In today’s episode, Beth Golik reflects on a recent church event and shares some strategies that will help take your event planning from stressful to successful.
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This is Beth Golik and I’ve got something on my mind. I just wrapped up a relatively large event at my church that involved lots of logistics…big and little. I know that event planning can be stressful. On today’s episode of Key Ministry: The Podcast, I want to equip you with some strategies to help you plan and implement your next ministry event.
Let’s be clear about something: disability inclusion ministry is a mindset, not a program.
That being said, however, there are times when we do need to plan programs or events. These can be regularly occurring events or even one-off types of activities.
As you and your church plan for ministry events and programs, there are a few things to keep in mind.
The first thing to consider is ensuring that churchwide events are disability-friendly or disability-inclusive. What exactly do I mean by this? Well, I mean that thought has been taken about creating an environment or an experience that is welcoming to individuals and families with physical disabilities, hidden disabilities, and mental health conditions. We’ll cover this in-depth in a future podcast, but for the time being, let’s just say that church leadership needs to include people at the table that can speak about this when ministries are planning events and programs.
Another area of consideration has to do with marketing your ministry, your program, or your event. This is actually one of my favorite topics to discuss, so we’ll tackle it in depth in an upcoming episode of Key Ministry: The Podcast. For now, be aware that marketing includes sharing the vision with your fellow staff members, the congregation, and the community. I’d love to help you come up with a marketing plan for your next disability ministry event. There’s a link in the show notes for you to set up a free consultation if you’d like to take me up on that offer.
The third area of consideration has to do with the plan or the logistics of the event itself.
In today’s episode, I’d like to share some strategies that will help you lay out that plan, save you time, and might just make your event run a little smoother. At the very least, I hope thinking through these planning strategies now will alleviate some stress as your event approaches.
This checklist of considerations could help you take your event from stressful to successful.
First of all, this is not rocket science. If you are the type of person that makes comprehensive to-do lists and thinks through every nitty gritty detail of an event, then you probably enjoy learning about and talking about this type of thing, so welcome to the podcast. If event planning, calendarizing, and mapping out logistics isn’t your thing, well then hopefully today you’ll learn a few strategies to help you successfully navigate the process and I welcome you to the podcast, too!
Let’s assume you’re replicating an existing, ongoing event (such as a Respite Event) or you’ve already received leadership approval for a new event and have a clear vision for the mission and outcome. In otherwords, you know who you want to invite and what the event is basically going to look like. You’ve already ensured that your event is designed to be disability friendly. You’ve come up with your marketing plan.
So what’s next?
You’ll want to develop a list of what needs to be done and a timeline for which to do the tasks. Ministry leaders, here’s where you can put a little extra time up front to make the crunch time of your event a less stressful experience. Let me share some potential items for your checklist.
First, let’s talk facilities. Depending on the size of your church or your church staff, you may have systems in place for reserving event space, requesting room set-up or requisitioning supplies. And maybe you don’t. But if you do, I suggest using those systems consistently so that you and others are not surprised when your event rolls around and the room is double-booked, or the venue hasn’t been turned over from the prior event.
In addition to reserving rooms or event space, here are a few other potential facility-related items for you to consider:
Request room set up such as tables, chairs, podiums, whiteboards, etc.. If there isn’t a system in place to make those requests, or your church doesn’t have a facilities team, make sure you have the volunteers in place to make it happen.
Will there be additional custodial needs prior to, during, or after your event?
What are your Audio Visual needs and how do you request assistance?
If your event isn’t at a normal church gathering time, will the necessary doors be unlocked? Will the HVAC system be on when you need it?
If you are serving food, have you procured the basic supplies needed (such as paper plates, napkins, plasticware, tablecloths, water, trash cans and recycling bins?
For some churches holding very large events, will you need to hire a police officer? Do you need to have a parking team or block off sections of the parking lot? Will you need additional temporary signage?
The facilities director at my church has a saying that everything is figureoutable. I’m certain, though, he’d prefer to work with ministry leaders to figure out things before the event…and not on the fly during the event itself!
Running through the checklist ahead of time can eliminate a lot of unnecessary stress the day of your event.
When selecting a date for your event, take into account what other events might be taking place in the same area on the same day. This is important both from a facilities perspective and a volunteer recruitment perspective. You don’t want to overtax your congregation or staff.
Most events or programs need volunteers. We’ll definitely tackle recruiting volunteers on an upcoming podcast when we address marketing your ministry. In the meantime, make a list of what needs to be communicated to your volunteers, how early, and how often.
Does your event require registration forms? If so, and if appropriate in your context, consider adding a photo and video waiver to your volunteer or guest registration forms. This will save you time and headaches down the road when you realize you have some incredible photos from your event to share but need to track down permission to use them.
No detail or task is too small to add to your event’s to-do list. It’s those little details – such as requesting a microphone or procuring the snacks – that are a real pain to try to take care of at the last minute if you forgot to plan ahead.
Once you have your comprehensive to-do list, let’s calendarize it. For you, it might look like putting pen to an actual, paper calendar. It might be a calendar or planning template like the ones available as Word documents. It might be a project planning app or website such as Asana. Whatever works for you, use it. Place each item in the timeline on the days or weeks or maybe even months leading up to the event. If this is a recurring event, you’ll be able to easily replicate your to-do list each time and update it with new dates. Remember, this checklist includes all the facilities-related items, volunteer and guest communication, and pretty much anything that has to happen in order for your event to be successful.
Let me give you an example. I run the Respite Events at my church. They happen on a quarterly basis. I use Asana to manage the tasks related to these events. I know which tasks need to be done months before each event (such as submitting communication requests and reserving rooms). I know the tasks that need to be done three weeks ahead (such as creating registration forms and promoting the event). Two weeks out Asana prompts me to do tasks such as managing the registration process and confirming my medical team. The week of Respite, my to-do list includes all the little tasks that have to happen, from sending out reminder emails to printing out name tags with assignments to assembling the ball pit. By replicating the project in Asana each quarter, I’m ensuring that all the tasks, big and small, are included in my to-do list so that they are not missed. I’m a visual person, so I can view this list in calendar form or a checklist style list. If you are a project planning geek you can appreciate what I’m talking about.
I hope these organizational tools and event logistics suggestions have given you some things to consider as you plan your next ministry event…and hopefully, this decreases the stress that event planning can bring. I’m looking forward to future episodes of Key Ministry: The Podcast when I can share more with you about marketing your events and about creating disability inclusive events. In the meantime, please take a minute to subscribe to this podcast so you don’t miss out and give it a 5-star rating and review to help other ministry leaders know it’s the right podcast for them. On behalf of my cohosts, Dr. Lamar Hardwick, Sandra Peoples, Catherine Boyle, and Dr. Steve Grcevich, thank you for listing to Key Ministry: The Podcast.
