a favorite place to serve.  Even the families in the neighborhood knew when to expect the flyers and when to show up in droves.

Now, you are probably thinking that it had turned into a bad thing because everyone was in a rut.  And to be fair, it was not working as a true outreach event anymore.  But that wasn’t what turned it into a problem.

The New Kid

The problem started when someone new in the church — who had no awareness of the previous history — was asked to do something very different with the event.  Result?  A fairly successful event because the members tried their best to stay in their rut.

The Staff Kid

The next year, a staff member headed up a moderately successful event.

The Newest New Kid

And then came the “fabulous” year.

A new person in the church — who had no awareness of the previous history — was asked to lead.  She poured her every waking moment and her extended family into the event.  I repeat: It was fabulous.

But…

The next year, she didn’t want to lead it again.  (Can you blame her?)  And the staff member didn’t want to lead it again.  And the earlier recruit didn’t want to get burned again.  And the original games and signs and food-prep stuff had long since gone in a dumpster.  And the church members no longer had their favorite places to serve.  And….

And Finally

No one wanted to try to follow last year’s “fabulous” act.

Lessons to Learn

There are quite a few lessons here:

  • It’s hard to change a well-entrenched ministry.  It has to be done with careful planning.
  • It’s not fair to throw a change like that into the lap of a new volunteer.
  • The dance between volunteer leaders and paid staff can be tricky enough.  Switching roles back and forth creates even more problems.
  • Annual events build over time, so the leadership needs to be recruited and supported over the long haul. A flash in the pan burns out everyone.

What happens when volunteers are too busy?

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by Carol

What happens when volunteers are too busy?

This is Therapy Journal 101. When I’m too busy:

  1. I don’t get blog posts written/proofread/posted.
  2. I snap at people.
  3. I have no patience.
  4. I make mountains into mole hills. No — the other way around.
  5. I make mistakes.
  6. I can’t think creatively.
  7. I give up before the job is finished.
  8. I drop things (like paint brushes, soft drinks, trays of cupcakes — icing side down).
  9. I snap at people.
  10. I get sick.
  11. I fail to ask others for their help, their understanding, or their prayers.
  12. I say things that shouldn’t be said out loud (like letting other people know how frustrated I am with someone/something).
  13. I snap at people.
  14. I think about quitting.
  15. I forget to give God the credit He deserves.
  16. I think about kicking the cat (which I wouldn’t do — and, besides, God’s word says a lot about people who mistreat animals).
  17. I don’t smile or laugh.
  18. I snap at people — and don’t tell me that I already said that!

People have limits.  When they are stressed, tired, and pressured, even the best of us run out of energy and let our filters slip.

There may not be anything you can do when one of your volunteers has had a storage unit flooded, had cats start the volunteer’s work day at 4:45 a.m., is about to be laid off, and has a VBS to-do list that is a mile long of things past their deadlines.  (Welcome to my world!)

What do I appreciate when I’m too busy?

  • Help with cleaning up or getting things finished.
  • A creative perspective.
  • A minimum of questions and advice.
  • A short memory for some of the things I say.
  • A long memory for expressing appreciation for good things I do.
  • Sometimes — but not always — a hug.

Thanks for listening.

Too busy – puppets, scripts and props

Where were we? (more on church size)

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by Carol

Where were we?  Oh, yes.  We were looking at the impact of church size on volunteers.  We had just looked at the large and very large churches, but we didn’t look at the difference between them.

IS there a difference between large and very large churches when it comes to volunteers?  The size categories we’ve used are small (up to 100 in worship attendance), medium (101-350), large (351-750), very large (751-1800), mega (over 1800) and super (more on that in a later post).

So, what’s the difference when you go from 600 up to 1,500?  You are going to have a larger campus, more staff, more programs, more diversity in the congregation, higher quality in everything you do, and more distinction between skills of staff and volunteers.

If you ARE a volunteer, you are going to see these differences in the church.  But, honestly, you might not feel the difference in terms of how volunteers are led or organized.

