Last week we received an inquiry from an organization that “…is looking for a way to communicate with its workers throughout the world…”. Throughout the world. That’s awesome. Sure, your church and nonprofit has groups that need to get organized and share documents, calendars and messages, but you’re at least in the same town (usually). These folks are spread throughout the world.
They’re in different countries, with different resources, different timezones and different cultures. Stop and think about the possibility that these folks can easily access a shared calendar and receive automatic event reminders in their respective time zone. No matter where you are, if you have an internet connection, you can collaborate with your team. That sounds so obvious, almost naive. “Duh”, you say, “Welcome to the 21st century”. I know, but only when situations like this come along do I ponder how powerful the internet is and how it enables such awesome feats.
In particular, this organization is trying to spread the Gospel to regions of the world where “sharing one’s faith is illegal.” Their ministry and mission could endanger their ability to live the places they’ve been led. They need to be diligent and organized when it comes to communication and collaboration.
Here are just 5 ways international ministries can benefit from online collaborative tools:
Keep everyone informed and ensure this mission’s goals and vision are being shared.
Members feel more connected and have a greater sense of togetherness even when spread throughout the world!
Encourage each other in their efforts.
Allow new members to easily be brought up to speed by joining the online group and reading old messages, downloading forms and viewing member profiles
Share files, photos, calendars and member information with each other to keep everyone in sync
I don’t know about you, but I need to work on my listening skills. I love to learn and I learn best by audio. I play the drums by ear. I love to listen to music. I enjoyed school because I liked to listen to professors (well usually). But I cannot for the life of me listen to two things at the same time. It’s physically and literally almost impossible for me to listen to phone call and have my wife talking to me at the same time. It’s amazing to me how well women can multi-task when it comes to listening. She can do it, I cannot. If I have more than one stream of thought or information trying to enter my head it’s bound to fail. Unfortunately this is what Twitter and Facebook have become for me at times.
Lately, I feel like I’m drinking from the fire hose with Twitter. It’s so hard to find the information that’s relevant to me and my business while also keeping track of personal events for friends, family and colleagues. I often feel like I am not communicating through these mediums.
What about you are, are you really communicating with Facebook and Twitter? Do you feel like you’re getting a valuable exchange of information?
Almost everything in your life can be digital now. It’s quite amazing actually. As a family we rarely print pictures any more. Even the ones that we want to share get loaded onto a digital picture frame and proudly displayed in the middle of our house. I figure we’re saving a lot of trees; considering how many pictures we take of our 2 year old.
As true as this is for most folks, there are still a bunch of organizations that haven’t gone “digital”. One of them that is trying is the pre-school that my daughter is in. These teachers and coordinators pour their lives into these children. They teach them to pray before meals, teach them manners, how to act socially around other children, and there are endless games and crafts that help develop our children physically and spiritually. But they definitely go through lots of paper.
Sure craft-time causes them to use construction paper like it’s going out of style, but it’s much more than that. The entire parent directory, which changes drastically every year is printed and bound. There aren’t many days that go by that an announcement is sent home on pink or green sheet of paper. There is one teacher that even burns cd’s for each parent with pictures of the kids. The photos are named by each kid and sorted appropriately. I’m thinking pre-school programs could be quite the market for MemberHub.
Here are 5 ways that pre-schools and teachers can save moneyand trees by using online group communication tools:
Allow parents to share and maintain their profile information online
Send announcements via email and text messaging
Upload all files, forms and parent tips into a common area; online
Share photos online
Encourage parents to share ideas, ask questions and generally connect online
Certainly this is just the beginning of the list. Can you think of any more? If you’re a pre-school or elementary teacher or a parent of young children in these programs I’d love for you to leave a comment and share more ideas below.
Check out the tweets from @milleemassey last week. Whether you’re involved with a church, nonprofit, association or generally looking for valuable information you’re sure to find a link or two in here that you must read!
How much time is WASTE D on Social Networks? http://bit.ly/vR5Lx – chk out MemberHub, a private place to do business & enhance communication8:06 AM May 27thfrom web
Tribute to Small Group Leaders: http://bit.ly/fTxaG // Small grp leaders, what are you using to keep your group connected & communicating?7:48 AM May 26thfrom web
I just read an excellent article on the importance of nonprofits keeping their volunteers engaged. This very factual and informative writeup suggests the following:
“Nonprofits rely heavily on volunteers, but most CEOs do a poor job of managing them. As a result, more than one-third of those who volunteer one year do not donate their time the next year—at any nonprofit. That adds up to an estimated $38 billion in lost labor. To remedy this situation, nonprofit leaders must develop a more strategic approach to managing this overlooked and undervalued talent pool.”
$38 billion…wow. I don’t have actual numbers, but I’m willing to bet that this problem exists in all types of organizations. Churches need to keep their ministries and members involved, associations need to keep their members active, and schools need to keep the parents engaged. We’re even learning that fitness and wellness programs are having more success if they provide tools to connect their members better.
