8 The Delegation Dance: Building Your Ministry Partners

The Delegation Dance

Building Your Ministry Partners

How can you expect to get consistent results from an inconsistent process?

80% of your problems are not people problems, they are system problems. . . . Your ministry is perfectly designed to get the results it’s getting.

So you work for the church. Full-time. I’ve always wondered: What do you do all day?”

I’ve sometimes had a difficult time answering that question. If you’re a full-time children’s director, you probably know what I mean.

“Well, let’s see,” I typically answer. “I edit curriculum, make shopping lists, get supplies, recruit volunteers, and send out lessons.” After thinking for a little while (and usually long after the questioner is gone), I think, “I update my rosters, plan advent activities, order third-grade Bibles, practice with the worship team.” Before long, I can recall more than a hundred items from my task list. Knowing there are people who wonder what I do all day can easily make me hyperfocused on doing all the work myself, of playing the workhorse role until I’m ready to drop.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Ephesians 4:11-12 says, “The gifts he gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ” (NRSV).

What would happen if we structured our ministry in a way that our primary job is not doing the work of ministry but equipping others to do it? If you’re tempted to think this is a lazy approach, consider what might happen to a football team whose coach feels lazy for not dressing in pads and doing the same work as the players. Or worse, consider what happens to that team if the coach tried to play all the positions. The team wouldn’t rack up many wins!

In children’s ministry, we’ve normalized having one person doing the work rather than equipping and coordinating the work of others. But your team can be different.

Building a Children’s Ministry Team

When I met Darcie, she was always in a hurry, rushing from one task to another, always with a frantic sense that there was too much to do. Every aspect of her ministry was under her close watch. She was managing an extraordinary number of details and almost nothing was falling through the cracks. Unfortunately, she was so frazzled that it often didn’t take much for her frustration to bubble over with parents, volunteers, colleagues, and sometimes even the children themselves.

Because she was so hyperfocused on making sure that every detail of the children’s ministry was running smoothly, she didn’t realize how often she responded to parents and volunteers with a biting tone. She was the face of the children’s ministry, but she was so overcapacity that she “didn’t have time” to interact well with the parents, volunteers, and kids.

When I began coaching Darcie, I asked her to identify places where she felt stuck. There weren’t that many, because she was so good at what she was doing. But she had trouble seeing the negative culture that had been created all around the children’s ministry. In our monthly call, I asked what responsibilities she could give away. Knowing what you now know about the workhorse syndrome, you won’t be surprised that she didn’t want to give anything away.

No one, she thought, was going to get things done with the level of excellence and attention to detail that she brought to almost every item on her task list. And she was right. No one would. However, she forgot to ask whether anyone should.

Without knowing it, Darcie was taking care of secondary priorities (like choosing the right snacks at the grocery store) at a ridiculous level of excellence, and tending to first priorities (like caring for her volunteers) as if they hardly mattered. Jesus observed this same phenomenon in the Pharisees, “You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel” (Matthew 23:24).

Darcie was struggling with burnout, to get more volunteers, and to get along with key players within and outside her ministry. After a few months of identifying all the details of her ministry, Darcie began to see that she couldn’t do it all herself. We came up with five areas of ministry and put together short job descriptions that clarified tasks involved in coordinating each area of her ministry.

Before long, she had recruited a hospitality coordinator who would make sure that new families were greeted and had received important information. Then a missions coordinator, a recruiting coordinator, a VBS coordinator, and a marketing coordinator joined the team. Darcie was more than apprehensive. After all, in her mind she had tried delegating before, and it “just never worked.”

These five volunteers became Darcie’s Children’s Ministry Leadership Team. Not everyone played their role perfectly, of course. There were times when Darcie was tempted to take all the tasks back, because, truthfully, no one cared about the details as much as she did.

