Childrens Ministry Online

Volunteer Week – Welcoming New Volunteers

Posted on19. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

One day I called to check on a volunteer. He’d agreed to volunteer, but according to the ministry director, he’d never showed up. Our call went something like this:

Me: “Hi. Can I speak to Mr. Jones?”

Him: “No Mr. Jones lives here. Only a Mr. Johnson lives here.”

Me: “I’m sorry. Is this <insert phone number here>?”

Him: “Yep.”

Me: “Well, perhaps I have the wrong name. Do you attend <insert church name here>?”

Him: “Yep.”

Me: “Hmm…have you volunteered in our kid’s ministry?”

Him: “Yep. I signed up a couple months ago and worked every week for about a month. But no one ever spoke to me, and I wasn’t really sure what I was supposed to be doing, so I stopped working about 2 weeks ago.”

WHAT???!!!!!

We actually had a volunteer sign up and show up for duty for a whole month AND NO ONE EVER SPOKE TO HIM?! AND WE HAD HIS WRONG NAME ON FILE?! Are you kidding me?!

Needless to say that particular ministry director did not last long. (No. It wasn’t Kenny.)

So ladies and gentlemen, let me ask you: “What is your volunteers’ experience?”

Remember how our mamas used to tell us to mind our manners? (At least mine did, but I grew up in Alabama and that’s what mamas teach there.)

Manners go a LONG way to transforming a ministry. Here are a few ways manners and simple kindness could make the difference for your ministry:

HOW DO YOU WELCOME VOLUNTEERS?

Unless you’re lucky enough to recruit a children’s ministry veteran, there is a really good chance your new volunteers are…well…NEW!

You remember how you felt your first day of high school at a new school? Or your first day on the job in your first real adult grown up job? Or how you felt the first time you went to dinner to meet your girlfriend’s parents? AWKWARD!

That is how your new volunteer feels. They feel new and awkward.

Have a heart! Help them out!

Here are a few simple ways to do this:

1. Call them before their first day of service. Introduce yourself. Ask them some questions. Find out their interests. Try to match them up with jobs that fit their interests. Find out who they already know. Try to pair them up with people they know.

2. I’m probably stating the obvious here – for safety reasons, have a process for new volunteers. Include applications, background checks and reference calls. Make sure these people are safe to be with your kids.

3. Take away the fear factor. Children’s ministry doesn’t have to feel like a fraternity hazing process! Have an orientation training. In today’s world, this could be a video and a bulleted list you email to them. Have some frequently asked questions and answers. Let them know what to expect, when to show up, what to wear, etc.

4. On their first day of volunteering, have someone show them around, or if you have the time, personally do it. Introduce them to other volunteers in their classroom.

5. Follow up on them. Call to see how their first day went. Check in a month later to see how it’s going.

First impressions are vital to your ministry’s success. What first impression does your ministry give new volunteers? A simple “Hello and how do you do?” friendly welcome to new volunteers may go a long way towards retaining your volunteers for the long term.

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Volunteer Week – Cold Calling New Recruits

Posted on18. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

Cold calls.

Do those two words make the blood run cold in your veins?

Don’t be scared! After all, you wrangle large classrooms of energetic children week after week. If you can do that, you can take on the challenge of a few cold calls.

I found in my volunteer recruiting experience that a friendly phone call to parents worked wonders for my volunteer rosters. Here are a few things to consider:

WHO TO CALL?

How does your church record children’s ministry attendance? If you’re lucky enough to work at a church with a robust database, chances are you have pretty good records of what families are regularly attending.

Each quarter, I would run reports of all my kids who’d attended regularly over the past quarter. (You need to define for your church what “regularly” means.)

I’d remove any families from the list if I knew the parents were already volunteering in some capacity in the church. Hopefully you can do this in an automated manner if your church keeps records of these things.

The remaining parents were my call list and over the course of a couple weeks, I would have a calling campaign. It was a numbers game. The more people I called, the more I would recruit, because a few would say no and a few would not be home and a few would have bad phone numbers. The rest would say “yes”!

