220: Mistake #5: Planning First, Asking for Help Second | Church Volunteer Series

This episode in Stop Doing This to Volunteers: Top Mistakes Our Churches Are Making looks at how we unintentionally sideline volunteers before they even begin. 

We’ve been taught in leadership to make plans first and ask for help later. Turns out, that’s a great way to make people feel unnecessary, unimportant, and often unseen.

In this episode, we cover:

1. How early planning decisions limit participation
2. Why people disengage when they’re brought in too late
3. What shared ownership actually looks like in small churches

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Transcript

Laurie Graham  0:01 
Hey, welcome to the Small Church Ministry Podcast, where we help volunteers and ministry leaders experience less stress, more joy and greater impact as we share strategies that actually do work in smaller churches. I'm your host, Laurie Graham. Let's dive in.

Laurie Graham  0:23 
Hey, hey, welcome back to the Small Church Ministry Podcast. We are halfway through the series called Stop Doing This To Volunteers: Top Mistakes Our Churches Are Making, and we are talking about what to do instead. 

We have already talked about how we need to stop locking people into roles without asking if they still fit. We've talked about stopping making everything so easy for volunteers that it becomes kind of like a job that doesn't feel significant. We've talked about stopping forcing everyone into meetings like it's 1995 and now we're talking about planning. 

Mistake number five is planning first and asking for help second. This one is kind of sneaky, because it doesn't feel wrong, it actually feels efficient. It feels responsible. It feels like good leadership to plan first and then ask for help. But by the end of this episode, we're going to talk, we're going to see how the timing of the invitation, when we ask people to join us, changes everything and why ownership does not start at execution. It actually starts at the beginning. 

So let's talk about what we're actually doing when we are planning first and asking people to help later. So here's what it looks like. We sit down with two or three leaders, or maybe in our own living room at night with our computer out, or maybe with a small leadership team. And we make a plan, and we come up with a theme, and we set the timeline, and we decide the structure, and then we put it out to others and say, Hey, can you help? 

But what that really means is, can you come make our idea happen? Bodies are needed. Ideas, we've already got that, but we need help executing this thing that we poured our heart into, or we had conversations about without you help us make this happen. And then we wonder why sometimes the energy feels flat, or we can't find the volunteers that we need, or the volunteers who do come, they want to help, but they're not really that invested. And we also wonder why we are left carrying the weight, whether that's the mental load or the actual physical, you know, doing of everything. 

But here's the thing, there's a belief underneath this that's again, pointing toward our values, our deepest held beliefs. One of those beliefs is 'it's faster if I just do it'. One of those beliefs that I believe is totally wrong is, we're the committed ones. The other ones don't show up. Sometimes there's a little bit of truth in some of these things, but doing it faster doesn't build ownership, believing that other people don't want to help. It doesn't build a team, but it is a pretty quick way to burnout and exhaustion and subtly, a little bit of pride as well. 

When we plan first and invite second, people don't see themselves in the outcome of that. They see themselves as helpers. They might help execute it, but they're not part of the innovation, the creativity, that ownership piece. They might show up, but they might not be all lit up about it. Think of that idea that you had. When I get ideas, I get excited. My eyes light up because it's my idea, and if it happens really well, and it comes to fruition, right? And it plays out the way I hoped it would. I am all lit up. I don't get as excited about an idea that someone else had, because I wasn't part of that idea. 

Now I'm still really excited to help other people succeed, but I still feel like I'm helping them succeed. Do you see the difference? Now? Here's the kicker. Sometimes we say no one wants to step up. I hear that a lot, but we never really gave them a place to step into it. We're asking them to help our ideas happen. This isn't about bad motives. I don't believe it's probably most often even intentional, but it's about something called, I can't think of a better phrase. It's kind of a business term, I suppose, but it's about closed systems. Like there's a closed loop that nobody can get in. There's a closed system that isn't really welcoming other people in. 

We feel like we are because we're asking them to volunteer to sign up. But that initial part of putting it together, when that's a closed system, it typically exhausts the people that's inside the system. It can make us feel bitter because we did all this work, all this planning, nobody's helping. 

But do you see the difference of when we include people in the vision? It shifts so it is. It does often lead to loss of control of different ideas, of not it always being our idea that gets pushed through. But I want to tell you what it gives us. It gives us a room full of people who are lit up and excited. It gives us more partners. It gives us more commitment. It gives us more of that body of Christ. We're on the same team, working together. It's so beautiful. So what does planning look like if it's not a closed door activity, if it's not in your living room or with a leadership team? 

What would planning look like? I could tell you exactly what it looks like, because we teach this. If you've heard about our planning parties, if you've done them, I know you're already like, yes, this changed our church. It changes so many. I'll just say it breaks the closed systems out. It's like, it's like just throwing it to the wind and watching something completely different happen. 

What it looks like is a room full of Post-it notes. What it looks like is individuals who were never welcomed into planning process before getting invited in. It looks like people having time to think first without the loud voices taking over the room. It looks like every idea gets written down and valued and celebrated with nobody interrupting, nobody editing things out loud. It looks like laughter and movement and energy and fun, and that's why I love planning parties, not meetings parties. 

A celebration of ideas, a welcoming in of people who've never been even asked what they'd like to see happen unless it was on a survey. It looks like inviting people to be part of the process of where we are going as a church or as a ministry area or as a community, not where you want to go and us helping you move it there. 

Something really shifts deeply when everyone is invited to shape it, when every idea is honored before it's evaluated, when people see their own voices in the plan, what we have seen happen every time, and I really do believe this is true across the board, in every church that's shared their testimony of what's happened with a planning party, this is what we've seen every single time. One of the first things as voices we have never, ever heard, have entered into the room, have spoken, new volunteers emerging all the time. Sometimes it's one, sometimes it's a handful, sometimes it's a lot. 