Staff members and volunteers who lead volunteers, though, will find that it requires
**more intentional communication,
**more intentional recruiting, and
**more lead time for events.
By the time you get to 1,500 in worship, the staff members are learning from the mega churches — the tips, the tricks, and the systems.

For the volunteers, other things matter more than mere numbers.  A church in the midst of explosive growth (because of relocation, a new pastor, etc.) may not have all of the policies, programs, and systems in place yet.  The newly-large will look much different from a church that has been large for a decade.  A church that has been slowly succumbing to outdated leadership may be an unpleasant atmosphere for volunteers, even if it has all of the bells and whistles of the very large church.

Yes, there are differences between large churches and very large churches, but they aren’t as easy to spot  — which is probably why you don’t see many books and articles about their unique characteristics.  In fact, they often get lumped in together.  It could be that more people just means more of what you’ve been doing, rather than requiring anything distinctly different.

If you have some ideas about how volunteers are influenced by the unique features of large or very large churches, leave a comment.  Let’s explore this together!

When Volunteers Bail Out – part 2

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by Carol

As my dearly departing volunteers depart, I think hard about how to fill their shoes.  In part 1, we looked at making their departure smooth and meaningful.  I prayerfully consider whether the ministry program needs to be changed or dropped.

Next, I delve deeper into what kind of volunteer(s) I need to fill the position.

We talk about filling someone’s shoes, but shoes come in all shapes and sizes:  loafers, boots, dress shoes, sandals, cross-trainers, flip-flops, and on and on.  They all have their special functions and, most of the time, they are not interchangeable.

The same is true of volunteers.  They have different spiritual gifts, of course, but it goes beyond that.  The following list probably just scratches the surface:

Visionaries – They see possibilities and set direction.
Organizers – Up front or behind the scenes, they pull resources together.
“Leaders” – These large-group and small-group facilitators aren’t afraid of the spotlight.
Support – Whatever you need, they’ll have your back.
Gophers – They’ll go-fer this and go for that.  Fold. Stamp. Stuff. Happy just to help!
Admin – Register folks.  Take roll. Count contributions.
Skilled – Run the sound booth.  Play the keyboard.  Design outreach materials.  Create/manage your website.

When I have a vacancy, I think about the type of volunteer I need.  Like shoes, they are not interchangeable.  Visionaries and leaders may be able to keep roll, but they are likely to get bored or see ways to improve a system that doesn’t need fixing.  Gophers and support may say ‘yes” to please you (and because that’s what you need), but they may freeze or fumble when they have to take center stage.

Use the list of types as a starting point.  What type are you?  What type is the departing volunteer?  What types do you have on the team, and what do you need going forward?

Then pray about your team and your vacancy.  Let God open your eyes to people who might be the perfect fit.

Do you see other types of volunteers for the list?  Leave a comment.

When Volunteers Bail Out (quit, move, retire, leave, or whatever)

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by Carol

[We’ll return to our series on volunteers in churches of different sizes after this brief non-commercial break.]

Many of our programs work on a school-year calendar, so we’re coming up on that season for volunteers to tell you that they won’t be back in the fall.  How do you respond?

I take it personally.  Bad form, I know.  Not everything is about me.  Sometimes God calls people to new ministries, new homes, and new challenges.

But after I have a personal panic party, what do I do next?

1.  I do, actually, question whether I ought to take it personally. 
Did I do something (big or small) that drove off the volunteer? Or, did I fail to do something that would have encouraged the volunteer to stay?  It happens — but I will never know unless I ask myself the question.

2.  I encourage a candid discussion. 
I ask the volunteer why they are leaving the position, and I make sure that I am listening carefully.  I take their reason at face value, of course, but I don’t assume that volunteers can always articulate the reasons that they don’t feel that this is the right fit anymore.  Even when they are moving across the country, I can still learn something through an exit interview.

3.  I help the volunteer to leave gracefully. 
Sendoffs should be proportional to the years they have served.  Goodbyes can be as warm as possible.  Leave the light on, in case they want to come home later.  And if the relationship is strained or broken, study the Bible for every bit of wisdom on love and reconciliation that you can find — and then USE it.  When all is said and done, pray for your volunteers who are leaving.

