Tips for Scheduling with New Requirements

As we embrace the new normal of scheduling church services and volunteers, whether it's for online or in-person services, it's important to know there are tools available to make this new reality easier. Here are three ways to accommodate the changes happening in your church while still making it easy to resume consistent scheduling when the time comes.

Changing ministries and requirements
You’ve likely needed to adapt many things when it comes to your ministry scheduling. Whether your services are being held in-person or virtually, it’s been an experiment in creativity and embracing change. You may now have new required ministries like sanitization or videographers that you did not previously. Your existing services may only slightly change in many situations, such as the type of ministries or the number of volunteers. On top of all these changes is the task of finding which of your volunteers are willing to serve.

Since Ministry Scheduler Pro is completely customizable, you can add new ministries and integrate them into your schedule, make changes to your existing service times, or make changes to the number of ministers required. Additionally, the program is designed to accommodate multiple scheduling methods so you can easily change the way you assign your volunteers. For example, the auto-scheduler is ideal for creating a balanced schedule that accommodates your volunteers’ preferences. However, you can also make manual changes to the schedule before and after running the auto-scheduler, which gives you ultimate decision-making power over who gets scheduled.

If you’d like to invite fresh volunteers to sign up for new ministries, or to fill any gaps in your existing ones, enable online enrollment forms. You can even allow for self sign-ups if requirements for a particular ministry restrict you from scheduling too far ahead of time. Ministry Scheduler Pro makes it easy to implement changes and get your volunteers up to speed.

Keeping up the lines of communication
One of schedulers’ new responsibilities is keeping up with volunteers’ comfort level with returning to church. The simple act of regularly keeping in touch with your volunteers will help you stay on top of this information, and show that you value their participation as a volunteer, even if they aren’t actively serving at the moment. The Announcements pane is an essential tool for keeping your volunteers up to date. You can send a regular request for availability to your volunteers at the beginning of each scheduling cycle, encouraging volunteers to take control of their schedule right from their desktop or mobile device. The results can help you quickly decipher who is ready to serve. Don’t forget to take the time to thank all your volunteers for their continued support, especially during this time!

New realities for tracking attendance
While most churches have tracked attendance for volunteer recognition or Christian education program requirements in the past, using attendance tracking for contact tracing is a new reality for many communities.

With Ministry Scheduler Pro’s Sign-in Kiosk, attendance records are automatically entered into Ministry Scheduler Pro as your volunteer’s check-in, giving you an accurate report of who was in attendance and when, even if there are last-minute substitutions or no-shows. With Ministry Scheduler Pro’s robust reporting capabilities, you can then export a list of who was in attendance or compose an email just to these people.

Lastly, if you'd like to track both volunteers and congregants' attendance, consider pairing Ministry Scheduler Pro with our newest product, Unison.io, which lets you offer online sign-ups for attendance at each of your services. Learn more about how Unison.io, can be used to support reduced capacity services!

If you're curious to learn more about how Ministry Scheduler Pro can help you manage your schedule during these changing times, reach out to our team! Our Onboarding Specialists can help you determine which of our tools are best suited to your church’s needs!