I CANT FIND IT! If you have ever been frustrated when looking for an old email, a file, or even a thing in your office then we have your back!
Youth may be chaotic, but your ministry doesn't have to be chaotic.
Honest talk. Have you ever considered how this lack of organization might be affecting not just yourself, but the people around you and the leadership you provide?
Booster is here to help! Seriously, it's one of our favorite topics. This episode and a few more to follow are all about the impactful role of organization in youth ministry and how it can enhance your leadership skills and give you more clarity and rest.
We're not just talking about tidying up your desk or sending emails on time. We're going a step further to talk about intentional neglect of certain tasks to focus on more important ones, and how a clean workspace can provide clarity, focus, and create a welcoming environment for others. You have to see the big picture! It's not just about planning the next event but connecting the dots in your ministry. It starts in taking a broader view, setting clearer expectations, and integrating new students really well into the community.
This episode is a reminder for how to structure your ministry for different seasons, and how to break down big projects into manageable chunks for better organization.
We want to help you grow your youth ministry! as we delve into the importance of organizational planning and goal setting. Zac and Chad discuss practical ways to increase your bandwidth for ministry work, like setting up templates and clear goals.
This episode is part one in a wealth of practical tips and insights for anyone involved in youth ministry. Let's get organized and make a difference!
I CANT FIND IT! If you have ever been frustrated when looking for an old email, a file, or even a thing in your office then we have your back!
Youth may be chaotic, but your ministry doesn't have to be chaotic.
Honest talk. Have you ever considered how this lack of organization might be affecting not just yourself, but the people around you and the leadership you provide?
Booster is here to help! Seriously, it's one of our favorite topics. This episode and a few more to follow are all about the impactful role of organization in youth ministry and how it can enhance your leadership skills and give you more clarity and rest.
We're not just talking about tidying up your desk or sending emails on time. We're going a step further to talk about intentional neglect of certain tasks to focus on more important ones, and how a clean workspace can provide clarity, focus, and create a welcoming environment for others. You have to see the big picture! It's not just about planning the next event but connecting the dots in your ministry. It starts in taking a broader view, setting clearer expectations, and integrating new students really well into the community.
This episode is a reminder for how to structure your ministry for different seasons, and how to break down big projects into manageable chunks for better organization.
We want to help you grow your youth ministry! as we delve into the importance of organizational planning and goal setting. Zac and Chad discuss practical ways to increase your bandwidth for ministry work, like setting up templates and clear goals.
This episode is part one in a wealth of practical tips and insights for anyone involved in youth ministry. Let's get organized and make a difference!
A SNAP.
Speaker 2:Hey, and we're back for another episode of the Youth Ministry Booster Podcast. Hang out in the garage. My name is Zach Workin' here, my best friend, I'm Chad Higgins. Hey, buddy, today I have something I wanted to talk to you about. I don't, I'm worried. I'm worried, I don't think you're organized Me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wow.
Speaker 2:I just want to level that right at you Before we get there?
Speaker 1:Before we get there, did you make my chair lower than your chair? Power, move, power move. Power move I that okay, you feel that about me.
Speaker 2:I don't think it's actually true, but it is the thing that we do want to talk about today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because I would say there are probably some things that I can obviously be more organized in. But as a whole, like I'm pretty organized. You take care of business, you take care of business, and I would say that that's a thing that I enjoy doing as well. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, but it's also the thing that we want to talk about today. I think a lot of folks get that leveled at them for a lot of reasons.
Speaker 1:So people hear that that's probably the like cutting comment that some youth pastors, like parents, would make a great senior pastor and make it's like you need to work on some organization.
Speaker 2:I think it's the backhanded like, compliment or slap of like man, he's so good with the kids but he's not organized, or like you know she's you know she's a great leader, she's not organized. Yeah, it's like this way of like trying to cut your legs without like. And usually the thing is and this is the thing that we want to get into Usually it's really one specific thing and it may not be across the board, but it's one perceivable, discernible thing, like either it's it shows up in a place like it's a messy office or a messy youth room, or it's you know it's last minute emails, or it's like backlogged receipts, like it's not usually all of it, but there's like one thing that they just kind of lump all those things into and I think a lot of it could be avoidable or at least, like you could navigate or like kind of outsource some of it. I think for so many folks, like it gets leveled at us when they don't know exactly how to say what they mean, but that's what they're going to talk about.