PREPPING THE FAMILY FOR THE PHONE CALL

A few days before I would have a cold call campaign, I would email the parents I planned to call. I’d share vision of upcoming things in children’s minsitry and some of the key volunteer roles I hoped to fill. I’d give parents a friendly heads-up that I would be calling. They could begin to consider if they’d like to help in children’s ministry.

A few people would actually just reply to the email, and I would have new volunteers without the phone call.

PREPPING MYSELF FOR THE PHONE CALL

Before making a phone call to the family, I’d review their record in the database. How recently had they attended? Were they members of the church? Did they have a baby younger than six months? All of these things factored into whether I called them.

How many kids did they have? What ages? What events did their kids attend? This information familiarized me with the family before the call.

THE ACTUAL CALL

My calls would go something like this:

Me: “Hi! I’m Sara Conley calling from the kids ministry at our church. How’s it going?”

Them: “Pretty good.”

Me: “Well listen, I’m calling you today, because we are expanding our volunteer team in the kid’s ministry and I wanted to personally invite you to be a part of it. Would you be interested in that?”

Are you ready for a shocker? Often, with the friendly personal invitation I just described, the family would say yes to me. In this scenario, I’d go on to arrange applications, background checks, training, and scheduling in the phone call.

Here are a few common reasons why they might say no:

1. TOO BUSY

Them:  “You know, we really can’t make a commitment like that right now. We are too busy.”

Me: “Oh yes, I understand. Listen, sometimes we need parents to fill in as subs. It’s not a regular commitment. It’s more of a last minute call if one of our regular workers cancels. Would you be interested in helping in that way?”

Again, another shocker. A great majority of people who couldn’t commit were willing to help as subs. And as I treated them right as subs – friendly, not calling every weekend, but respecting their time and calling occasionally – oftentimes, as their schedule lightened, they would join the regular schedule.

2. NOT A GOOD TIME DUE TO PERSONAL CIRCUMSTANCES

Sometimes, families would not agree to help because they were in difficult personal times. I’m not really sure why, but complete strangers would pour their hearts out to me in these cold calls. I think they felt they could trust me since I was calling from church. And truly, I was willing to listen as empathetically as I could.

Listen with your heart in these cold calls. Even if these families are saying no to volunteering, they may be opening their lives to you. This may be your window into what is going on in the homes of kids in your ministries. Pray for these parents on the phone. Follow up on them. Find help for them.

If you genuinely care for these parents, they will remember. As they find light and hope in their lives again, they may seek you out and become a loyal member of your team. I’ve seen it happen.

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Volunteer Week – Examine Your Volunteer Culture

Posted on17. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

What kind of culture does your ministry have? Did you create that culture on purpose? Did you get there by accident? Did you get there by poor decisions?

The Bible talks often of the church being a body. Have you ever considered the human body? The pieces and parts work together. One is not more important than another. All have purpose and meaning. Is this how your ministry functions? If not, how do you turn the tide?

Examine your culture. Here are a few questions to consider:

Does your ministry have a stated purpose? Do volunteers know where the ministry is going? If you stop and ask any volunteer, do they know what the common goal is?

Does your ministry have a clear structure? Do volunteers know where to go to ask questions? Are leaders adequately trained to behave with wisdom and discernment? Do leaders have your back when you are and are not present?

Do volunteers have clearly defined roles? Do they know what is expected of them? Simple things like written job descriptions can create healthy boundaries.

Is your ministry friendly? Do new volunteers immediately feel welcomed? Or do they have to fight to prove themselves before they are accepted? Do you create opportunities for volunteers to interact outside of serving?

Are volunteers held accountable for their actions? Do you check in with volunteers who no-show or show up late? Or do you “let it slide”? Are volunteers equipped to trade with each other if they’ll be out?

Does your ministry challenge the spiritual growth of volunteers? Do you provide opportunities for them to sharpen one another?

So many questions. I’d like to hear your thoughts and answers. A healthy ministry culture will attract and retain volunteers. What’s worked for you?

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Volunteer Week – Attitude Check

Posted on16. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

In the summer of 1998, I’d been dating Kenny for nearly a year. He convinced me to work at a kid’s day camp with him in Germantown, Maryland all summer. We had a little drill there that has served me well as a life lesson.

