If you’ve ever had a “Toll Tag” - a device which lets you drive on toll roads without stopping to pay with cumbersome coins - you know the blissfulness of driving uninterrupted to your destination. Or if you’re using a high-speed internet connection, you simply open up a browser and search and surf in real time. Maybe you’ve shopped a grocery store that use RFID for auto-scanning items for checkout and bills your credit card on file so that you literally bag your stuff and walk out the door.

If you’ve experienced any of those situations then you know what it’s like to have transparent technology.

Transparent Technology
The application and usage of technology that is seamless to the user; technology that doesn’t call attention to itself.

I think a lot of church leaders have an aversion to certain levels of technology (and the costs associated with them) because they don’t get to experience transparent technology in their week-in, week-out church service, events and communications. A few examples of interruptive technology usage:

• Feedback through the sound system
• Volunteer/Children’s check-in system that doesn’t offer bar code scanning
• Motion backgrounds that stutter and skip behind song lyrics
• Microsoft Powerpoint. Yes, I’m jaded. Buy worship software or use Apple’s Keynote
• Poor lighting on the stage
• Typos in song lyrics, sermon notes or anything else (electronic or print)

We typically can’t eliminate every distraction, but we should be actively doing our best to minimize distractions. In my short list above, most of those distractions have a relatively inexpensive solution and all of them can be eliminated.

What distractions do you see in church? How should we eliminate or minimize them?

Once in a while you read something insightful in an unlikely place. For me, it was the quote on a Starbucks cup:

“The irony of commitment is that it’s deeply liberating - in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the fear that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life.”

- Anne Morriss, A Starbucks customer from New York City.
(From “The Way I See It - #76)

So, in essence, commitment is freeing. The Apostle Paul said it another way:

“Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.”
Romans 6:19-20

It’s hard to accept sometimes that we tend to think our way into a situation, all the while assuming we’re in control. But the weird part is realizing we’re not in control and, in fact, the sooner we get our head out of the way, the sooner we can have the commitment to God’s way instead of our way.

I need a sign that says: “Step One: Remove your head.”

“Step Two: Repeat as necessary.”

White sugar donut powder coats EQ knobs. Coffee cup rings leave sticky circles next to equipment. Cables are left strewn on horizontal surfaces. Labels are mysteriously missing from most connectors. Dust is layered on top of equipment and clogs the filters and fans of electronics.

In short: it's a mess.

Maybe it's because media people would rather plug in cables than label them, or maybe it's that we have a tendency to do things quickly to "make it work" but don't take the time to "make it right". I'm not sure what the reason is but most churches have a mess in the tech areas. (I was guilty of this at my first church media job, so I'm guilty, too!)

You have not because you clean not

OK, that's not exactly what John 16:24 says, but I'm convinced that media folks usually don't get new equipment because the leadership doesn't see them taking care of what they do have.

When I first started at my third church staff position, I inherited a young assistant named Daniel. This quiet young man and I had spent less than a week together before I had to leave and go teach at a conference. Before leaving, I had toured the entire campus and looked at everything (Audio/Video/Lighting) that we were responsible for and had made the announcement that we were going to clean up and organize those areas. My rationale was for three reasons:

1) I was new to the church and wanted to have a complete inventory list of every piece of equipment;
2) I wanted each tech area to be organized so we could easily operate and repair the equipment;
3) I knew that the business administrator and executive pastor would appreciate our new list for both insurance purposes and for a fresh start towards excellence in our ministry.

Daniel took the lead and pulled together staff and volunteers to do some major cleaning, organization and labeling. When I returned four days later, he and his team had it completed!

Now beyond the moral of the story (get it done and do it right) is a great ending: when I was able to show the church leadership what equipment we could re-use and what needed replacing (instead of expensive repair for outdated items), getting a P.O. signed was a piece of cake!

Your leadership wants you to have the right tools

I know some of you don't believe that statement but I submit that if you show that you're using what you have to the best of your ability and you research and document the cost for replacement vs. repair, the money will show up.

People don't give money to need - they give money to vision.

When you show that you're taking responsibility for what you do have and you create a vision for what should be, people and resources will show up. Every time.

Get it right. Keep it right.

I know, it's not fun to clean. It's a daunting task to chase cables (hundreds of them), test them and label them. All of them. It's not easy or a quick task to create start-up and shutdown checklists for every position in every venue. It's certainly not easy to break habits of sloppiness. But it all must be done.

