What would happen if you decided you were actually going to hit all your deadlines? What if no one had to wonder if you were actually going to deliver when you said you were going to?In the Creative Dept, deadline mistrust is about the worst thing we can do. It really should be this way for every department.

When a video bumper doesn’t get produced check out what happens…

Video deadline gets missed…the bad news is delivered from the Video Editor to the Communications Director (in our org chart)…the Communications Director passes the news on to the Creative Pastor…the Creative Pastor sits through a meeting with the Executive Pastor or Lead Pastor and has to explain why the deadline wasn’t met…the missed deadline creates a sense of mistrust between parties…now things that shouldn’t be questioned are being questioned (what else is getting missed?)…the emotional energy it takes to not think about what else is missed doesn’t get used for more productive efforts…we’re not as productive or efficient as a church…we don’t create the optimal opportunity to hear about Jesus because we’re wasting time and energy…we’re not being good stewards for what God has given us…

Think this is a little dramatic? That might be the problem.

Of course, it doesn’t always play out like this, but the daisy chain is real whether you think so or not. Missing a deadline has the potential to send ripples so much further out than we realize.

Do the little things and communicate all along the way. It can only help.

Larry Hubatka, Creative Pastor

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One of the things I’ve learned from my short tenure at Elevation Church as the Guest Services Director is that volunteers want to know what part they play in the big picture. Volunteers are most willing to do whatever is needed of them, as long as they know the role they play in the big picture.

So what part are you talking about, you may ask?

Let’s start here… When John and Kim are invited to Elevation Church for the first time with their two infants, they drive into our parking lot to a team of friendly and happy parking guys. Once they have parked, they come toward the building and they are welcomed by a group of Greeters and our First Time Guest team. They truly feel welcomed, and somewhat surprised at how easy it has been so far. They had imagined church to be a place where they would feel like outsiders.

John and Kim are then escorted to the E-Kidz check-in to drop their children off. They are instantly at ease because the E-kidz volunteer tells them what their children will be doing while they are in the service.

Next, they are seated by a knowledgeable Usher that happily answers their questions as they are seated. The worship team then comes up to lead John and Kim into worship. John and Kim feel so relaxed because they were able to find a good parking spot, their kids are safely being taken care of, and they hearts have been softened by worship.

It’s then that Pastor Furtick is able to walk on stage and have John and Kim’s full attention—because they had a distraction-free, smooth experience coming in.

It’s this… we communicate to our volunteers. We communicate the vision of the church (to see those that are far from God be filled with life in Christ) and the importance of the first 15 minutes after a guest arrives at church. It is during those first fifteen minutes that a first time guest has decided whether or not they will like Elevation. Our volunteers understand that each step towards the auditorium is a part of that deciding factor.

I could liken it to a baseball game, except in our game there are a lot of extra bases before making it to home plate. The volunteers understand that the part they play in getting the guests around the bases really makes a difference in whether or not those guests will have the opportunity to make it to home plate. If our volunteers have succeeded, by the time Pastor comes out to share the Word, the guests’ hearts have not been distracted by chaos and confusion coming in, but rather pleasant experiences that have softened their hearts and have allowed their ears to remain open to hear what God is speaking through Pastor.

My encouragement to you is this: communicate to your volunteers the role that they play. Share with them stories of people that have come through your church and have been positively affected by your volunteer staff. Remind them of the vision they have committed to be a part of.

If we do this, our volunteers will feel more valued as well as feel a sense of purpose in their roles.

Candice Lanning, Guest Services Director

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I read a book about 5 months ago that has really been helping me out recently. The book’s title is “Made to Stick” by Chip Heath and Dan Heath. The basic premise of the book is that it is our responsibility to make the ideas we want to communicate sticky.

Here’s an example of a sticky idea that Chip and Dan point out:

The candy-tampering Halloween criminals, that every parent fears, who slide razor blades into apples and poison candy bars…Yeah, they don’t really exist. Well, maybe they exist now, but the whole thing started because of an inaccurate and unfounded rumor surrounding a kid that overdosed on his uncle’s heroine stash around Halloween in the 60’s.

The reason the rumor didn’t get squashed and eliminated is because, frankly, it’s sticky. There are elements of the story that we all want to believe and it sticks to us.

I’m being challenged right now, because somehow I’ve got to figure out how to make the things I need to communicate stick like the candy-tamperers. In other words, it is our responsibility to make sure that the message we are trying to communicate sticks.

So if I’m trying to encourage my small group leaders with a milestone we have just crossed in our small group numbers I have two options:

1) I can give it to them straight:

o We have 1,000 people in groups.

2) Or, I can make it sticky:

o We have 1,000 people in groups. Last year at this time we only had 1,000 people in our whole church.

o At 1,000 people in groups, we now have 10 times the number of people in groups as we had last year at this time.

o If each person enrolled in an Elevation small group were to walk a mile the collective distance covered would span from Raleigh, NC to Tulsa, Oklahoma…1,000 people goes a long way to accomplishing our vision of initiating and sustaining life change through community.

You get the idea – that is, if I made it sticky enough…

John Bishop, Chief Ministries Officer

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