A few months agio, Kem Meyer, forward-thinking church communications guru and author of Less Clutter, Less Noise, picked yours truly’s personal blog among 26 others for a blog tour and book giveaway. We have decided to repost it here at Shrink for the benefit of humanity and church communication strategy. Enjoy.
Below is my question and Kem’s answer, if you are in a similar position as I am at your church, I hope you find it as helpful as I have.
Shrink : In the past, we have had NO communication strategy in place at my church. Part of my job is to create one and implement it. In your experience, what is the best way to successfully walk the ministry leaders and staff through this transition without becoming a dictator of communication?
Kem Meyer : If you recognize the benefits of a centralized communication strategy, you’re not going to go very far implementing it without getting others on board. I remember my early lobbying efforts. They fell short of the finish line. I started and stopped with “we need this!” I was missing the most important part; the “here’s why it’s a good thing and how it could work.” Delivering the first part without the second is like a hit and run.
I commonly get emails from people in the early stages of the process asking for advice how to get buy-in. They all sound like this: “We need to do this. But, it will only work with the support of senior management and buy-in from the rest of the staff.” And, that’s where they stop. They fall short the same place I did when I made my first few pitches.
Here’s some tips for being an effective advocate for the cause (which leads to buy-in from everyone):
- Give them something to champion. Go to your boss with proposed solutions; not just the problem. Let them ask questions, identify gaps and make suggestions for edits to your proposal before anything is presented to others.
- Tell a story. Can you share examples of real-life consequences that have resulted from a decentralized strategy (e.g., bad dates, bad directions, duplication of efforts, conflicting content, poor member care, etc.)? If you can’t communicate where the real pain is and how it affects a variety of audiences (internal and external), it will be hard to sell the need for relief.
- Ask about structure. Suggest starting with a centralized calendar and budget. Instead of independent calendars and budgets competing against each other, what better way to encourage the “we’re one team” mindset than with time and money? What does that look like?
- Talk about process. Try to draft a process that streamlines the flow of all information (e.g., database, print, platform, online, etc.), touching key stakeholders along the way. A simple outline is a good place to start. It doesn’t have to be complicated. You can use technology or paper; just map out the roads you picture the information traffic using to go from point A to B. Attempt to reduce and consolidate multiple entry points into one place. What does every department share in common? For us, it was EventU. Every ministry had to reserve facility and calendar space here. So, instead of adding another layer to the work people were already doing, we started using this as the place to capture all the information for every activity (e.g., date, place, promotions, technical support, etc.) and then it was routed to the appropriate stakeholders.
- Roll it out slow. Introduce one item of change and a timeline for the next couple of steps. Transitions will go smoother when everyone knows when and where the change is happening. Keep it simple. Allow room for questions. There’s a chance you may have missed something.