Managing members is more than just keeping data about them. Technology can help all types of member-driven organizations in the following ways:
It keeps everyone informed and ensures that vision and goals are shared
Communication channels are clear and everyone knows how to reach the group and each other
Members feel more connected and have a greater sense of community
It encourages participation and sharing of ideas, which leads to refinement of objectives
Instant communication to users cell phones with text messaging can save much time
These are just a few examples. How is technology helping your nonprofit, church, association or member-driven organization? What can we do to help?
Many of you know @milleemassey. For those of you that follow her on Twitter, you’re already well aware of her knack for sorting through 100′s of tweets and finding those nuggets of goodness that deserve to be passed on and retweeted. For MemberHub customers you may just know her as the friendly account representative that answers all your questions.
Either way, check out the tweets that she shared last week. You’re sure to find a link or two in here that you must read!
“Life is too short to waste. Dreams are fulfilled only through action, not through endless planning to take action.” (via@mikehanes)12:07 PM May 11thfrom TweetDeck
Many of you know @milleemassey. For those of you that follow her on Twitter, you’re already well aware of her knack for sorting through 100′s of tweets and finding those nuggets of goodness that deserve to be passed on and retweeted. For MemberHub customers you may just know her as the friendly account representative that answers all your questions.
Either way, check out the tweets that she shared last week. You’re sure to find a link or two in here that you must read!
When things seem to be falling apart God is actually arranging things so we will see who He is & recog HIM as our source! (via @duff85710)1:23 PM May 7thfrom TweetDeck
Many of you know @milleemassey. For those of you that follow her on Twitter, you’re already well aware of her knack for sorting through 100′s of tweets and finding those nuggets of goodness that deserve to be passed on and retweeted. For MemberHub customers you may just know her as the friendly account representative that answers all your questions.
Either way, check out the tweets that she shared last week. You’re sure to find a link or two in here that you must read!
Seminaries face unique challenges. Secular universities and colleges are up to their eyeballs in the new world of communications that include social media outlets like Twitter and Facebook. There are few if any filters on these offerings and they generally pose more problems for a seminary environment than they do solutions.
Does that mean that seminaries are to be left in the Dark Ages with regard to communication? Let’s hope not. One of the main needs for future pastors and church leaders is to be in constant communication with their peers and to learn how to best handle the church congregation of the 21st century. It ain’t like your grandaddy’s church anymore .
One way that future church leaders can be prepared is to have more modern means of communication within the seminary environment itself. Of course you can provide courses to help students learn the ins and outs of how the new world communicates (and even reads the Bible for that matter) but there is nothing like learning by doing.
While seminaries are often strapped for capital to implement these types of programs there are now web based software apps that can help facilitate the communication necessary to help them grow as leaders. Of course, MemberHub is one of those options (you didn’t expect me to not say anything about that now did you?).
Here are 3 very simple yet powerful applications for web based communication tools that should be considered.
Classes can have collaborative activities that strengthen their learning and help to reinforce what is covered in the class
Seminary wide communication can be taken beyond just e-mail lists and there can more information disseminated in a more efficient and effective manner
Seminary staff and departments can have greater continuity with less face to face meetings and more time doing what they do best; equipping.
Is your seminary living in the past in the way that it communicates with students and staff? Could there be greater learning and preparing taking place if there were quicker and cleaner communication for these groups? Could seminaries be using software to help improve communications and prepare students for using technology once they go out to shepherd their flocks?
Ok, so I’m mostly doing this post as a test. But, this video is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen about Twitter. Seriously, there’s so much humor and truth in this thing. Watch this!
Posted by Matt Harrell on August 24th, 2009 | 
Last week we received an inquiry from an organization that “…is looking for a way to communicate with its workers throughout the world…”. Throughout the world. That’s awesome. Sure, your church and nonprofit has groups that need to get organized and share documents, calendars and messages, but you’re at least in the same town (usually). These folks are spread throughout the world.
I don’t know about you, but I need to work on my listening skills. I love to learn and I learn best by audio. I play the drums by ear. I love to listen to music. I enjoyed school because I liked to listen to professors (well usually). But I cannot for the life of me listen to two things at the same time. It’s physically and literally almost impossible for me to listen to phone call and have my wife talking to me at the same time. It’s amazing to me how well women can multi-task when it comes to listening. She can do it, I cannot. If I have more than one stream of thought or information trying to enter my head it’s bound to fail. Unfortunately this is what Twitter and Facebook have become for me at times.
As true as this is for most folks, there are still a bunch of organizations that haven’t gone “digital”. One of them that is trying is the pre-school that my daughter is in. These teachers and coordinators pour their lives into these children. They teach them to pray before meals, teach them manners, how to act socially around other children, and there are endless games and crafts that help develop our children physically and spiritually. But they definitely go through lots of paper.
Check out the tweets from 
$38 billion…wow. I don’t have actual numbers, but I’m willing to bet that this problem exists in all types of organizations. Churches need to keep their ministries and members involved, associations need to keep their members active, and schools need to keep the parents engaged. We’re even learning that fitness and wellness programs are having more success if they provide tools to connect their members better.