Speaker 1:Okay, so what are what? When, when guys or girls hear that, what do you think are some of the things that people would be pointing at?
Speaker 2:I think. I think one the number one I think is there's some place where they've seen you at work or your workspace is messy. Usually it's the office, especially we hear this a lot into summer like post camp, like not everything's put back away in August. After July it maybe got put away in like September, october, like things were maybe stacked up, but they're stacked up pretty high in the office, like whether it's boxes or it's the t-shirts, it's the, it's the leftover pool noodles and like it's the half eaten like jug of Cheeto puffs or whatever. And so I think there's just some of those like there's like a remnant, or it's like the youth room, or it's like that closet in the youth room there's always that one closet that's like hey or whatever. And so it like it's not affecting ministry but maybe it's affecting the perception of like keeping your stuff organized together, or it's some kind of internal mechanism of last one to submit stuff to the email newsletter, or it's like last person to turn in this month receipts or whatever.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think that's a thing too and I even see a lot of people joke about like the turning in the receipts and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:You know I'll get to it eventually, Right.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think that that's one of those like black eyes that youth pastors get, it's like, even when like joking about it. That I think is important to realize, like you're getting made fun of, like in our professions getting made fun of when it is something Kind of becomes a joke.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You're a joke man and I think that I think that we need to realize that and own that in a little bit of going Like we want to fight against that perception. But even like, beyond perception, I think that, being organized and you may not, there may be people that are listening, that are like man. That has just never been me Sure.
Speaker 2:But it's been somebody that was enough to become the thing. That was half true.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think that there's ways that organization where you may not be the like, you know all your pencils are lined up in the same direction but you can still function in a way that doesn't create a distraction or a hurdle for other people to like deal with. Yeah, I think a lot of times people that aren't organized think about organization as only benefit or affecting themself, and I think it's actually the opposite that when organization becomes a problem is when it goes beyond just affecting ourselves and start affecting the other people around us that the organization affects the organization Correct.
Speaker 1:And it's like your lack of planning has caused like a lack of attendance, because people don't know about it soon enough or the event doesn't fire really well because you created stress on somebody else because we wanted it's in the email newsletter Thursday and you didn't get it until Thursday morning, and so now it's going to be Thursday afternoon, well, so here's one thing that I don't hear talked about enough that I think is really true the lack of good organization actually causes a lack of good leadership, because it, when you're not organized, you can't delegate or hand off things and you're you're creating no space for other people to engage, and so, like even for adult leaders that would be.
Speaker 1:Maybe they're not super excited about being a student ministry, but they're like oh, I would help, yeah, but if you're not organized, you have no place to really put them or reason why you would put them anywhere. Right, and so there's no place for them to lead, and you're like frantically running around trying to do everything because it's last minute and that's why you feel overwhelmed, and because of that, your next thing's not organized and it's cluttered and all those kind of things, because you're constantly playing catch up.
Speaker 2:Well. So the best example I can give of just a simple way to flip the script on it is when you send out your lesson material for your small group leaders, I was the guy for a number of years that would always send it closer to the weekend to get ready, because I'm like they're not going to look at it until Friday or Saturday anyway. I'll just send it Thursday after the Wednesday and maybe that's okay. But I wonder at how many levels I denied them the opportunity to look at it earlier because they never got it earlier. You're sending it on a Monday instead of a Thursday and then sending a reminder on Thursday might have might have broke open some bandwidth for somebody else.
Speaker 1:Well, what you did is you created an atmosphere that met the needs of your lowest common denominator, and so you actually built a structure that lower the expectation. Lower the expectation which anybody that's like a high caliber that would come in, that would actually need that or want that have it. And so now it's like, wow, that's going to bring stress to my life, and so I just don't want to serve.
Speaker 2:Or it's less fun to serve.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because it's always like, well, I have to look at it this weekend, I guess, yeah, yeah. So we want to talk a little bit, though, so we're going to spend a few weeks of the podcast talking about organization. And so, chad, you shared some things with us, and I think it's a new fall year, so whether the title of you're not organized or you are organized hits you or doesn't hit you, I think we've got a couple episodes that we wanted to share that would help line out maybe some ways in which this fall could be a fresh start for a lot of our folks that are looking for a fresh start that way, so this is not on our list, so we're not starting very organized, okay.