How has your tech area improved? Share below...

If you're a ministry-minded person looking for a church job, please send me your résumé and a one page manifesto describing your ideal church position. If you're a techie or worship leader, please include a web link for your demo reel. I've got quite a few churches needing qualified and experienced people for a multitude of positions. As of today, some of my church clients are seeking:

• Children's Pastor
• Media Pastor
• Technical Director
• Video producer
• Executive Pastor
• Motion graphics artist

Email me your résumé and be sure to include all of your contact information, including a cell number and an email address.

Your résumé should include this additional information, dependent upon the kind of position your seeking. Some additional info might include:

• Type of position you are seeking
• Minimum Salary requirements
• If you're willing to relocate
• Areas of specific expertise
• Proficiencies in software/hardware (name and version)
• Years of experience on software/hardware
• Licensing and/or Ordination information (if applicable)
• Denominational preferences/requirements
• Your greatest strength
• Your greatest weakness

This doesn't cost you anything. My fees are paid by the churches who hire individuals. Just be sure to send me an email. Be sure to pass this along to your friends in ministry who are searching and your church leaders who are looking for just the right person!

You’re the only staff or volunteer person who shows up week in and week out. Every rehearsal, every service, every event, every Easter, every Christmas - you’re the one making the tech happen. Oh, sure others help out occasionally, but if you’re not there, things just go wrong. You have to be there, right?

Or maybe you’re in a church where the demands and expectations from the leadership are unrealistic. You have some gear, so they think you have all the gear you need. You have a few volunteers, so what’s the problem? Pastors can change things on you last minute, but that’s why you’re the expert - you’re supposed to know how to fix things and make it work, right?

And quite possibly the aggravation of working with people who don’t understand what you do has you stressed out. Suck it up, right?

WRONG, on all three counts!

Dave Wilcox asked a great question about burnout:

“I have heard tech folks at churches use the term burnout frequently. How would you define burnout? What are its symptoms? What are its remedies, both for the ‘burnt out’ individual and for the church that ‘burns out’ people?”

Wow, is that a terrific set of questions or what?! I’m going to answer his question in the hopes of helping out the folks in the trenches of technical ministry. Maybe something I’ll say here will give you the freedom you so desperately need.

What is ‘Burnout’?
Dictionary.com defines burnout like this:

“Physical or emotional exhaustion, especially as a result of long-term stress or dissipation.”

I’d add to that spiritual exhaustion, because I think that it’s the main reason that media personnel experience burnout.

Understanding Burnout
Spiritual Exhaustion

The technical ministry is often one filled with people who don’t want to attend a Sunday school, small group meeting or Bible study. Many of these folks would rather click a mouse, spin a knob or push a button than talk with people about God’s Word. “Hey, no one asks me to quote Bible verses when I’m mixing sound,” say people I’ve talked to before.

The technical ministry is perhaps the one ministry area where it’s easy to hide from spiritual discussions. Yet this is robbing them of personal growth, a closer relationship with the God who loves them and a stronger sense of mission and purpose for the tech team. We can no longer afford to ask our volunteers to serve unless we serve them with spiritual food, too! Any tech leader reading this should memorize it, print it out and post it:

The technical ministry is not about the tech. It’s about the people behind the tech.

Emotional Exhaustion

Volunteers are often set up to fail, and fail spectacularly. Churches - even large ones - rarely provide adequate or consistent training for their staff and volunteers. Instead, it’s simply assumed that we’ll somehow get better without knowing exactly how to get from where we are to where we need to be. This puts a real toll on tech arts staff and volunteers who feel the pressure to make everything work flawlessly week in and week out but who do not have the proper training, planning or practice to produce effective results.

The result? People get tired of sitting in the booth when the audience turns around because of feedback. They get tired of being told by a frustrated music minister that there’s not enough monitor volume even though the monitors are creating more volume in the room than the PA system. They are emotionally spent when the pastor makes an unhappy remark about the problems with the technical team on a Sunday morning during service.

The stress of having to perform without the right tools, the right training and the right amount of preparation wipe out volunteers who are often under-appreciated and not shown the love they need.

Physical Exhaustion

If you’re serving more than twice a month in a volunteer capacity, you’re probably serving too often. We need a break. We need to experience corporate worship. We need to unplug from the matrix of tech volunteering and focus on the message, not the medium.

“But we don’t have enough technical volunteers, so I have to be here,” some try to explain.