When we’d see our kids’ energy dragging, the camp director would yell: “ATTITUDE CHECK!”

The kids would snap to and shout back, “PRAISE THE LORD!”

Cheesy?

Yes.

But it worked! Immediately the energy of the camp was once again buoyant and happy.

Sometimes, I think we in children’s ministry need an attitude check, particularly regarding our volunteers. Misery likes company.  Here are a few common sob stories I hear children’s ministers griping about:

1. “I can’t get enough volunteers.”

2. “I can’t keep the volunteers I get.”

3. “I don’t understand why my volunteers aren’t as invested as I am.”

4. “Why do my volunteers cancel last minute? Or no-show?”

Okay friends, it’s time a for a little “ATTITUDE CHECK!”

I’m going to say something you may not like. Your volunteers play a little game called “Follow the Leader”. They will go where you lead them. If you think they suck, maybe it’s because you suck at leading them.

Ouch.

Here’s the good news. Attitudes can improve. Leaders can be trained. Ways can be changed.

Check back this week. We’ll examine some simple changes that can transform the volunteer culture in your ministry.

PRAISE THE LORD!

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Guest Blogger: Sara Conley – Volunteer Week

Posted on16. Feb, 2009 by Kenny.

Last week my wife wrote a couple of posts. If you missed them, you can catch them here and here.

I know I’m biased, but I felt she had some really good things to say. She’s actually worked on my staff as well as another campus’ staff as a volunteer director. She rocks. When she was a nursery director, only two times did she ever have someone no-show. Two times people, that’s unheard of. She developed an incredible report with her teams and she always knew who would be there, who wouldn’t and who’d be filling in.

So, I invited her to guest blog all this week. It’s Volunteer Week and she’s going to hit several issues regarding volunteerism. Here are a few examples:

• Your ministry attitude toward volunteerism
• Your ministry’s volunteer culture (didn’t know you had one… you need to read this one)
• Cold Call recruiting (sometimes you have to do it)
• Volunteer training

So, I’ll be blogging some this week as well, but if you only have time to read one post a day from this site… be sure to read Sara’s! You’ll be glad you did.

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Volunteer Expo (Extras)

Posted on12. Feb, 2009 by Kenny.

Okay, Sara talked about several great things here. So, I’ve attached images of all the files we used. Feel free to use them to get some ideas:

Here is the poster we hung in all the bathrooms:

Banners over each of the three areas:

Actual logo of “I’m In”

Live Production Trifold:

Kids Quest Trifold:

Hospitality Trifold:

Sign up cards (we had these at the booths as well as in the programs):

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Volunteer Expo (Part Two)

Posted on11. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

Here is “part two” of the blog post from yesterday.

5. BE ORGANIZED.
Think through the details of your event and plan accordingly.

We recruited for three ministries at our recent expo. Each ministry was assigned a color. Banners, balloons and booth paperwork in these colors quickly visually distinguished the ministries from each other.

Each booth was equipped with sign up cards, trifolds listing job descriptions for volunteer positions, pens and clipboards. The children’s ministry booth also had applications and background checks available for every recruit to fill out on the spot.

6. PLAN FOLLOW UP.
As a recruiter, I hate to see people fall through the cracks. By Sunday night following the Expo all the data entry of our prospective volunteers was complete. The staff could start follow up first thing Monday morning.

I personally find that this method for follow up is very effective:
1. A follow up phone call within a couple days following the Expo to confirm the volunteer’s interest and scheduling preferences.
2. A formal or on-the-job training within a few weeks of the Expo to equip the new volunteer.
3. A personal welcome the first day of service. Introduce your new volunteer to their coworkers. Help them get settled that first day.
4. Occasional phone calls to check in on the new volunteer over the first few months of service. Give them a venue to ask questions, express concerns and know their input is valued.

7. PRAY.
Sound pretty basic? Perhaps it is. Invite God to show off. He loves your kids more than you do. He knows who he’s calling to ministry. He knows what adults are crying out to him for connection with others. Pray that he will speak to the hearts of your future volunteers through your Expo efforts.