Speaker 2:We had a list, and so we're going to start with this. We do have a list.
Speaker 1:It's item zero on the list, but it's something that I just thought about in my head. New business, but I know is very true for myself in all of these is to get on top of any of this stuff that we're about to talk about. It really does start with a better us. Okay, and we've talked about this in many episodes before like always, an indicator for you of where I'm at is how messy is my truck.
Speaker 2:Oh, 100%. We're about to go to lunch today and I'm going to know, after everything that you've shared today about organization, if the proof is in the pudding when I hop in the cab of your truck and I look at the floor board. So are we? What do we? Got a little. We need to go make a little pit stop before we go.
Speaker 1:My God, you come ready today.
Speaker 2:I'm excited for you All right, starting off right, okay, cheers to you, my friend.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, no man. But I think that for us and it goes back to what I would just said like when we're stressed out, we often are just trying to play catch up, and so what I would identify for anybody that's trying to implement these kind of things is don't immediately jump in the work that's in front of you, jump in the work that's on yourself.
Speaker 2:Okay, and before you fix everybody, this is the oxygen mask, right, like pull down, put on you.
Speaker 1:Before you put it on those that are leading, yeah, Well and know this to get ahead in these areas, there's going to have to be a season where you neglect things. Okay, and that's hard for some of them Intentional neglect, intentional neglect. There are things that we have to understand are less important for us to do in the now, to get in a place to do them well in the future, and that's just the reality. Like you can't, there's no pause button on ministry right Now. Some of us get the great benefit that your church has been able like hey, we're going to pause.
Speaker 2:We're going to take some mid weeks off or whatever.
Speaker 1:For the summer, the beginning of the year.
Speaker 2:Sunday's always coming.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:There's always another Sunday. It's funny how that works out.
Speaker 1:And so there's some things that we can't put pause on, but there are things that it's like, okay, we don't have to try to take ground right now, because we realize that, man, we are in an organization and build phase that has to happen for us to get in a place to really knock it out of the park. It is that like sharpening the axe mentality, yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, something that's sharpening the axe doesn't actually mean the thing you're about to cut in somebody else. It may be the edits you make in your own life. Big time yeah.
Speaker 1:And I would say that, be aware that when we're doing this process, try to eat better, exercise, wake up, sleep, all those kinds of things, because it really will help you in a lot of these. Yes, let it guide you. Thanks, go clean out your truck yeah, there is.
Speaker 2:So in all the staffs I've served on, the best mentors have always checked in, not just with the workload of like hey, because ministry is often very relational, very mental, emotional, spiritual but had several mentors that always made sure to ask like what are some of the like physical tasks you've done? Like there's something that grounds you about cleaning out your truck or getting your desk right We'll talk about, I think, in a future episode just your office itself. It's not about getting those things right. Like there's something about a clean workspace or a clean vehicle I know that sounds like dad wisdom, but there really is.
Speaker 2:Before you're like Papa working, thank you but like truly nothing about when you hop in a car that's put together and clean and you sit on a desk. That's not like the stacks of commentaries are about to fall on top of your laptop, that your mind is clean and focused and ready. And I think focus is ultimately what we're working for. An organization is not just because it is good, but it's good for you. I think that's one of the things that there is a payoff for you, both selfishly and as a leader, for both the capacity and the clarity that you can provide.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Well, and I think that it goes into it's teaching this bigger like narrative and lesson of people walking in your space, specifically, when we're talking about, like the church areas and things like that, right, Like if we have students, which we all do, that are dealing with like stress and anxiety and those kinds of things, we have to start realizing that our environment plays into those kinds of things and so when they're coming to engage with God and the space that they identify with that is cluttered and messy and grows like those have subconscious, like messages to them, and so I think that we've got to take care of of those kinds of spaces and and making them beautiful, and I think that that's that's really useful in multiple different ways, and not just this like gross engaging this, but this like opportunity to teach and create a space that's in and welcoming.