You have not because you ask not. Every person in your church has a sphere of influence. That is your starting point: asking those who you know are not serving regularly (or at all). And I’m not just talking about pew-sitters, either. We all have unchurched friends who share some of our same interests. We can invite them to come and observe the tech operations and see if it piques their interest. In addition to growing your ranks, you also get people involved in church, as attendance outside of volunteering should be required for every member of the tech team.

While this article is a basic overview of burnout, I have previously written an entire three-part series on “Dealing with Tech Arts Burnout":

• Tech Arts Burnout: Part I
• Tech Arts Burnout: Part II
• Tech Arts Burnout: Part III

I hope you find these articles helpful and freeing from the unnecessary burden of burnout at your church. If you have a story of burn-out or a story or restoration after burn-out, please share with us below or email me offline.

In my previous posts, I’ve been talking about WFX as a tech conference and, well, it is…but it’s also more than that. Where I spend most of my time is in teaching in the Church Production or Digital Church tracks, but the reality is that WFX is more holistic.

The goal for the event is to help build the Kingdom and for churches to make better investments in facilities and technology. Attendance and content-wise, the goal is to present an appropriate balance of content and exhibitors to attract a balance of executive, facilities and technical teams. There’s simply not a lot of conferences that try to do what WFX is doing (are there any?) and, for that, I give them full credit.

All that to say I’m also interested in hearing from those of you that went to WFX for more than the tech side of the conference. What say you?

In previous years I’ve taught more classes solo than I have at this past WFX. With more and more panel discussions becoming the norm, it seems, the intimacy and connection that I feel with the people is somehow diminished. Yet there were still some times, even with three to six other people on a panel, that I felt the Lord giving me instruction for some in the audience. No, I didn’t get a word from God about a new tech directive, but instead about the larger spiritual issues facing all church tech arts and worship teams.

Essential Management Skills for Technical Directors is a class I taught with Ryan and Chuck. There was a time towards the latter part of the class when the Lord spoke very, very clearly to me about people being burned out in ministry.

I knew there were people in that very room that needed more than management skills and project management tips; they needed a fresh wind from the Holy Spirit.

So, right there in the middle of class, I asked for people to be totally transparent and raise their hands if they were at the point of burn out or very close to burning out. A dozen hands went up and I invited them to come down to the front for a time of prayer. God spoke so clearly to me that it was, simply, the most natural thing to do in the middle of a tech class. Everyone in the room either raised a hand over the group down front or literally walked down to lay hands on these hurting brothers and sisters in intercessory prayer.

Can I tell you something? That was the best part of WFX for me this year!

WFX is the brain child of Brian Blackmore, Armando Fullwood, Greg Persinger and myself. Yet for all of our planning and strategizing and the subsequent explosion of the conference by the capable hearts and hands of the convention team at EH Publishing, the one thing that really makes this tech conference stand out from the rest is the freedom for us as presenters to go beyond the tech and touch the heart. God’s very presence is palpable in so many of the classes and keynotes and in discussions in hallways and on bus rides together. This is the greatest part of WFX. This is why it’s my favorite tech conference.

I truly hope that everyone at WFX had a time like the one I just recalled. It is my personal desire to see WFX have more moments like that than the mere dispensation of knowledge. If you had a time where God really touched your heart - stuff way beyond the tech - please share your story with us all in the comments section below or on your own blog. Just give us a link here so that we can hear about how you were moved by the Holy Spirit and allow us to rejoice with you in what God’s doing in our lives!

Blessings,

Anthony

A while back I posted a variant of this theme, but with the questions at conferences and from emails that I receive regarding volunteers at church, I’ve added to my 7 Steps of Recruiting, Training and Retaining Volunteers. Feel free to share and comment.

1) Invite someone to learn with you. There’s something powerful about being invited and asked to participate in something bigger than ourselves. Most of the best volunteers I’ve met at hundreds of churches came because someone asked them if they’d like a chance to see what it was like to do what we do! Your pool of current volunteers are the best possible recruiters. Why? Because, chances are, they are friends with people similar to themselves. That means techies know more techies. It also means that your non-techie volunteers (more on that below) know people like them, too. Leveraging the spheres of influence that your volunteers have is the best way to invite new people to your ministry.

