When you’re involved in church ministry, you learn pretty quickly that no matter how smooth a service looks or how impactful the worship has been, there’s a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes to make it happen.
The worship team needs time to coordinate and practice. You have to check out the new curriculum for the children’s ministry. You need to make sure that you have a full calendar’s worth of nursery room volunteers. And the next thing you know, it’s Monday, and you have to do it all over again.
What if it were possible to run a church without having to hunt through past emails or waste valuable time following up with people throughout the week? What if keeping track of who’s booked what room for small group meetings was as easy as consulting the organizational calendar?
When it comes to church management, software solutions can be a figurative and literal answer to prayer. We’re about to tell you what you need to know about choosing a church management software that works for your congregation. All you have to do is keep reading.
1. Take an Honest Look at Your Current Needs
Lots of church software companies will promote their product as the end-all-be-all answer for churches. And sure, when you visit their websites, they might have all the bells and whistles that say, “Your church needs us.”.
But when push comes to shove, the software solutions that would work seamlessly for Joel Osteen or Saddleback Church may not work so well for a congregation of fewer than 50 people.
When you sit down and look through your list of church financial software or church management software vendors, it’s important to ensure that the product comes with the features you need right now.
Do you need to make sure that your Sunday School leaders have all received the lesson at the right time? Are you struggling to send out Zoom invitations at the same time every week?
As a church leadership group, you don’t necessarily need to buy the software with the most features. You want to get the software that’s best able to handle the unique challenges you and your team face right now.
2. Consider Your Budget
In personal finance circles, people talk a lot about the dangers of what’s known as “subscription creep.” The idea is that it’s easy to spend $15 a month on Netflix and $10 a month on Amazon, and $20 a month on some other ongoing monthly service until you’re spending hundreds of dollars a month on services that you don’t need or use.
While we don’t always sit down and talk about churches and non-profit organizations using personal budget terms, the same concept applies when you start considering software solutions.
Tithes and offerings will often go towards different projects and general funds. And at the end of the year, people will need tax receipts, and expenses will need to be accounted for. When your operating budget has a lot of monthly subscriptions attached to it, it can be easy to lose sight of where the money is going. Top-notch church financial software can only help you in this regard.
However, if you’ve already got services like CCLI and Proclaim on your list of ongoing expenses, it’s important to weigh the benefits of the software against its price.
3. Think About How Different Features Can Be Used to Streamline Your Operations
If you and your deacon board were to sit down with your church volunteers and have an honest conversation, the chances are that you could all come up with a list of three or four regular tasks that disproportionately tie up people’s time every week.
For instance, is your pastoral team spending too much time on social media? Is there often confusion about which volunteers are expected to run the Sunday School or prepare the snacks?
In some regards, a well-oiled system can do the work of several volunteers and treasurers all at once. But you have to identify your pain points to assess your software solutions’ pros and cons.
Are the admin tasks draining your time? You may need a management software suite that handles emailing and scheduling. Is it a hassle to keep track of tithes and offerings every week? Church accounting software can make all the difference.
The key is to make sure that the software you choose for your church can actually provide a tangible benefit to you, your staff, and your congregation.
4. Choose a Software That Can Grow With Your Church
Where do you see your congregation going in 5 or 10 years?
It goes without saying that if you’re looking for church management software right now, you’ll want to choose a product that fits your needs like a glove. After all, there’s no point in fixing something that isn’t broken.
That being said, it’s not enough to think in terms of what would make everyone’s lives easier today. You also have to think about whether or not the software will be able to help your church tomorrow or in three years from now.
Some software providers, like Icon Church Management, will give you the option of expanding your plan and scaling as your congregation grows, while others may have to be replaced in the long run.
And, of course, when you’re dealing with church finances and record-keeping, having to switch plans or migrate to new companies can be a pain. That’s why it’s important to think about whether the church management software you’re considering is one that you’ll be able to use for a long time.
Simplify Your Church Ministry Operations in a Big Way With Church Management Software
Church ministry is ultimately about managing and organizing people. As a member of the pastoral team or as a board member, you need church management software that allows you to operate more smoothly behind the scenes and focus on the big picture —winning more people to Christ.
Once you’ve found the right software and you’ve gotten it up and running, you’ll be surprised at how much easier service planning and church organization will become.
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