Creating a TEAM HANDBOOK for your Creative Culture.
In my experience, so much tension and turnover in church cultures stems from a lack of healthy and honest communication of values and expectations. I have commonly found myself in an office having a hard conversation with a disillusioned team member or a frustrated leader and can trace it back to a lack of understanding when it comes to our ‘why’. As leaders, we sometimes believe that culture is caught and not taught… In reality, it’s both.
“If we believe that culture is the sum of what you communicate, demonstrate, celebrate and tolerate then when there’s a breakdown in our culture it’s important to reverse engineer the frustration and determine where in that culture building motif there was a missed element.”
One of the best ways that you can explicitly communicate your desires for the people who serve on the teams that make your culture special is to put together a team handbook. Sounds dry and boring? Sounds legalistic or authoritative? Believe me, your team and your church will thank you for it. This is the first step towards building the foundations of a culture that is both healthy and productive. What a shock! You mean to say that you can have a healthy culture where things actually get done with excellence and impact? Correct.
Before we get too stuck in, I’ve got a FREE COPY of a Team Handbook that I’ve already created waiting for you.
The most successful leaders will commonly mark their process back to two key components: intentionality and communication. As much as working with people — commonly volunteers who are otherwise incredibly busy and come with their own host of experiences, preconceived notions of church, culture and leadership — can make for some long days and sleepless nights, I’m a firm believer that we can sometimes be our own worst enemy as leaders. As I help leaders work through tensions with team members, the first comment that is usually made as a preface is, ‘I’m shocked that they thought that that would be ok.’ To which my response is, ‘did you ever actually tell them that it wasn’t?’
So, it doesn’t have to be the most stunning piece of art you’ve ever created… It could be a black-and-white print out on 8 1/2 x 11. Let the record show, I think you can easily do better than that but whatever… The key to this is CONTENT. This document will give you a baseline for existing team members to work towards and will also serve as a great first step in your onboarding process for new creatives. When it comes to correction or discipline, this handbook will be a lifesaver because there will be no excuse for someone not understanding your expectations as a leader. When it comes to scaling, this can be a benchmark to determine if the way that you are developing and resourcing your team members is actually working.
Ok — let’s get stuck in — here are some key ingredients that I believe are essential to your team’s handbook.
01 — MISSION & VALUES
Your team handbook is a great opportunity for you to re-state your church’s mission statement and core values. Your creative teams should always exist and work within the purpose of your larger church community. Just because sometime is attending your church or joining a team doesn’t mean that they have internalized these important axioms. Any chance you can get to reiterate them is valuable. These create culture and culture feeds vision. The inverse of that statement is also true… Culture will eat your vision for breakfast if it’s weak and hungry.
I’m a pretty big proponent that the right language is integral to building culture. Poor stewardship or use of language can undermine years of hard work. Your most important statements that pertain to mission and values should be prominently posted throughout your building, social, website, print media, signage, etc. If, as you go to build out this document for your team, you realize that you don’t know these statements OR they haven’t been defined yet, I would encourage you to put this handbook journey on pause and go to the drawing board with the leadership of your church to put some of these down. You’ll most likely find a lot of resources already available for you that help to give language to articulate things that you already know to be true. Remember, another word for cheesy is memorable; you don’t need to reinvent the wheel or write the next Dickens novel, you’re simply looking to search for the reasons that you exist as a church and record them in a consolidated statement.
02 — TERMS & DEFINITIONS
Ok ok, this is where you’re probably like, ‘Jon’s a full send word-smith-ing nerd.’ To which I would say, ‘correct.’ Ha!
Never take someone’s understanding of a specific and significant word for granted. They may come from another church background with different expectations OR they might be new to serving in church and craving some clarity. The goal of this handbook is that it is self-explanatory.
A great example of this is the term ‘call time’. Many church cultures use it but rarely is there a universally accepted understanding of what it actually means. When I worked at Movement Church, we would say that call time — for musicians — means that when Front-Of-House (FOH) calls your name you are ready to give a sound check. So that means that if call time is 7:00am, most musicians are probably arrived anywhere from 6:30am to 6:45am so that they can settle in, grab a coffee, load-in their gear, tune and be ready for sound check. In other cultures, call time is when you are expected to be walking in the door OR more a loosely held time to be on stage and getting into a team huddle. In almost every email that I would send for our weekend teams I would remind of our definition for call time so that there was no confusion as to when they were expected to be present for a service.
Having a hard time thinking about potentially confusing terms for your culture? Ask yourself, ‘what do I find myself repeating on a weekly basis with most of my team members?’ Your existing team can probably help with answering this question too.
03 — SPIRITUAL EXPECTATIONS
The most important commitment that a team member has in serving the church is to their journey of with Jesus. This may be a point of contention but, in my opinion, if the goal of serving is to bring people to a great revelation of God then I think each team member should have an active and thriving relationship with Jesus. In other words, I think someone should be a Christian before they serve in your church’s environment. But hey, maybe for some teams that’s an area that you’re willing to concede for the sake of getting someone plugged in with some ownership. Your culture, your conversation.
This section might include…
Public profession of personal faith (i.e. baptism).
Completion of church-led introduction course (i.e. Alpha, GrowthTracks, NextSteps, StartingPoint, etc.).
Character in agreement with church’s theological and value statement.
Regular attendance at weekend services and additional events (i.e. team nights, worship nights, small groups, etc.).
O4 — PERSONAL EXPECTATIONS
Here’s where some pretty difficult conversations can come into play, especially if you’re explicitly inserting these expectations into a pre-existing team. All I can say is this, ‘keep the why central.’ Make these as specific or as vague as you feel comfortable with. These will be the most difficult to describe without sounding passive aggressive or offending some people AND will probably be hard to enforce in the early days. Each individual is signing up to be a part of a team and there are elements of personal preference or expression that are sacrificed for the sake of their team’s mission and purpose.
This section might include…
Communication standards (i.e. how long it takes you to text/email leadership back).
Dress code expectations while serving.
Personal presentation while in community or online (i.e. what you can or cannot post on social media).
Frequency expectations for serving opportunities.
Quick aside — forgive me for coming on a little strong here but — I believe that volunteers who only want to serve once a month is useless, especially when it comes to creative teams that require certain skills and crafts to be stewarded well. Think of it this way… If you’re only serving once a month you’re going to be on team 12 times a year. Let’s say one service is cancelled for weather, then you get sick and you’re great aunt’s birthday is on a Sunday… So maybe 9 times in all actuality? Would I want my kids to sign up for piano lessons that were only 9 times a year? Or to be on a basketball team that only have 9 games in a whole season? I think not. Ok, thanks for letting me get that off my chest…
05 - CREATIVE EXPECTATIONS
The tension of this section is, and always will be, calling people to a high standard of creativity that will benefit them, serve your church’s vision and edify your community while also making it accessible for normal people who have careers, families and other commitments. But don’t let that daunt you, because I think this is a great opportunity for you to set the pace for how seriously people steward their craft on your team. You get to decide what they need to already know or be able to do and what you’re willing to equip them with or train them in. People want to be called to a level of high standards; they want to be a part of something that is great. The mark of a good leader is your willingness to resource and equip them to reach your expectations.
This section might include…
Expectations for gear that is personally owned and used.
Knowledge of craft or skill related to the serving opportunity.
Thresholds for experience or confidence before joining team.
Audition, shadowing or training requirements.
