Having the right team in place is important for guiding any type of project. It’s no different when it comes to your leadership team for a church building project. You need to assemble the right members to reflect your vision and set the right expectations for those joining the team. We’ve talked about who should be on your leadership team in an earlier article, so in this post we’ll focus on some very practical commitments you’ll need to ask from every team member.
Making a Long-Term Commitment to the Church Design Process
The first is to expect a long-term commitment from each member of the team. Taking a new church design or church building renovations project from incarnation through completion can take years, and you need the same people to stick around during the course of the project. Continuity is key because bringing new people up to speed takes time and can cause a loss of focus on the project’s forward path. You don’t want to backtrack to rehash decisions that have been thoroughly discussed because you have a new team member that doesn’t understand the reasons behind those decisions.
There are occasional exceptions when new membership can be beneficial, like when you realize you need more input from a ministry that you do not have represented already on the team. Otherwise, new perspectives later in the process are more likely to delay or derail a church design project than benefit it.
Keeping Your Church Design Discussions Private
Another expectation that needs to be clear with team members from the outset is the need for confidentiality. This is not because you don’t trust others, or want to keep secrets from the general church membership. It’s because there’ll be lots of brainstorming going on, and a lot of ideas will eventually be discarded for one reason or another. If team members talk about those discussions, especially ones that haven’t been finalized, you could find that members of your church are disappointed when something they heard about as a possibility doesn’t show up in the final church design. This does not mean you shouldn’t communicate information to the congregation. In some church cultures that would cause other problems with member buy in of the final design. The information you do communicate should be agreed upon by the leadership team so the message is unified and consistent.
Focusing on a Clear Ministry Vision for Your Church Building Project
Finally, you need to expect your team members to be visionary. This means being able to see beyond their own particular needs and desires for the church to focus on the good of the whole. To find visionary members for your team, think about members who have proven, over time, their investment in your church community. Not necessarily financial investment, although that does matter, but instead people who are faithful to and passionate about your church. They are the ones who support your church, talk about it to others, and share their excitement about what your church is doing.
To learn more about church design and building the right team, sign up for our free i3 webinar series. And if you have specific questions about forming the right team, reach out to ask us your question. We’ll be glad to help, because we know that forming the right team makes our job easier, too!