4.  I think about changing the time or the program. 
We’ll dig deeper into this in the next post, but sometimes your best volunteers are not available during the time slot that used to work.  And sometimes you need to rethink the program — is it requiring too many volunteers, or too much from the volunteers you have?

5.  I reconsider the role. 
You’re not going to get a clone of the volunteer who is leaving, so what do you really want?  Is it time to change the job description?  Is it time to find a different personality type?  Does a new volunteer need to fit into an existing team?  Think before you run out and grab the first person who looks something like the one who is leaving.

6. I ask for help in recruiting. 
Help comes in various forms — a referral from the outgoing volunteer, a suggestion from a current volunteer, an idea from someone who says no to serving right now.

You also may need help on a grander scale.  This year, we are losing some key workers at a time that we are hoping to expand some of our children’s ministries.  Because I am recruiting for the whole ministry, I will ask for help from the pastor (to address the importance from the pulpit), from the keepers of the screen (rolling announcements, verbal announcements, and video clips), and from the gatekeepers of our direct publicity (outgoing emails, print media, etc.).

Bottom line:  Volunteer turnover is normal.  When volunteers leave, take a breath and then turn it into a good thing.

Next time — As volunteers come and go, we’ll take a look at the kind of volunteers you need and the type of positions you have open.

3 Reasons for a Happy Dance

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Happy Danceby Carol

Between Medium and Mega lies the land of the Large Church and the Very Large Church.  For many church volunteers, this is the Land of the Happy Dance for at least three reasons:

1.  Volunteers leaders are needed and supported.  By the time you get to the mega church, many volunteer leadership positions have been taken over by pastoral staff, support staff, and even interns.  But the large church still relies on volunteers to lead volunteers.  These leaders often work closely with the support staff (ministry assistants and shared secretaries).  In fact, it is not unusual to see volunteer leaders hired onto the staff as the church grows to the next level.

2.  Volunteers can develop an area of interest.  Unlike the small church, where the jack-of-all-trades is crucial, the large and very large churches have room for specialists.  Musicians who aren’t professionals, for example, can shine in a variety of roles without feeling guilty that some other ministry of the church is struggling.  Volunteers gain experience and expertise, but they don’t have to be exclusively dedicated to a niche.

3.  Volunteers appreciate participating in programs that are done well.  Benefits come from having more people, the leadership of well-trained staff, and more resources (financial and otherwise).  The church doesn’t hesitate to foot the bill for training and workshops.  And the volunteers get positive feedback from church members who appreciate the quality of the music, children’s activities, teaching, interior décor, etc., etc.

Right Fit
Volunteers don’t always know what they are looking for, but they feel the difference when they find the right place to serve. Large and very large churches aren’t right for everyone, of course.  I always think about the question of whether you want to be a big fish in a little pond or a little fish in a big pond — assuming that being a big fish in a big pond isn’t one of your options.

So a few questions are in order:

Are you a jack-of-all-trades?
Are you a professional in some field and do you want to use that expertise in a volunteer capacity at church?
Do you like feeling that you have made a difference in whether a ministry will continue to function?
Do you put a high value on excellence above other things?
Are you more concerned with finding a place for everyone, even those with limited skills?

These are the trade-offs that volunteers consider, whether they think about them consciously or not.  It helps when the volunteers and their leaders are aware of what the trade-offs are.  In fact, they may even launch their happy dance!

The Twilight Zone Revisited: From Medium to Large

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by Carol

It’s interesting being in a medium-sized church that has a high proportion of members who have come from much larger churches.  I didn’t realize what was driving my expectations and those of other folks in the church until I started writing this post.

A Different Transition
A while back (see 10-30-2015 post, The Twilight Zone of Transition), we noted that volunteers make the difference going from small-sized church to medium. The transition from medium to large, though, can be uniquely difficult to maneuver. Members of the congregation, including volunteers, struggle to adjust their relationship to the lead pastor.  While members of the small church expect direct access to the pastor, members in the larger church understand that the pastor can’t do everything.  As the church adds paid pastoral staff, members look to the staff for matters within their areas of responsibility.