Another important recruiting tip is to find college interns, stay-at-home moms and retirees who have the time to give on a Monday thru Friday basis. Unlike your other volunteers with full-time jobs, these folks have more flexible schedules and can help you with a host of necessary, if not technical, areas including volunteer scheduling, administrative support, copywriting, duplication, organizing, documenting and encouraging. I have had men and women help me out during the week so that I was freed up to do the work that only I could do instead of work that anyone could do. One of my best volunteers never touched a piece of gear; she just kept me organized and helped me with the myriad of daily tasks that I didn’t like or have the time to do.

When you use interns, keep a log of what they do and give them the chance to apply their time and effort towards their high school or college credits. It may mean you need to go and visit with their high school counselor or college professor, but those real world on-the-job training hours can result in applicable hours towards their degree.

2) Guide someone through the process, initiate them slowly through the ropes and give them a lot of freedom to watch and observe. There’s a great deal of safety in knowing that an invitation to come into the tech booth has no expectation for them to perform. If possible, have a trained techie with the observer to point out what’s happening and to answer their questions. De-mystifying the tech is a big part of alleviating their fears.

3) Encourage those who have a giftedness at certain tasks or in certain areas. We all love hearing when we’ve “got it” and like to know we’re doing something well (or have the potential to do so). Your best volunteers will ‘own’ their role, taking your ministry to new heights because of their joy, passion and talent! Plus, really happy volunteers are also highly motivated volunteers who show up early and stay late.

4) Develop the people who show the most interest, have the best servant attitudes and are teachable. I’d much rather have a person who is inexperienced and teachable than an “expert” who can’t be taught. If you’ve got a soccer mom who doesn’t know technology but is highly teachable, pour into her and see where she can serve. I’ve quite often found that soccer moms make some of the best presentation software volunteers and excellent camera operators. Truly, you don’t have to have a techie person to keep up with detail work. They don’t have to know the operating system or even how the camera really works. They just operate with confidence and style!

5) Evaluate honestly. Hurting feelings doesn’t have to be a part of the job, so be gentle when you have to redirect people out of areas where they can’t accomplish the job. Keep written records of evaluation and offer tangible steps for people to either improve or find new ways to serve.

6) Participation has to be consistent. There’s not an expert or professional on the planet who simply showed up and started being a genius without any failures or dedication to their role. This is a “team sport” and it takes all of us working together in unison and not flaunting individual talents.

Personally, I’m a fan of having a volunteer team serve the entire weekend. This means you will have the same team for all rehearsals and services so that you’re all very consistent and work fluidly as a unit. By building these teams and operating in a one-week-on, two-weeks-off rotation, they’re consistent in their roles while having the time off to recoup from a long weekend.

7) Reproduction should be a natural part of someone becoming seriously qualified and competent in their role. Far too many churches have “the sound guy” (as in ONLY ONE PERSON) or “the worship leader". While there can (and should) be a leader for decision-making and administration, a team of leaders is the only way to obtain consistency, quality and growth.

One of my roles at Fellowship Church as a volunteer was as a volunteer trainer. I had a blast doing my “job". I called my job “Loving On Volunteers". That’s how I viewed my role of doing technical training! It was just another way to pour into people and equip them to serve successfully. And I did that as a volunteer myself.

These are the staring points or recruiting, training and retaining. There’s a whole lot more to it, but I can’t fit it into a blog post. There’s simply too much to cover. But if you want to learn more, shoot me an email or call me sometime. I’d be glad to chat.

Disclaimer: I’m on the WFX Advisory Council. I’m dear friends with the head honcho Brian Blackmore. I’ve been invited by the folks at EH Publishing to share my thoughts and get involved in the planning. I’ve been with WFX before it was WFX (it was T3, the Technical Training Tour, as part of Church Production Magazine). I’m on the Editorial Advisory Board for Church Production Magazine and write for it as well as its sister publication, Worship Facilities Magazine. In other words, I’m not just some guy spouting off about WFX. I care about it enough to speak the truth and share honestly. End of Disclaimer

WFX needs to make one major change: They need to lead out by using the best, most reliable technologies along with some of the cutting edge technologies as a way to demonstrate what’s being taught in the classes.