Speaker 1:Okay, so first thing that I would say, first thing first. First thing first the the idea of becoming more organized is I want us to back up and take that like 60,000 foot view and realize that we've got to get out of the mindset of day to day and week to week and we have to start looking at the bigger picture. And I would say this, and what I've known at, working at everything from a student ministry of you know, 40 to 400, like the bigger that scale gets, the bigger your view has to get Must get like, like, truly like, and I think that probably is even tied to the growth you desire.
Speaker 2:Correct Is the ability to take a longer, broader view. I think we're so I mean we've talked about this before like if your goal is just to do better this Wednesday than last Wednesday, then you are on a roller coaster that has no end in sight. You have to see the whole track for what we're trying to get to.
Speaker 1:Well, and I even think that this goes beyond organization, but maybe it doesn't Like organization and people speaking. It's why, when you're, when you're functioning week to week, so many of these guys are teaching like ineffective, like messages, because they're trying to pack in everything and they feel like they've got to communicate everything about the story that they're communicating and talking about in the passage that they're like chasing rabbits every once in a you know every little different, like doctrinal rabbit, because they feel like, well, we've got to teach all the kids everything, because you're just thinking about the week and week instead of this bigger picture.
Speaker 2:If I would say it now, they'll never hear it, right, yeah?
Speaker 1:To realize that, okay, you're teaching, your series are not a one off right, but it's a bigger view of where are we going. You have these kids for seven years and we're trying to get to an end goal there. That's good, that's good, okay.
Speaker 2:So what are some of the places you for folks that maybe feel a little bit buried up? We just got done with a busy season and we're like man, I'm just trying to get ready for this Sunday. What are some of the intentional neglects that you would give them permission to have this week, next week to peel back a little bit, to kind of start to gather that view, because that's that's not an automatic function for a lot of people. I guess that's a thing you have to. I think, practice, maybe even discipline and carve out not 15 minutes but a few hours for like that. I think this is like a. I need the better part of a Thursday or a Monday to really do what you're talking about. This is not like I'll get it done before staff meeting next week. Like this is a hey guys, turn my phone off for a Thursday afternoon because I'm carving out some some big picture time some porch time to use another friend's metaphor.
Speaker 1:So I think that some of our like ongoing, like um meeting, you know, meeting with people going to events, that kind of stuff probably gets a little bit neglected during this time. It's like okay, we, we can't make all of those.
Speaker 2:We're going to reschedule some coffees.
Speaker 1:We're going to reschedule some coffees, those kind of things, because we've we've got to begin to like work on those kinds of things, this is your appointment with yourself to develop you as a leader.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so the where I would start. And one of the reasons why I wanted to do this series right now is because, for a lot of churches, they'll have a new calendar season beginning of every year or the fall, um, and so right now, if your budget year starts at the beginning of the year, I think right now is a great time to begin to plan for 2024. Yeah, um, and to begin to think through, like, okay, what is my schedule? So the first thing that I would do is I would sit down with a calendar, um, and I would start to lay out all of my big events, starting with our biggest attended events. Okay, so look back at this year?
Speaker 2:What were the events or the weeks that were high, high density, so whether that's camp, or Easter or yeah, so winter weekend I would probably start with camp for myself.
Speaker 1:Um, depending on the flexibility there, some places are like it's always going to be the same week and so this is easy.
Speaker 2:You may be locked in. It's always the third week in June. It's congratulations, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so here's a case in point in that right. You already know that. Yeah, why is that secret information?
Speaker 2:Right, put it out there. Yeah, put it out there.
Speaker 1:Um, if you can give families, it may not be all of the things that you're going to do, but the heavy hitters for the summer the most important things, that you want them at if you can identify, if you could say these are the three events that I want every one of our students at, then those are events that need to be given to them. It may not be the full blown promotion of them, right.
Speaker 2:On the website, sit in the newsletter like. Tag it at the bottom, Like it's just always there. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Hey, parents, we already know the date for camp. Yeah, just letting you know that can be one email.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's super simple, and the thing is, we get it. Most of our families aren't going to think about it until a few months out. Right, they're not really going to start planning, but you have a few of those families. Yeah, Again raising the expectation bar not the lowest common denominator.
Speaker 2:We're going to try to increase or raise in the tide, raise in the water.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we can start identifying. We put them in place. The next thing I would start to do once those big events are in place is I want to start thinking about okay, how did what are these chain?
