Elevation Church is a multi-site church. Prior to launching our second campus, we went on a tour visiting three pioneers in the multi-site movement. Seacoast, Northpoint, and Lifechurch.tv were the obvious choices for us to gain some insight and wisdom into harnessing technology to reach more people in the Charlotte area.
Here are a few of the highlights from our trips:

1.      Don’t overcomplicate it- Don’t restructure the church when you start a second campus. It’s much simpler than that. Treat the second campus like a service across town. Sure you have to staff it appropriate for its size but the true confusion and restructuring doesn’t have to come until the third and fourth campuses.

2.      Go where the density is- It sounds simple but it’s not always the first factor in locating a second campus site. Unless God is calling you to a particular area, if you plan on seeing growth, you better go where the population density is high.

3.      Cannibalize the original campus- Starting a second campus is often due to a lack of seats at the original campus. By having a core group move to launch the new site (cannibalizing the original campus) you open seats at optimal service times there along with added potential to reach people at the new site.

4.      Is it reproducible?- This is a question that you must ask about everything done at the original campus (programming, creative elements, etc.). Of course this also assumes that you are truly trying to create an identical experience at both campuses.

These are just a few takeaways we had from some of the sharpest multi-site minds in the country. They are simple but have really shaped our multi-site approach.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor
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What exactly should a church staff be reading together? First of all, if your staff is not going through books together then you are missing out on one of the key principles for leadership and team development. But what are the best and most effective books a staff can read?

There are corporate books, leadership books, marketing books, personal growth books, church growth books and there are several books in a collection called the Bible that are pretty good. We’ve learned there’s no set order of books to read to grow or transition a church but it must be driven by the leadership.

Whatever is on the Pastor’s heart and the things God is revealing to the leader is the best place to start. You should also factor in the church’s stage of growth, the current challenges you’re facing, and what is holding you back.

Here are a few scenarios that drove us to reading the following books at Elevation:

Let’s start a church
Purpose Driven Church, Warren (we focused on chapters 1-14)
7 Practices of Effective Ministry, Stanley
Simply Strategic Growth, Stevens and Morgan

Let’s create a buzz
The Purple Cow, Godin

We need to have a unified team
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Lencioni (or anything else by that guy)

Let’s go multi-site
The Mutli-Site Revolution, Surratt
The E-Myth Revisited, Gerber

Personal development of staff
Fresh Wind Fresh Fire, Cymbala
Integrity, Cloud
In a Pit with a Lion, Batterson

We need to develop leaders
Leadership Pipeline, Charan
The Next Generation Leader, Stanley

Take it to the next level
Good to Great, Collins
Blue Ocean Strategy, Kim

This is a snapshot of the books that we have gone through as a staff in the short history of Elevation Church. We’ve also created a leadership development plan for new employees to read some of these books to catch up with the books that have shaped the culture of Elevation Church.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor

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Have you ever been on a treadmill when the speed is set a little faster
than you are used to? Now think about increasing the speed and adding a
little incline. You start out at a jog, move to a run and are looking ahead
at a dead sprint. That’s what Elevation Church feels like many weeks. God
is doing so many amazing things and it feels like we are moving at the speed
of light most weeks.

Because of the pace at which things happen as well as the size with which
they happen, we have had to be extremely deliberate with our assimilation
systems. When I say systems, I’m referencing the steps that a First Time
Guest (FTG) takes to become to a vital part of the church. The system is
the thing a person does to become a part of the church

Part 2 of this 3 part blog will describe the major principles of
assimilation that were implemented in our first 8 months as a church.
During this time we had grown to average 700 people in attendance with a
volunteer force of approximately 210 people and 40 FTG’s each Sunday. Here
are several of the practical things that were essential during this time

1) Reverse engineer - Start with the end in mind, what does a “member”
of your church do? You’ll notice I did not write “know”, “believe”, or
“profess”. We chose “do” because that’s the tangible things you can
actually measure. For Elevation, it started with 3G’s (Groups, Giving and
Gifts). You can’t measure someone’s prayer life, but you can measure
volunteering.
2) Steps - Now that you have the end in mind, what you want them to do,
what are the steps a FTG takes to become involved? For us, we directed
people to a once a month newcomers lunch. It was 45 minutes long and began
with 20 minutes of vision casting, 10 minutes talking about our 3G’s and the
remainder of the time to sign up on the spot for a small group or as a
volunteer. It was the primary means for people to become part of the
church.