Half & Half in Medium
In our medium-sized church, I get the best (and worst) of both worlds!  Folks who have been with the church since it was small go directly to the pastor with their questions and concerns.  Folks who came from larger churches come to me, expecting me to know everything and expecting me to have the ability to make adjustments.  They are familiar with going to the staff member instead of the pastor.

As a volunteer myself, though, I am frequently out of the “staff” loop and can’t make the adjustments.  We are a medium church — so I got the title, but no office or day-to-day communication with the pastor.  (Let’s just say that I like the ministry, and I knew what I was getting into.)  Nevertheless, the expectation is there.

Armed with this new insight, I can revise my expectations.  We live in a fuzzy area, where some members will go to the pastor and some will go to the pastoral staff responsible for the program.  Neither way is wrong in the medium church.  But what about the large church?

Transition to Large
As the church continues to grow, members need to learn to look to the staff members instead of going to the lead pastor.  It is becoming an Acts 6 situation, protecting his time to lead the church and prepare sermons.  And, of course, the church will probably hire a paid staff member to take my position to the next level (1 Timothy 5:18).

Take-aways
We could say that communication becomes critical during this transition — which is true.  But even more, leaders and other volunteers need to be flexible and tolerant.  Medium churches can do things that won’t fly in the large church.  Until it is a large church (and everyone in the church thinks like large-church members), there will be differences of opinion of how things ought to be done.

If you want the medium church to become a large church, let people learn and grow into the structure.  If you want to be sure that your medium church will never become a large church, be rigid and intolerant, insisting that everything be done the way that the large churches do it.

Middling, but Not Mediocre, Part 2

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by Carol

Be careful when you describe something as “medium.”  The Big Thompson River in Colorado is sort of a medium river.  It flows steadily throughout the year, swollen with mountain runoff in the spring and showing its rocky foundations in the summer heat.  I remember the canyon as a tourist attraction, with its old-fashioned motels and comfortable little cabins along the banks.

But one Saturday evening in 1976, the river turned into the most deadly flood in Colorado history, killing 143 people and injuring 150 more.   (See http://content-static.coloradoan.com/news/thompson/)

We’ve said that volunteers in the medium church (101-350 attendance in worship) tend to be steady, tolerant, numerically challenged, good (or great), contented volunteers who make competent leaders.  Like the Big Thompson River, the medium church can be a peaceful destination for fishermen or unimaginable power (destructive or positive) ready to be unleashed.  What makes the difference?

Think about the relationship between volunteers and the church staff (the paid kind).  Two words come immediately to mind:  vision and equipping.

Vision
In Part 1, we mentioned that volunteers need to be challenged.  Volunteers can keep on doing whatever they’ve been doing, whether it’s good for the church or not.  The paid staff needs to have the time and theological training to explore what the congregation ought to be doing.  Then the pastor and staff need to communicate these things to the members.  It’s called vision casting, and it should happen in any size church.

Equipping
The other important thing that the pastor and staff need to do is to equip volunteers. This includes spiritual growth, training, and managing “stuff” for them.

In the medium-sized church, “stuff” is where it gets tricky.  As soon as you start adding staff members, the pastor and staff have the opportunity to communicate on a day to day basis and get things done while the volunteers are not around.  Some things that volunteers were doing (or not doing) are done by staff without the input or participation of volunteers.

Let’s give a simplistic example:

The pastor sees a certain staff member every day, so the pastor asks the staff member to check the supplies in the children’s area.  The staff member sees a large tub of broken crayons.  The staff member assumes that the volunteers are not making good use of their limited storage space, so she throws them away. The volunteers come in the next Sunday night to find that the crayons they had expected to melt down for an art project are gone.  Ouch.

“Stuff” can also be dates on the calendar, equipment in the rooms, decorations on the walls, and on and on.  In the small church, the pastor doesn’t have time to look at crayons.  In the large, staff-driven church, the staff manages the materials and a whole lot of other stuff.  Between the two extremes, though, the staff and volunteers have differing expectations.  Let’s just say that, without really good communication, volunteers can be blindsided and caught off-guard — with very unhappy results.  It’s just human.