We had to talk her off the ledge more than once, helping her navigate the delicate dance of holding her volunteers accountable, but doing it with kindness, patience, and love. By the end of the year, Darcie had to admit that despite her lack of confidence in the process at the beginning, it was actually starting to work. These were real partners, carrying real weight in the ministry.

Darcie and her team found a rhythm, and she remarked that she didn’t realize how lonely she had been, doing everything by herself. A self-proclaimed “hater of committees,” she found herself looking forward to her team meetings once a month.

Darcie began to sleep better, spend more time with family, and feel that sense of accomplishment that had been lost in her busyness. Darcie, now close to retirement, sees an even brighter future for the children’s ministry after she is gone.

God has brought you into your role and gifted you to lead your ministry. Your job is not to do everything, but to equip “the saints [that’s your team] for the work of ministry” (Ephesians 4:12). As you think about building your team, I want to introduce you to the three roles that need to be filled to run a sustainable ministry.

The architect. The architect in your ministry serves a similar role to the architect on a construction project. The architect draws the plans and then makes sure the ministry is being built and executed according to an intentional design. Sadly, most churches work without an architect or any sort of overarching plan, assuming that they can build a multilayered, multistage children’s ministry “on the fly.”

In children’s ministry, your architect would help you intentionally set the goals and mission of the ministry and make sure your programming is more than a conglomeration of creative ideas with no common ground, that all your activity aligns with your goals and mission. Without an architect, it becomes almost impossible to say no to any well-meaning church member with a new idea.

It should go without saying that just because an idea is good or creative, that doesn’t mean the idea fits within your ministry’s vision or goals. In our experience, one of the biggest reasons a ministry winds up being over capacity is because programs and events multiply without being anchored to a clear and compelling mission and goals.

The second responsibility of the architect is to keep an eye on what the ministry will require in the future. While others are taking care of the day-to-day tasks, someone has to be thinking a few years down the road.

If, for example, there is a demographic shift taking place in the community, how should that shift affect your ministry strategy? Or if the church is engaging in a new community outreach initiative, how will that priority affect the children’s ministry?

The architect role can be filled by the director, a supervising pastor, or a layperson. But our experience is that these kinds of leaders are overwhelmed by the day-to-day whirlwind of ministry. Ministry Architects came into being out of this very need, allowing the staff and church leaders to manage the operation, while we play the architect role. (For more information about this, go to ministry architects.com/listen-design-and-build.)

The general contractor. The general contractor works in that space between planning the work and doing it. The general contractor makes sure each part of the building project takes place on time, with the right people doing the right things in the right order.

The contractor makes sure everyone on the team has been trained in their specific roles, has the tools they need, and accurately understands their specific jobs. Having a general contractor prevents having plans that are never implemented and ensures that ministries are not just busy and haphazard.

In children’s ministry, this person might be seen on a Sunday morning going from classroom to classroom, making sure all the leaders are present, all the equipment is working, and all the supplies are where they need to be. During the week the general contractor makes sure all the systems are in good, working order (database, communication, hospitality) and the people assigned to the various roles in the ministry are completing their tasks well.

When, not if, things get off track, the general contractor encourages, corrects, supports, and troubleshoots problems. And though sometimes the contractor will need to jump in to cover a specific role in the ministry, more often than not, the contractor is recruiting a team and coordinating their work.

Typically, the point person for a children’s ministry will serve as its general contractor. And sometimes a volunteer can be general contractor of a single area of the ministry. For example, VBS coordinator recruits, trains, and implements plans for an exciting week of VBS.

The skilled laborers. You can’t build a house without people swinging hammers, pouring concrete, and installing an electrical system. If the whole construction team were architects and general contractors, there would be a lot of planning but little construction.

In children’s ministry, without our laborers, lessons don’t get taught, diapers don’t get changed, songs don’t get sung, and little cotton ball lambs don’t get crafted! These are the hands-on people of your ministry. They are Sunday school teachers, greeters, check-in volunteers, nursery workers, baby holders, techies, singers, and nose wipers. Without these important people, ministry doesn’t happen.