Where WFX missed leveraging technology to the fullest extent at WFX in Houston:

• Smoke What You’re Selling - WFX is, at its core, a technology conference. Therefore, it should have the best audio, video, lighting, staging, networking… whatever… on display and in use. I realize that every convention center is different and, sometimes, you don’t get to pick your technical support company. But that just leads me to think that if you can’t control the quality of the technology support, find another venue (more on that below).
• Keynote w/ Dave Ferguson - I was the video director for the event and came in to find that we were missing some important technology. Namely, we used PowerPoint and Windows Media Player to handle the on-screen graphics and video playback. Ugh. With Renewed Vision in the house, I’d have much rather had Brad or Matt running the gear and leveraging their cutting edge solution through our SDI switcher (thanks to Sony for use of the Anycast). Also, the ‘wide shot’ (cam 2) was not set up correctly (it was in 720P mode while the other camera was in 1080i - leaving the switcher unable to make it all look the same). Plus, the operator was not a trained techie and was, in my opinion, set up to fail. I don’t blame him. We simply needed a techie with experience running the on-screen content delivery.
• Wireless mics in all presenter rooms - I was told we’d have a wireless for every presenter, even during a large panel, but that didn’t turn out to be the case. The AV techs were hit and miss with a table top SM-58 on a stand for 3 presenters to share. Not good. With Shure, AKG, DPA and others on the show floor, it seems that we should have zero issue getting free (sponsored) mics in every room for every presenter. Personally, I wanted to wear a DPA-4066 all week and simply plug it into the bodypack in whichever room I spoke in next.
• 16:9 projection. Everywhere. - Any laptops created in the last 5 years will offer 16:9 output resolutions. Why not have every presenter build all of their presentations in 16:9 and project them onto 16:9 screens with native 16:9 projectors? Let’s face it: 16:9 in churches has more to do with typing song lyrics like they’re actually sung than it does with HD video. Let’s use the technology that we know they should be using!
• Proper audio reinforcement - In a room that seats 400, two EON speakers may not work. Yet that’s what I found in one of the large meeting rooms where I sat on a couple of panels. Worse yet, only one of these worked. Where’s the AV tech company when you need them?
• FREE Wi-Fi - Seriously, at a TECH conference this size, making me pay for Wi-Fi is dumb. Roll it into the price of the tickets. Make the manufacturers pay for it. I don’t care. I just want to have free Wi-Fi everywhere I go. I’m already paying for Wi-Fi at the hotel (T-Mobile), but have to use the convention center’s provider, too? Not cool. Plus, the conference is missing out on people wanting to blog, text, download and share their real-time experiences by not making it free. We’re at a technology conference! Gimme the technology, baby!
• Create time and space for impromptu get-togethers - there was a nice seating area with tables in front of the main Ballroom at the Houston event, but with a killer back-to-back-to-back list of sessions, it seemed difficult to make time for meet-ups. The morning breakfast discussion groups (moderated) were a great idea, but I think they can be extended to times before and after lunch and again before dinner. I heard from a few people who traveled alone that, other than the church tours, were bored and wished the could have a place to sit and talk about what they’d learned and share experiences.
• Meet in Smaller Venues - The last few WFX events have been held in HUGE convention centers. So big, in fact, that the WFX portion takes up about 1/4 of the space, if that. I’d rather see them meet in a place where it felt a little crowded than feel like we’re pebbles rolling around in a big ‘ol box car. Here in North Texas, we have the Frisco convention center that would fit WFX snugly. Then again, we have Six-Flags-Over-Jesus, too (Prestonwood Baptist Church - it’s ginormous). It does make me wonder if we should be meeting at big churches with the facilities to handle our classroom, meeting area, and large venue areas instead of convention centers. Hmmmm.

Still, in spite of those observations, I maintain that WFX was a good success and that people were encouraged, uplifted, inspired and equipped. In my next post, I actually talk about what sets WFX apart from other tech conferences. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!

Though I’m on the WFX Advisory Council and have been in the conference teaching role for years, I actually love learning more than I love teaching. I learned quite a bit at WFX Houston this year and wanted to share some of the thoughts that have been percolating in my head.

I had lunch with Kirk, Mark, Tim, Aaron, Brian and Mike on the show floor of WFX. The conversation included a fun discussion about the viability of social networking as a means of attracting/connecting small groups in churches. In addition to “the regulars” (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Ning, etc.), two companies occupied the majority of the conversation: Unifyer and Roov.

I’ve not played with Unifyer yet. I’ve opted instead to watch from a distance and lurk through blogs and their website for others experiences. My chief complaint/issue is their pricing structure. For anything approaching a larger church, this becomes financially daunting due to the cost ratios, even with larger group discounts.

I brought up Roov, as I’ve personally spent time with Chris and Hannah and am seeing it work at my church (Gateway Church, Southlake, TX). I’m wondering if there’s not the possibility for a meeting of the functionality between Unifyer and Roov?

