# Encouraging Church Staff



## macsound (Aug 11, 2020)

So having conversations with fellow volunteers at a church I (used to) mix at.
Every couple of months there's a "required" zoom call where the musicians and tech team bs for an hour.

I sent an email to the music leader requesting that our meetings had a bit more of a agenda, some info about what's going on, upcoming thoughts to mix up the livestream, creative ideas, alternate formats etc.
My email to the music leader was met with a bunch of PR crap which is weird because the church isn't big enough to have a PR team.

In any case, has anyone who used to be a part of a place, church or otherwise, who is currently not working but the "events" are still happening online but you, as a person or a team of creatives haven't been connected with to see how you can contribute?


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## FMEng (Aug 11, 2020)

It seems like many people are struggling just to handle the work load and get the necessities done in the work from home environment. Asking for creativity and planning might be one straw too many. At work, I might get one phone call a week from my boss, so I just work independently. I work on what I see needs attention. If he wants something, he'd better tell me. When he forgets, it's on him. My boss is juggling his responsibilities along with conference calls and daddy duty for a 1 year old, when his wife has to focus on her work. His day is very fragmented.

I find the same thing with producing church videos. I usually have to reach out to the Pastors to find out whether they are coming in, recording themselves at home, or a combination. They just don't have the extra bandwidth to remember to let me know, but I know they need some slack. Happily, the musicians are reliable for the same time, same plan every week.


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## macsound (Aug 11, 2020)

Makes sense. I agree. I barely see my day job boss on our weekly team meeting, much less anything else during the week unless they need something specifically from me. 
I guess my frustration lies in the required meetings, but with no content, my willingness to create a brainstorm session and their pushback.


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## DrewE (Aug 11, 2020)

It may well be that the no agenda meeting is actually serving some very useful purposes in helping to keep the people connected to each other when they aren't seeing the others on a weekly (or more frequent) basis. If that's the case, then there is a pretty good argument that could be made that it oughtn't be mandatory. When and how and whether or not to make that argument probably calls for a certain degree of wisdom and prayer.

(To some extent, I also think this could be a bit of the clash between the "artistic temperament" and the "engineer temperament," for lack of better terms. "Artists", at least stereotypically, prefer less structure and more freedom to go off in various directions as the moment dictates; while "engineers" thrive rather with structure and process. Needless to say, there are excellent artists and technicians and engineers of all different sorts of temperaments, and many intermediate steps between the extremes. But I still think there's a tiny kernel of truth to the stereotypes, at least when taken on average.)


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## TimMc (Aug 12, 2020)

macsound said:


> Makes sense. I agree. I barely see my day job boss on our weekly team meeting, much less anything else during the week unless they need something specifically from me.
> I guess my frustration lies in the required meetings, but with no content, my willingness to create a brainstorm session and their pushback.



I too despise "meetings" that degenerate into BS sessions. Let's have an agenda, get through it, and then if we've got time left in the hour, do our socializing. If anyone needs to leave after that it's all good. Maybe break it down into sections: Pastoral, Artistic, Technical, Congregational. Are we meeting needs/expectations? What feedback are we getting from each? Do we need outreach to get better evals? What changes are forecast? Whatever you do make it the same every time and soon they'll be moving fast and not breaking things.

I'm recording secretary for my IATSE local. Since our executive board has been meeting via Zoom, with the president phoning in, our having a set meeting agenda and order of business is a big help to me and keeps meetings focused.


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## JAC (Aug 12, 2020)

These are, after all, volunteers. Often when you're working with a committee of volunteers, for at least some of them, this will be an important social outlet. Frustrating, but you'll be happier if you can recognize and accept it.


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## FMEng (Aug 12, 2020)

I was thinking more about this. The thing is people may prefer to stay in the rut when they can right now. I think many of us are in change overload. As long as what's happening at your church is working well enough, people might be glad to have one part of their life that is predictable. Church services are often based on ritual, because doing the familiar is comforting. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.


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## macsound (Aug 14, 2020)

Ok. Ridiculous ending to a frustrating set of emails.
The music leader ended up completely altering the format of the meeting to basically follow my requests. 
No more slackjawing, mostly worthwhile discussion about information that hadn't been communicated to us and a little blue skying about ways to improve viewership. 
And the commitment that they wouldn't do any illegal meetings that apparently other area churches are doing. 
Sigh


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## JimOC_1 (Aug 15, 2020)

Good for you.
Probably happened without a “thanks, good ideas” reply. I try to keep that in mind, the power of saying thank you, I’m not the best at it. I like the saying a successful event is one where the volunteers are willing to show up for the next one.
FMEng thanks for your comments, good things to keep in mind.
Best,


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