SUMMARY
Okay friends. Those are my ideas. Some of you are old pros at this recruiting thing and others of you bring young new fresh energy and creativity to the table. Please, share your ideas and experiences in the comments. We’ll learn from each other.

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Volunteer Expo (Details)

Posted on10. Feb, 2009 by Kenny.

Okay, I thought I’d elaborate on something Sara mentioned, but it provided to be a huge success. At the very end of the service, the staff member who oversees live production was doing announcements. She made the announcements and then ended with a big push for live production. She went on to talk about the power you have as a light and sound operator… plus who doesn’t like to where the cool headsets. Then the staff member who oversees hospitality came out telling everyone that if they really want to be where it’s at, they’ll want to serve in hospitality. He “randomly” selects someone from the audience and asks them what they want most on a Sunday. She obviously reads from a script revealing that she’s a fake and as she talks about wanting connection, people run in bringing her coffee and a muffin. She finishes reading her script with difficulty with a muffin in her mouth. Finally I came walking out on stage with the cutest baby I could find. The crowd does the gasp and “awwwww” thing. Then I went on to say that people really want to change the world, to leave a legacy and how we serve 18,000 kids every weekend in kids quest. One of the other staff members asks who the child is and I reply quickly “it’s not important, it’s a valued member of our ministry.” The other staff member jabs with… “come on, is that your own kid?” At this point we start arguing and the lead teacher walks out and stops us and goes on to say how all the areas are great and people can plug in anywhere. Then he looks at me and says while shaking his head, “Wow Kenny, I can’t believe you played the kid card.”

It was a riot and the audience reacted very well. We had many people coming up to the booths still laughing.

So, be sure to do something where you have fun and engage the audience.

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Volunteer Expo (Part One)

Posted on10. Feb, 2009 by Sara.

Hi Friends!

My sweet hubby Kenny invited me to chat with you about a subject I love dearly – volunteer recruiting.
My, oh my. Children’s ministry is a hungry beast when it comes to volunteer recruiting huh? Ever feel like you’re nonstop asking for volunteers? I’ve been there.

Today, we’ll specifically chat about Volunteer Expos.

Recently at Gateway Community Church I was hired as a contract employee to plan a volunteer expo. Our goal was 150 total new volunteers for three ministries in the church. Guess how many people signed up? 350! Can you believe it?! We had more sign up than we hoped for! Wow!

This was not my first Expo. I’ll share with you a few things I’ve learned.
Here are my tips to a successful volunteer expo:

1. COORDINATE WITH “BIG CHURCH”.
Sometimes in children’s ministry we become little islands. THIS IS NOT HEALTHY PEOPLE! We are the body of Christ. Your arm would do you no good if it was not attached to your body.
Don’t willy-nilly plan an expo. Talk to your pastor or the creative team who plans sermons. Plan your expo around a sermon or series of sermons about volunteering and serving. Let the pastor pump vision into people through his words from the stage.
Incorporate the expo message into the sermon for the day. Plan a fun skit to share your ministry’s heart. Design a slide to use in the announcements. Film a creative video. Make people laugh. Tug at their heartstrings. Photos of wide-eyed kids are great for this.

2. MAKE IT FUN!

I like expos that feel like parties. I’ve been to my share of dull navy-blue-colored-pipe-and-drape business expos. YAWN! That’s no fun!

Give your Expo a theme. Use bold colors! Design fun graphics! Play music. Blow up balloons. Give away food and candy.

Details, details, details! Don’t forget to incorporate details that represent you, your ministry, your church or your community.

We’re proud of our live music in Austin, Texas. You bet we invited live bands to play in the courtyard by our expo booths. The energy the music added was immediate and it reflected our culture as a church and as a city.