Some churches are filled with people who want to sit on committees and plan and talk, but are short on people who actually do the work. Other churches are filled with doers. But without the coordination and alignment that comes through a clear plan and a general contractor, these doers can scurry in a hundred different directions, often leaving chaos, hurt feelings, and discouragement in their wake.

When all three roles—architect, general contractor, and skilled laborers—work together as a team, children’s ministry gets traction and leading them becomes a lot more fun.

The Three Works of Children’s Ministry

Now that you understand the three roles, let’s talk about the three different kinds of work every children’s ministry needs to be doing.

Relationships. Faithful and effective ministry is always grounded in relationships—between leaders and children, between leaders, between kids, and between God and everyone involved. A healthy church fosters the faith of young people through faith-building relationships.

These relationships can look different at every stage. We nurture and build trust with infants as we comfort them, sing to them, and talk about God’s love.

We introduce preschoolers to stories about God, but we are doing much more than disseminating information. We comfort, listen, and provide a space where safe and loving relationships can be formed.

We begin to guide older children beyond stories into concepts and principles that will shape their faith for the rest of their lives. In an ecosystem of caring relationships, we coach them, applying biblical principles to their lives.

These varied stages require people with varied gifts, and different children respond differently to different adults. As a result, having a team of relational leaders is essential to a healthy children’s ministry.

Tasks. One of the most surprising discoveries to people new to children’s ministry is how many tasks need to be managed. If we were sitting together looking at your task list, I’ve got a good idea what that list looks like (and your facial expression as you’re looking at that list!).

There are administrative tasks, scheduling tasks, communication tasks, designing tasks, accounting tasks, technology tasks, musical tasks, managerial tasks, spiritual tasks, marketing tasks, craft tasks, teaching tasks, cleaning tasks, organizational tasks, and tasks that sneak up on you and don’t fit into any category. And in each category there are more subtasks screaming for attention.

Because you know about the workhorse syndrome, you know that our first inclination is to do every task ourselves. It’s easy to be guided by the irrational thought I have too much to do to ask anyone to help me!

Building a great children’s ministry team is never a seamless process. We set up a group to knock out a project together, and half of them forget the meeting or don’t show up. We make a new policy about every teacher wiping down tables, taking out trash, and delivering lost and found items to the office each week, only to discover that in the first month only one volunteer is actually doing these tasks. We invite people to a meeting to support and encourage them, give them resources, and make their work easier, and only those who don’t need our help show up!

As long as we are spending the majority of our time handling tasks that could easily be handled by volunteers, there is a good chance we’ll feel like we’re spinning our wheels more than we’re making progress. I know that experience all too well.

In my first few years leading a children’s ministry, I absolutely loved the energizing work of being in front of the kids, singing, teaching, watching them laugh, helping them pray. But working with database information on all my children and their families kept falling to the bottom of my list. I hated the thought of sitting at a desk and looking at spreadsheets for what felt like days on end.

As part of a quickly growing church, I found myself heavily involved with my current volunteers and families. With all the tasks I was doing, I hadn’t made the time to meet new families or connect with prospective volunteers. I felt the need for more volunteers. I had asked everyone I knew, and I had exhausted all the personal connections. I began to think, Why aren’t there more people in our church who care about children?

The truth is that there were plenty more, I just didn’t know them yet. I knew the church had a database that kept the attendance of children and adults in our church. So I asked two dear friends—the highly organized kind who loved spreadsheets—to look through our attendance reports from the last six months and make a list of all the regular attenders, children and adults. This became my new list of volunteer prospects, which freed me to focus on what I was uniquely positioned to do—invite more people to serve on our volunteer team.

When I talk with children’s pastors and I ask, “What are the things you wish you could quit doing?” I sometimes hear, “Nothing! I love it all!” And sometimes I hear a jumbled laundry list of tasks, some of which could be given away tomorrow but some of which are absolutely essential for the point leader to take care of.