Speaker 2:Okay All right, we do so. You're dropping anchor on these big events, but what's the chain that ties them together?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I may think through all right, I've got camp in July. Okay, great time to go to camp. It's a great time, it's hot, we're going to go to.
Speaker 2:Can we have a time where we just have October camp?
Speaker 1:Yeah, fall break yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, two days at a last Dude, I'm here's the deal.
Speaker 1:Help me with this petition. I don't know who we need to sign it. I want, quote unquote, summer break to happen in the spring, oh OK, why are we not getting? Why are kids not out when it's nice, when the best time of right, right, right, we have a C. Yes, we're not farming anymore.
Speaker 2:But Chad, but the children. You know why are the best weather months. Are we putting kids indoors?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Why do we not have spring off?
Speaker 2:Yeah, like let's just work all through December and then all through summer and then just take off October, november and March, april. There you go, four months off. Yes, fantastic. Instead of a 12 week summer, let's have a two ten week spring and fall. We just figured out, we just figured out the education.
Speaker 1:So, solved it. See, that's what organization does for you, ok, so what I'm going to do, it'll never pass. I'm going to, I'm going to take, I'm going to take something like summer camp, ok. Ok, I'm going to know. I'm going to know my goals, ok, and I'm going to know the biggest reason why we have those.
Speaker 2:OK, we don't. That's an important piece. It's not just. It's not just this is the biggest date on the calendar, there's also the biggest why. Yes the goal is not just the win, but the why.
Speaker 1:And the biggest reason for that when you get out of thinking about the week to week, you start looking at discipleship and teaching at a broader sense and opportunities to enter your ministry in different ways. I I know that over. I know that without a doubt, one of the biggest entries to my ministries over the year was summer camp of meeting new kids five days cooking together like literally we can cook and meals and cook it in the heat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we can build a relationship really well over that time. It's also an easy entry for kids to invite their friends. Yeah, and so the number of brand new students that would show up for an entire week. Ok, so what do I? What I want to have happen out of a big event? Right, I want to be able to plug those kids into community, because I know that that is a sticky end to them getting connected to a ministry and all those kind of things.
Speaker 1:So I want to immediately begin to think, if I have new students walking in and summer camp, what is happening in August? Ok, yeah, then I want to do a big small group push in August. Yeah, I may put a mini kind of event of a big sign up that's going to happen here, and so I start pinning it. Boom, that Sunday we're going to launch new groups, right, right, we're going to do some group connection event.
Speaker 2:We we actually the last few years at the church here in Tulsa for our high school students that had midweek home groups that were elective because they were more like geography based than they were necessarily grade based. Like if you were in high school we would have our home groups that would meet in various parts of Tulsa. So for anybody in a larger kind of sprawling city it's helpful. Sometimes folks come in from all over. It was at camp. They would decide which home group they would be in with all of their buddies, right. So we're having seniors, juniors, sophomores, freshmen sign up for the group they want at camp. So it becomes this like the energy is already there. So when the groups launch at the end of August it was in July that they were like oh yeah, we're all going to be a Tammy's house, it's going to be awesome.
Speaker 1:Yep, and so you begin to start thinking about that. Maybe that's this midway point between disciple now or whatever you're doing next, right? Whatever that next big event that we want to do. So we want to make little chain links between each of them, and that may not be events, it may be teaching series. Yeah, right, and so out of okay, we've got new students at camp.
Speaker 1:We're trying to get them connected by August 23rd or whatever, and to a small group, and so we're working as a team. Okay, who are all of our kids? Who are kids that haven't been coming to group, that came to camp? All right, we want to make intentional phone calls. We're going to plan out sending letters, those kind of things. We're going to get hyped. We know that we've got to start recruiting leaders.
Speaker 1:So we've got another thread that we're doing during that time period and so we're thinking through. We're thinking through things in seasons yeah, All right. So this is a recruiting season for us. It's a connection season.
Speaker 2:Community building Yep.
Speaker 1:Okay, now we're, we're out of that. Where are we? Where are we going? We've got them in small groups. Now we want to start talking about, like personal discipleship. Right, how are we growing? You're connected, but how are you?