Every time we've seen momentum build and energy just kind of skyrocketing, because ownership doesn't begin with a sign up sheet. It begins with a Post-It note. It begins with being invited into the planning. Now, if you're familiar with our planning parties, I'm not saying a full-blown planning party every time a decision needs to be made, please hear that. That's not what I'm saying. But what I'm saying is that is an amazing example. Possible a model, something that I believe can be done in multiple ways throughout the year, at different levels of energy and even like volume. Planning parties can be done with smaller groups, with big groups, with the whole group. But the mistake we're calling out this week

Laurie Graham  10:25 
is, it is a mistake to plan first and invite people to help after ownership, team building, it starts way before the sign up sheet. So before you not lock in your next plan, just ask who hasn't been invited into this yet. What other perspectives would it be great to include? Are we asking people for insight, for ideas, for the deep things that they're holding and thinking about, or are we just asking people for their labor? 

I really believe this is so key in turning around our churches from the 20% or the 5% doing the majority of the work or the effort. And I will throw in that seeing the impact and feeling significant to flipping this on its head so that we're watching that percentage shift to 50% and 60% and 70% and 80% and more of the people in our congregations being included, feeling significant, utilizing their gifts. 

Let's back it up. Back it way back from that sign up sheet. Let's shift from trying to get people to help us execute an idea to being co-creators in where we're going. Let's shift from these closed systems or closed group plannings. To having sessions of shared ideas and shaping direction. Let's shift from just trying to keep it efficient and getting it done to creating engagement. Let's shift from perfectionism and control and that hierarchy of a few people deciding the vision to broadening it out. It is, I'm just going to say it is so much more fun to watch other people get excited about their ideas being on the board. I know it's a little scary if you are used to controlling the schedule and the calendar, and what we teach with this concept of planning parties is not a free-for-all. 

There is order, there is structure, there are outcomes we are looking for. We're not talking about throwing structure or excellence or planning to the wind. We're just talking about inviting more people into it, because when you invite more people into the vision, into the planning, into the mission part before we ask them to help with it, when we invite more people in, it multiplies the impact, it multiplies the sharing. It multiplies the resources of people who are going to be part of it, because shared ownership, it reduces burnout. 

We talk so much about one of the biggest struggles in small churches, being burnt out, being you know, the core people, the core volunteers, the core leaders, holding so much, doing so much, serving so hard. This is one of those things that speaks directly into that shared ownership. It reduces burnout. 

So let's stop planning first and invite inviting people in later. Instead, what if we could stop feeling like we had to carry everything this small group? To carry so much responsibility. What if we could see volunteers initiating more instead of waiting to be asked? What if we could build ideas that more people cared about and saw a natural, organic ownership taking place, because this is what happens if we want more people to feel ownership and excitement and be part of the ministry impact that so many of us like love, that ownership starts way before the sign-up sheet. 

It starts at the very beginning. Let's start including more people in the vision, in the planning, in the mission, than just asking them to help execute our ideas later. This is a shift. How do we make this shift in our churches? Okay, we have, after every conference in the Small Church Network, when we do live events, many people come back later, the next day, the next week, they've tried to take this to their church. People aren't as open to it because they haven't been part of the experience. 

How do you make a shift in your church culture? Maybe you're excited about this idea, and you're like, okay, but other people are resisting it. Yeah, they're, of course, they're resisting it, because that's what we do as humans. We don't like change. We like doing things the same way we've always done it, even if the results stink, okay? Like there's something about sameness and comfort that we hang on to. I'm going to tell you how to start bringing this into your church. If you're excited about this thought, this concept so simple, share this podcast, but don't share it and say, Hey, this is what we need to do. Don't do that. Share it and say, Hey, I'm curious what you think about this. I would like to have a conversation about this. I'd like to talk about this. I'd like to know what you think about this. Now, whoever you share this with, they might not be as onboard as you might feel right. Now, sometimes we need some time. 

We need some experience. We need to say, hey, let's, let's see what this other church did. Let's, let's read what happened when they tried this, when they made these shift with volunteering, whether it's stop treating volunteers like volunteers, whether it's stop requiring meetings, new experiences, new ways, whether it's this particular episode, talking about not planning First, start the conversations. Bring them back around. Don't walk in as though you're the expert, because it's the same thing we're talking about here. Ownership starts at the beginning. Share the thought. Share the idea, start the conversation before we go in and say, Hey, this has to change. Share this podcast. Start the conversation and then come back and let us know what your experience is. 

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We are not about growing bigger churches. We are not about numbers. We're not about metrics. We are about showing up, being the best humans we can be, loving people well, and modeling ministry after what Jesus did. And if you've got 12, that's great. That's what Jesus had for most of his ministry. That's great. We don't need more people to do better ministry. We need to serve faithfully where we're at. 

So let's keep learning. Let's keep learning about us, about God, about humans, about behavior, about leadership, about being effective and not just efficient, about building relationships and not just programs. We love what you're doing. Your church is so blessed to have you, and I know that because you're listening to this podcast. Thanks for spending time with me today. Again, we are in the middle of the series on just doing better in our churches, with volunteers, with building teams, with being the church

Laurie Graham  20:23 
that God has called us to be. So today we talked about top mistake of being planning first asking people later, something that's been modeled and taught to us. You know, ad nauseam, really next week we're going bold. I'm calling out recruiting. I'm going to tell you why I believe we need to stop recruiting. 

Okay, yep, let that sit with you until next week. Invite somebody into the planning, somebody that hasn't been invited before, even into this conversation about why we would invite people into the planning. All right, do that and watch what happens next. All right, talk to you next week. Till then, be a light.