The bottom line is that delegation can be confusing and complicated. It’s not a single-step process. It’s more like step, adjust, step, shift, step back, adjust—you get the idea. You’ll be delighted to know that eventually you’ll be able to use the filter If it doesn’t give me joy, I can give it away.

Of course, there will always be some tasks you must hold on to as the leader, like recruiting, but there are many more you can (and should) delegate to someone who might enjoy that task more than you do. Usually, the things that give you joy are also the things you are naturally gifted at.

Some gifts and talents will be obvious to you, but others might require a little discernment or even an outside voice to bring them to light. StrengthsFinder (strengthsfinder.com) is a great tool for bringing your gifts, talents, and calling to light. It has been invaluable to me, helping me embrace the way I’m wired and helping me work with teams more effectively.

It will give you a boost to know your areas of strength, but until you’ve got your team in place and functioning well, there are going to be some tasks only you can do (and will very likely not get done if you don’t do them). I usually begin with volunteer recruiting and training, building a database, and the annual ministry calendar. These may be items you’d like to avoid like the plague. But as you jump into delegating more intentionally, start by not delegating the tasks that only you should do right now.

Know this: there is someone in your congregation praying for a way to get involved or even just hoping to get connected to other people. Remember, you’re not merely asking people to help you. You’re inviting them to join in what God is doing in your church. You’re inviting them into a circle of new friends that can become an extended Christian family to their children. Your invitation might be the answer to their prayers.

Events. The final kind of work you can delegate to members of your team is events. For better or for worse, events often become the only part of the children’s ministry some people ever see. Events can provide a welcoming door into our church and into our ministry, as well as helping build community among the families who are already engaged. A well-executed event often gives us a doorway to punctuate the themes and spiritual principles of the year.

Early in my children’s ministry career my supervisor would say, “Sunday and Wednesday are the most important thing we do.” So, I focused all my energy on making Sundays and Wednesdays great experiences for children. But after a few missteps with major events, I realized the rest of the church may not notice if all the materials for each lesson are perfectly arranged in bins with instructions, supplies, and completed examples, but they will notice if our bounce houses aren’t manned and ready when they bring their grandchildren to the fall festival.

The person who approves my budget requests is more likely to be at the Easter egg hunt than in the children’s program on Sundays or Wednesday nights. So yes, while the weekly programs make the most impact, our special events are the public face of our ministry. Making those events excellent and engaging serves to amplify and expand the impact of our weekly programming.

It took me longer than I care to admit to realize that great children’s ministry is not about choosing either weekly programming or special events to focus on. It needs to be both.

Linda thought that she had to be the one to manage every major children’s ministry event. She would invite the same three friends to help. Then she would scramble for weeks, neglecting family, getting little sleep, trying to make every event epic. But with each event it was becoming clearer that it wasn’t sustainable for her to keep using this approach. Eventually she began to entertain the possibility that someone in her church could manage event planning without becoming overwhelmed.

She began recruiting a major event coordinator for every special event in the children’s ministry. (See “Volunteer Position Description: Major Event Coordinator” and “Creating a Major Event Notebook” for sample templates. These can be found in the online resources at ivpress.com/sustainable-children-s-ministry.com.) This person owns the event, but Linda regularly checks in on them and offers support every step along the way. Linda takes the time up front to equip the coordinator with expectations, contacts, and a rhythm of check-in meetings, and the coordinator carries the load of recruiting, ordering, setting up, and preparing so that the ministry can put on a stellar event.

The coordinator’s focus on a single event allows me to keep my focus on all the other pieces of maintaining a healthy, sustainable ministry. I hope you see the commonality. In each of these areas of ministry—relationships, tasks, and events—God never intended for us to do them alone, at least not for very long.