The Big Thompson flood was caused by an unusual weather pattern over the canyon.  The flash flood caught up trees and boulders.  But it was much more deadly because the rising waters also picked up cars, propane tanks, cabins, and even entire bridges along the way as the water came down the narrow canyon.  Human stuff.

Bottom line:  Don’t let human “stuff” destroy the dedication of volunteers in the medium church.  Clear the debris and keep the channels of communication flowing freely.

Middling, but Not Mediocre, Part 1

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by Carol

Like the middle child, medium-sized churches often don’t get a lot of attention.  They don’t have the big, flashy programs of the mega church.  They don’t have the hand-to-mouth financial struggles of the small church.  They just go about their business on Sundays and throughout the week, doing their best to grow believers and share Christ in their communities.

So, what makes volunteers in the medium church (101-350 attendance in worship) different?

Steady
For one thing, these volunteers tend to be steady.  (Not all of them, of course, but more often than not.)  They know that people are counting on them, but they don’t have grandiose plans to wow the world.

Leaders
There are enough levels of leadership in a medium church for leaders to rise up and yet not be in over their heads.  It’s small enough that leadership flaws, when they exist, are not fatal.

Tolerant
Members in conflict, at least to a certain level, can co-exist under the same roof in the medium church.  On the Up side, people can simply avoid those with whom they disagree.  On the Down side, though, conflict may fester and remain unresolved.

Numerically Challenged
Where one or two volunteers could handle something in a small church, most projects or programs need more staffing (or funding) in a medium church.  It’s common for the medium church to take on more than its volunteer base can actually run.

Good / Great
Volunteers can be excellent, but they don’t have to be professionals — especially those with technical skills and in the area of worship arts.

Contented
In a medium church, volunteers can get locked into tradition.  Maybe it’s because the status quo is working, and there is no apparent reason to risk it.  But medium churches actually have more opportunities to experiment — they are neither a small rowboat that sinks easily nor an ocean liner that is difficult to turn.

In Part 2 on medium churches, we’ll look at the relationship between volunteers and staff (especially the pastor).  Volunteers in a medium church need challenges so that they don’t become mindless sheep.  The pastor and other staff members have a significant role to play in casting the vision and gathering resources for volunteers to fulfill their potential.  But that comes with a price that is often overlooked.

The Twilight Zone of Transition

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— by Carol

We’ve looked at volunteers in small churches.  Before we move on to medium-sized churches, let’s pause to look at volunteers in the transition zone.  More than any other transition, volunteers make the difference going from small to medium (or medium to small, but let’s not go there…).

For our purposes, the dividing line is an average attendance of 100 in worship each week.  Volunteers, though, can push this number higher or lower.  Experts point out that a small church is organized around family-type relationships, while a medium church is structured around programs.  Here, too, volunteers can change the picture.adult programs

Watch for some of these signals that tell you that numbers alone don’t tell the whole story:

  •  Volunteers who are strong leaders, helping to organize and direct other members.  They can lead programs — especially start-up programs.
  • Lack of strong leaders.  In some churches, the volunteers don’t get the leadership training or experience at work or in other community organizations.  The pastor has to be more involved in everything, which may lead to burnout or turnover.
  • Talented / skilled volunteers who pick up some of the roles (music, for example) that other churches hire part-time staff to fill.
  • Volunteers who “push back” against growth.  They prefer the close relationships of a small church, even though they may want the church to grow.

 

Try these keys to a successful transition from small to medium:

• Help volunteers to understand and buy in to the medium church structure (where relationships grow in small or medium-sized groups rather than across the entire congregation).

• Develop and use volunteers’ skills in positions that staff would otherwise fill.  (Caution: Don’t treat volunteers unfairly when you can and should be paying them for the time and skills they bring to the church.)

• Make training in Christian leadership skills an on-going, intentional process.

graphic of kids' church programs

It’s no wonder that experts can’t agree on the cut-off point between “small” and “medium” churches.  When you are counting noses, the noses of volunteers can make a world of difference.