Regardless, social networking, at least in my opinion, exists for far more than narcissistic individuals spouting off about their innocuous day-to-day happenings. There’s real power in giving voice to conversations online that can lead to IRL (in real life) collaboration and engagement.

Walking the show floor, I enjoyed the wide variety of vendors exhibiting but felt that it might have been helpful to create a show map application for either a browser or, specifically, the iPhone. I wanted to walk the show floor and have solid Wi-Fi (FREE Wi-Fi anyone?!?) with an interactive app that let me search for vendors based on keyword searches. With the iPhone, it seemed reasonable to have it use the GPS built-in to the phone to give me directions. OK, that may be a bit much, but still, a way to see the show floor and know where I needed to go would save me from wandering.

Totally as an aside, I wanted a way to blog/post/Tweet about where the best swag (give away stuff) was at the various booths so we could get the good freebies.

Now think about this: what if your church offered that kind of interactivity through a free Wi-Fi system at your campuses? People could download a map, find where to take their kids, download a PDF of the sermon and .mp3’s of audio podcasts and worship services (with the proper licensing, of course). The possibilities are nearly endless and can, of course, extend to two-way interactivity.

In my next post, I’m going to step on the toes of my good friends at WFX. I love them dearly, but I want to share what I think is the major thing missing from WFX. Stay tuned!

This first post of the series will most likely be the shortest of the bunch, but perhaps (hopefully?) it will be the most commented of the bunch.

Today’s post is for two groups: those who attended WFX in Houston (or past WFX events) and those haven’t yet attended. Since that includes, well, everyone, I’m hoping this removes any barrier to posting! In fact, if you’d rather answer these questions on your own blog, please feel free to do so and post a comment below with a permalink.

There’s only one rule: You’ve gotta be completely, totally, flat-out honest.

What should a conference like WFX accomplish?

Specifically for those who attended:
Did WFX accomplish this goal?

What should be added, removed or changed about WFX?

What was the best thing about WFX for you?

Finally, I have a personal request:
If you attended any of my classes, please tell me the good, bad and ugly. I want to learn from you!

We had a very interesting and lively discussion today in what can only be described as the largest panel discussion I’ve ever been a part of. Lots of churches (well over 70% of the room when I polled) are looking at getting into some flavor of video venues. There were plenty of questions around the technology, but I hope that what they took home was asking “Why?” before they spend any money AND getting their focus off of the tech and on the people behind the tech.

I think some of my favorite moments were rethinking the live vs. taped (is it Memorex, anyone?) video venue. Great thoughts by Dennis Choy, perhaps the grandfather of video venues in churches, solid input from Steve Reed of Acoustic Dimensions, intrepid thoughts Brad Weston of Renewed vision and future pontificating from Peter Taylor of Barco projection.

I’ve got some other thoughts that I’m still chewing on, specifically in relation to what technologies will help take video venues to the next level. More to come…

I had the privilege of sharing the stage with Bruce Smith, the former tech director for Willow Creek, Dennis Choy, the tech director of North Coast church and Chuck Walthall, a renowned consultant. We had a class that asked great questions and spoke into more areas a good deal more than I anticipated. I hope that we were able to bring the ship around and really help drive home the key points of recruiting, training and retaining volunteers, a subject that is very close to my heart!

Here’s my notes from a presentation I did for this at the Spring WFX conference when I taught the class by myself:

WFX Volunteer Training Class

Enjoy!

I’ve gone ahead and posted my PDF files of the classes where I have a presentation ahead of time so that you can have the notes yourself. Enjoy!

WFX Volunteer Training Class

Essential Management Skills for Technical Directors

Video Director Commands Quick Guide

I’m sitting in front of Starbucks at the Houston Convention Center for the beginning of WFX. I think I’ve found the ONLY free wi-fi in the whole place!

Anywho, I had the privilege of hanging out with Dennis Choy, the Tech Director for North Coast Church in California, at a morning tech talk breakfast. He’s a great, affable guy that I respect greatly.

I’m headed to teach at the “How to Recruit, Train and Retain Tech Volunteers” panel discussion with Dennis Choy, Bruce Smith, Chuck Walthall and Don Allensworth. Coolness begins at 12:30.

If you’re in the class, be sure to Twitter your thoughts and I’ll post your twitters on the comments section below. Or, if you wanna go old school and actually comment yourself, bring it on!