Making It Work for You

Since there are so many skill sets required for a thriving children’s ministry, the most successful ministries embrace the priority of building a team. Your team needs to be crystal clear on their roles and the mission of the ministry, but also free enough to work creatively to accomplish the ministry’s stated goals.

I know that having a great team in place may seem like a pipe dream. You might hear the word delegation and think, Yeah, great idea, but who exactly am I supposed to delegate to?

The truth is that you can’t delegate until you have a team, and building your team takes time and sustained effort. It’s not impossible, though. We watch children’s ministry people do it all the time.

Having a children’s ministry leadership team is not something just for larger churches. Every church with children needs people willing to take responsibility for different areas of the ministry.

The problem with most leadership teams is that they can easily devolve into nothing more than idea generators. In the end, this group winds up giving you more things to add to your task list. You don’t need a group of advisers; you need a group of partners. You need a team of people willing to roll up their sleeves and help do the work. Only then should you create a space for idea generation.

The following are a few of the coordinator roles that we’ve seen other children’s ministries include on their team:

In

Delegating, Not Dumping

There is a huge difference between effective delegating and just dumping responsibility on a new volunteer. When we dump tasks on volunteers, they naturally feel flustered, abandoned, and overwhelmed. And they likely will never want to volunteer again.

For example, I gave a supply coordinator a stack of lessons and asked her to get all the right supplies in all the right bins. I explained that I would be out all day and left her to it. I was disappointed with the results. Like I said, I’m a slow learner. I forgot a few essentials of delegation.

Delegating a task well means that we give necessary instructions and resources, communicate clear expectations and a deadline, and even then most volunteers will need ongoing support and troubleshooting. In my example of failure, I could have provided a list of supplies for each class and given a list of what items go in which bins. And perhaps most importantly, I could have checked in throughout the duration of the project, providing a little encouragement, troubleshooting, or a vente latte.

Once your team has been equipped with all the information they need (which, despite our best efforts, is almost never all the information they need), the next step in delegation is to empower them.

Empowering Your Team

Empowering your team involves connecting them with the people and places they will need to know to successfully complete their role.

Let’s go back to my supply coordinator. I needed to give her connections to the accounts and a tax-exempt card to use at local stores where she would be doing the shopping. I could have explained the process for reimbursement and given her the process for turning in receipts.

Instead, because I dumped on her, she had to come back to me multiple times with questions that could have been answered on the front end. Dumping rather than delegating wastes everyone’s time and burns out volunteers faster than they can say, “I’ll never say yes again!”

Managing Your Team

When your leadership team is equipped and empowered, you might think this task is finished. You would be wrong.

This is when your role changes from doer to manager. Instead of worrying about each item on a task list, you are finally free to do what you love—focusing your attention on the people performing the tasks while keeping an eye on the larger vision for the ministry.

On a practical note, because responsibilities of different leaders can vary greatly, it’s hard to set a hard and fast rule for how often you check in with them. For example, the person who changes your bulletin board once a month may not need the same level of attention as your VBS coordinator. Here are a few rules of thumb:

Your check-ins can be a quick phone call or text, a lunch meeting, or talking in your office about how their tasks are going. The three key pieces of information you want to get from these interactions are

If you know these three things each month from each member of your team, you will be able to continue to empower and equip without getting bogged down in the details of each individual’s role. If a problem is ignored for more than a month, it can affect morale and the spirit of your team.

Unless you ask, your team members may be tempted not to bother you, to keep the problems they are having to themselves. However, if you know they are feeling stuck, you can often resolve their challenge and make both of your lives less stressful in the long run.

Of course, one of the gifts of leading your team is that you naturally have the privilege of serving as a spiritual shepherd to them, not just as a manager. As you get to know them and talk about their lives, you will have the unique opportunity to pray with, encourage, and listen to them. But remember, you won’t have the time or the energy to be with your team if you’re trying to handle all the work yourself. Let’s talk now about how to get your team in place.

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