3) One step at a time- In the early days (350 people or less) my goal
was to know every person walking in the building and if I didn’t know them
there were probably a FTG. I was outside functioning as a greeter welcoming
everyone as they came in. My goal with every contact was to move each
person one step forward in the assimilation process. The contact may only
be 15-20 seconds, but I maximized the time. This part of the process is
extremely organic and relies upon you being bold and knowing who you are
talking with. If you are the assimilation pastor or connections pastor, you
need to feel personally responsible for moving people along even when a
person doesn’t know they need to be moved along. Here are snippets of
conversations that helped move people along in the assimilation process:

a. “It looks like you guys are enjoying Elevation, have you guys
considered jumping on board?”

b. “You seem to be enjoying your experience; do you have any questions
about the church?”

c. “I think you’d be a great greeter. Here’s Gary, he’s one of our
greeter leaders, he will help you start volunteering in that area.”

4) Follow-up - In our worship experiences we drive all FTG’s to complete
a communication card. It’s a perforated card in the worship guide they fill
out giving us their contact information. Monday morning I began the process
of following-up. Everyone received a FTG letter from Pastor Furtick as well
as a phone call from me. Since I was greeting, I was able to meet most of
the FTG’s as they walked in, so when I got the communication cards to make
the phone calls it was my second contact with that family. I pushed to have
a face-to-face with the FTG’s if possible. There were many weeks with 10+
such interaction all of which were vital to rapidly bringing people into the
system.

5) Opportunity, not need - We have never, nor will we ever, tell people
we need them to volunteer. We always talk about opportunity. Even when we
were small and had profound volunteer needs, we always operated like we
didn’t need anyone. Are you guilting people into volunteering because of a
need, or are you motivating people to action with an opportunity to become
part of the life transformation process?

The key to keep in mind is, what do you want people to do and have you made
how to accomplish the goal easy and obvious? Every step in the process
should reinforce the goal and it should be simple to explain to everyone
involved.

If you haven’t flushed out these components, that’s where you need to begin.
If you need, gain a fresh perspective from someone outside your organization
to seek another opinion about your processes. The more streamlined and
simple the process, the more people you are inviting to join you in
ministry.

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One thing that God has allowed Elevation Church to do is grow. Structuring for growth has been a key principle in our growth. One of the big questions I’m getting more and more of lately is “what changes does our church need to make to transition from 500 people to 1000 in attendance�.

It’s a question that can have many answers depending on multiple variables at individual churches. Things like what’s the vision of the church, who are you reaching, how many seats do you have, marketing strategies, demographics, etc. All can be factors holding a church back but every church faces different issues.

There is one thing, however, that I see consistently across the board. Churches typically grow as much as their structure will allow. This makes sense to contractors and engineers but there is no building code when it comes to building church staffs. A lot of churches aren’t able to grow because of self limiting structure.

Fortunately, there is a new wave a church leaders in America who have revolutionized the church and structures it more like a Fortune 500 company than a country club. Guys who take the great commission seriously and seek to structure for growth while impacting cities and reaching people for Christ.

They have paved the way for church planting of today. Structuring for growth is commonly heard at conferences, in leadership books, and has become church planting 101. But what does that look like?

Structuring for growth is often uncomfortable and awkward. At Elevation we’ve always looked like the guy in a tux pumping gas at the station on his way to the prom. We’ve often looked bigger than we were, out of place, and “overdressed�. But eventually the guy in the tux gets to the prom and he doesn’t look awkward anymore.

One simple exercise that we got from E-myth Revisited was drawing an organizational chart. We did the org chart based on where we were going and not where we were at the time. The first one we did was the structure we felt would accommodate 2000 attendees when we had around 700. If your church is at point A and you want to get to point C, then structure for it and begin to function like you’re there. It will make the transition much easier.

The other advantage to a completed org chart based on positions needed and not individuals is that you can come back and fill in who is doing what roles. Now you’ve got a chart that will scare you. How many areas are you over? Is the Lead Pastor in charge of marketing and guest services? How can a church grow to 1000 if the Pastor is still doing all of the follow up and not spending much needed time seeking God?

An org chart with 24 roles and only 10 names divided up doing them all is not a problem but a goal. This is structure that can facilitate growth. What better way to explain a key position for someone than to show them the need based on the organizational structure? They see the need and immediately understand the chain of authority.

Finally, don’t let a lack of money for hiring keep you from structuring for growth. Have well defined roles with distinct lines of authority detailed in an org chart. Then present opportunities to high level people in volunteer roles. Structuring for growth in church planting will always be awkward, always involve volunteers, and never be the most comfortable way of doing things.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor

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