If you’re a church leader, you probably spend a lot of time dealing with various ministry teams or committees. Whether you’ve got committees to chair, manage, or attend, you likely work with numerous groups of volunteers who are helping your church thrive and grow.
Committees are sometimes necessary, and are sometimes great—but they can also be a problem.
The adage “Too many cooks spoil the soup” can apply when you have too many committees working on your church remodeling or building project.
Every Church Building Project Needs a Leadership Team
The McKnight Group’s church architect, Philip Tipton, has accumulated numerous stories—often cautionary tales—about churches that have had varying approaches to committee responsibilities. Philip offered some good advice during a recent free i3 webinar.
You probably won’t be surprised to read he believes a church building project will work best when the church designates a single committee to handle the task.
A single committee makes it a lot easier for a church construction company like The McKnight Group to interface with your church and understand its needs and priorities.
When the members of your committee are authorized to communicate with members of our team, it helps keep the project moving forward and the marching orders synchronized.
The Pitfalls of Multiple Committees
Now for one of Philip’s cautionary tales. There once was a church that had a long-range vision committee. That committee developed the idea of a church remodeling project, then handed its vision off to the phase-one building committee, which got the project started and hired a building contractor.
Problems occurred partway through, however, when the phase-one building committee completed its work and handed the project off to the finance committee.
The finance committee had not discussed the long-range vision or developed the design. Nor had it been involved in hiring the building contractor. It had the power of the purse, but hadn’t been included in the vision or the reasoning behind the decisions that had been made so far.
The contractor, on the other hand, experienced mental whiplash when trying to communicate the church renovation project to people who only cared about the bottom line.
And that wasn’t all. Later, the finance committee handed off the project to the interior design committee to oversee the finishing touches, so there was another committee that needed to be included in the process.
Every Church Construction Project Needs One Leadership Team that Understands the Mission
We hope this story illustrates why we believe that one single leadership team should remain involved with a church building or remodeling project from beginning to end, vision through completion. As we said in another post, the makeup of this team is critically important to the success of your venture.
If your church needs to have a long-range vision committee, a phase-one building committee, a finance committee, and an interior design committee, that can work. But be sure to designate at least one member who serves on all the committees to help with communication and continuity. Or be sure to designate one member of each of those committees to be on the building committee.
That way the needs of each of those committees are represented in a single group that is empowered to work on the project from beginning to end, understanding exactly how your church vision will be realized in your successful building project.
Find Out More
To learn more about the power and perils of committees, as well as other aspects of church remodeling and building projects, visit our website. There, you can also take advantage of our i3 webinar series—just sign up! They’re all free.