Speaker 2:growing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so we may, we may, you may, go all right. So, september, what we want to do is we want to have a five week series over spiritual disciplines right. How to pray, how to read your Bible.
Speaker 1:Boom, boom, boom and we start to put those up. We know, right that we don't want to just talk about it, but we want to actually put resources in their hands. We're going to talk about scripture reading on week one, which means, hey, I've got it, we've got to start thinking of reading, plan, journal, those kinds of things. Hey, wouldn't it be cool if, the Wednesday that we talk about journaling, the kids could pick up journals on their way out, right? And so we're going to make.
Speaker 2:We'll provide the journal. Yeah, and so you not rocket science, but just forethought, yeah.
Speaker 1:So here's the deal. What, what I want you to see in this 60,000 foot view. You are understanding the why you're trying to connect them, but you're not getting in the weeds yet. Okay, you don't have to write that talk yet. Yeah, you don't have to figure that game yet.
Speaker 2:Just top level this month. Spiritual disciplines, prayer reading scripture asking for help done and let it cook, let it be there.
Speaker 1:What's my one and you can get. Maybe at this point you're starting to get into. Are there things that I'm going to have to buy? Yeah, are there things that I have to get extra leaders? Is there a cool?
Speaker 2:feature thing Like what is the thing that helps to enrich the thing? You don't have to have the journals yet, but you have to know that we're going to buy the journals. Man, maybe if even thinking about it early enough now, we could maybe customize them.
Speaker 1:Yep, Kind of make them make them their own kind of thing, yeah, yeah. And so all of that kind of stuff is leveling up and we'll get to some more organizational tips. That's going to help you in the future. Because here's what I want you to understand. If this is brand new to you, this is going to 100% feel overwhelming. You're going to have to feel like you are recreating the will, the great thing that we'll talk about later, or maybe we even get into it now. No, I'm going to drop it now. Let's do it now. The thing that I want you to understand is this Stop making one-offs and start making templates, okay, and all of these kind of things. There are the rhythms to student ministry that happen every single year.
Speaker 2:We've talked about this a lot in some different conference sessions. One of the things that's been heavy on my heart is that we're using all the wrong imagery. I need youth ministers to be more comfortable with the seasons of ministry than just some of the business growth metrics. At some level, ministry is far more like gardening than it is business growth models, because students come and students go. The thing that students always do is get older and we've got to stop acting surprised that a big class graduated and then a smaller class came in. That's the waves, that's the tides, that's the seasons of it, and getting comfortable with knowing that our ministries in a younger stage right now. So we're going to adjust for it. You can't force the growth. You cultivate it and nurture it, and so don't be surprised when, every May, when you graduate seniors, it happens every year and whether it's two, 20 or 200, that happens every year. So stop being surprised by the things you knew were going to happen and anticipate and plan and cultivate.
Speaker 1:Well, and here would be the thing that I would add If you're doing one-offs on things that are going to be the same, you are doing so much work every year that is the exact same. Let's take graduation Sunday yeah, it's going to happen every May, and you're going to write an email to all of those parents right, asking for the same thing that you do every year. We need six photos.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:A senior picture and five others of your daughter or son. Please send them to youthpastoratfirstchurchorg.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there are people that are writing that that same Fresh, every year, every same year, and the reality is because they're just writing it in the email and they're hitting send and now you've got 9,000 other emails that you can't find it in Instead of writing it in a Word document Save it in the Google folder.
Speaker 1:Yeah, putting it, and we may go into this in another episode, but there's part of that organization structure that can happen on your laptop that's really, really useful of creating folders. That is graduation Sunday and then you have all of your elements in there.
Speaker 2:Well, templates yeah.
Speaker 1:And then every year you can update it Boom, boom 2023. All that kind of stuff. That's exactly where all those photos are going to go. All that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:You should be getting Every year, and one of the things that we argue for a lot is longevity. One of the benefits of longevity is this should be getting easier, Like if I can take it aside and just say like if you've been somewhere for four, five, seven years and you don't have more bandwidth now than when you first started, my friend, you need these next two weeks to clear the clutter and lay out the big plan. Like if you are still feeling like sideswiped and blindsided by the things that you can control and delegate, then you've got to put the things in place for your own health, for your own clarity, for your own focus. Yep.