3. PUT TOGETHER A TEAM.
What are your strengths? Put together an Expo planning team with members who are strong in your weaknesses. Here are a few roles I like to have on every event team I put together:
• The project planner. This is my favorite role. This is the person who can give legs to dreams. They can map out goals and milestones and deadlines with the same ease it takes most people to eat or breathe. They can communicate and check in with people to make sure the event will happen on time.
• The decorator. We all know someone like this. Their house looks like a magazine. They are cute and polished. Invite this person on your team. Let them own making the theme come to life in booth décor.
• The administrator. This person likes details. Let them handle the printing of sign up cards, the data entry of people who sign up, etc.
• The party planner. This person can throw a party! They bring fun to every situation. Let them own the giveaways and food and music. Let them work with the decorator to make the Expo full of life.
• The communicator. Let this person own the marketing pieces for the Expo. (As a personal note let me plead with you all: PLEASE! NO CLIP ART OR RIDICULOUS FONTS! If you do not personally know how to make your printed materials look like a million bucks, invite a graphic designer to join your team! )

4. CREATE MOMENTUM. DON’T LET PEOPLE GET AWAY.
We experimented with our recent Expo at Gateway. We tried our best to post our message at every turn and get people talking. How’d we do this?
• Days before the expo we started sharing volunteer stories on our church website blogs.
• The night before our first expo weekend, we invited our Facebook Gateway Church group to the expo.
• We printed cheap posters announcing our Expo at www.sircooper.com and hung them in every bathroom stall on the church campus.
• We printed cheap stickers in house with our Expo theme “I’m In”. The weekends of the Expo, every volunteer on campus was given a sticker to wear. Every person who signed up at the booths was also given a sticker to wear. If the “I Voted” stickers create momentum on Election Day, I was sure stickers could work for us.
• We ran our expo for two weekends, since our attendees are not regular every week.
• We printed our sign up cards and stuffed one in every program. Families don’t have time to visit the Expo booths? Not a problem. They could sign up and drop their cards in the offering bucket.
• We positioned our Expo booths in the courtyard, the heart of our campus. All traffic on campus flows through this area. The booths were impossible to miss.

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Volunteers: When you don’t have enough (Part 2)

Posted on29. Oct, 2008 by Kenny.

I was hoping to get a little more feedback from my previous post about how you fill the gaps. If you didn’t read it or didn’t have a chance to post, I’d still like to hear some more ideas. You can post your comments with this post or the original one.

So, if you’re recruiting or you need to recruit to fill some holes, what do you do in the mean time?

Last year at the Orange Conference I heard Craig Jutila talk about this. He said, whatever you do, don’t fill the spot yourself. You’ll get stuck and if you’re the leader, how can you lead when you’re stuck in a spot that should be filled by someone you’re leading. It’s a very good point and I do the very best I can to plan for that. I’ve found that in the few times that’ I’ve gotten sucked into a spot, it was because of a no show or unexpected emergency. Otherwise, I try to follow this advise fully.

I combine if necessary. I launched small groups on Sunday mornings in elementary in September. I started with a few open spots that need to be filled. I have two groups that I had to combine. 4th and 5th grade girls during one service and 4th and 5th grade boys at the other.  They were combined for about 7 weeks. Another group I utilized one volunteer who could only serve every other week. He’s leading on his schedule and I have another leader who is pulling a double shift and serving on the weeks the other leader can’t be there. Not ideal, but it’s holding those spots until I find the right person.

Utilizing subs. If found that subs are better than once a month workers. Once a month workers seem to never remember when they are supposed to work. So, when I’m calling and recruiting and someone says no, they can’t do the job, I ask them if they’d at least be willing to serve. In mos cases, they say yes. I assure them that they won’t be called to work more than once a month. Then, when I have my subs, I call them when I know I’ll be short and they jump right in. I also have a few spots that I’ve used subs to fill. Unfortunately, when I use my subs to fill an empty spot, I don’t have my sub when a volunteer calls in sick the morning of. Then I have to combine or something. Not ideal, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

Work the phones and emails. I always take care of my open spots before Sunday. I’ve had staff who would pull people on Sunday. I told them to stop it. Why? It was usually the same people every week. If we have a healthy sub list then I can work that list and get my people in place before Sunday. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t know that I could sleep if I didn’t have all the spots filled before I went to bed on Saturday night.

Trained monkeys. Always my last resort, but I haven’t had to use them yet!

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