Speaker 1:So the big thing, once we've come up with this big plan of big events remember you're not trying to do everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you don't have to the camp theme yet, just the dates, just the dates, location.
Speaker 1:That's it. And that's another big thing too, even thinking through, like how we title and label things. Yeah Right, so a big change for us. We used to do our own summer camp.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, and obviously you have like a theme for that camp and all that kind of stuff. If you're trying to roll out theme a year in advance, that becomes really hard, that's difficult. But if you brand your summer camp just this camp, then it's just camp or it's big camp or whatever you want to call it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, then you can have the. You can still do themes, right, but the emphasis is camp and the date and not just the wow of like guys. It's going to be this like get it to the folks Like they know what camp is. The theme can come later, that's right. That's right.
Speaker 1:The other thing, too, is, as you build out your plan, the other calendar that you need to have along with that is your communication plan. Okay, specifically, the bigger the thing is, the more, the more lead time you're going to give people. Yeah, and it may not necessarily be big in attendance, it may be big in cost, okay. So, yeah, you may take a ton of students to summer camp, but two weeks later you know that you have the mission trip and that's pretty expensive. That actually costs two grand, right.
Speaker 2:Right Now for everybody. But if you want, if you want everybody at camp and you want a lot of kids at mission trip, you aren't asking for $300 or $400 for camp. You're asking for $3,000 because you wanted them at mission trip and camp. And if you don't tell them early enough, if they're having to make choices, right that's, that's hard on them, not you giving up time that they can plan and do and, again, a lot of folks do. But I think, again, thinking about the menu of things that you're offering, really matters Well.
Speaker 1:So one of the things that we did in that because we knew that those were high ticket items is we broke it up in a seven year cycle for us. Okay, that we wanted. We wanted by the time that every kid we brought kids in in sixth grade. So our goal was by the time kids hit seventh grade, we wanted them to do a local service project. Okay, by the time they got out of middle school, we wanted them to do a state trip where we would go somewhere new, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sometimes those went out of our state, but it was a regional.
Speaker 1:Yeah, by the time they hit 10th grade, we wanted them to take a national trip Okay, and by the time that they graduated, we want them to go on an international trip. And so we, internally, those were benchmarks for us that we were able to look at okay, of our eighth graders, how many of them have actually served on one of these trips to Oklahoma City or Dallas? Right, and we were able to break it down there. We were able to have metrics of how we were doing in that. But you're In doing that. When you communicate that to your folks as well, the expectation, then you can actually, even though they don't know where they're going yet in high school, families can start planning even when their kids in eighth grade hey, we want our kid to go on an international mission trip over the next four years and we can begin to financially plan for that.
Speaker 2:And so they hear the expectation, they know that every year our high school is going to be other opportunities, and this is what's coming down the pipe, and so they may not get to go year one or year two, but for some families we need to be aware that for some families these are big ask and we shouldn't pretend like they're not.
Speaker 1:For some families to save up $2,500.
Speaker 2:Isn't their kid for 10 days somewhere.
Speaker 1:That's a big ask and so we want to respect that. We want them to know. They may not know the exact date, but every year in July we do this and the year before we're going to lay out here's the exact plan and trip and all those kind of things and allows them to start to get planned. And if you can get two years out on those big hey in 2025, we're going to Israel, or whatever, then you can start to build excitement for those kind of things.
Speaker 2:Again, you may not have the itinerary but you know, in July of 25, we're going to go here. It's going to be an approximate cost of, especially, again, longevity. If you're fostering relationships with certain missions, organizations or people that you're working with, you know that you could have those in cycles, like hey, we have an African mission trip every three years, we're working with this family. They're wonderful, and that's just something that our church is doing in a rhythm of every three years and we would love your high school student to pick one of those and come with us.
Speaker 2:Okay, so in review. So this is part one of organization, the big plan establishing the goals of when and of why, and templating as much as we can, when we can, to move forward, to create more bandwidth so that we can do some of the other relational ministerial work of the week to week. Take the time this week and next to clear the space, to clear your desk, to get a big, broad view of what this next year will bring. So any closing wisdom before we shut it down today Make sure to come back.
Speaker 2:All right, we'll come back for part two next week.