Monday Morning Checklist – Time to Begin General Enlistment

Back in September I suggested it was time to enlist a leadership team or steering committee to assist with planning, promotion, age-division leadership, decorations, and continued connections.
Now it is time for members of the leadership team to begin enlisting their individual teams. By enlisting your VBS team in January and February you are:

• increasing the number of VBS prayer warriors,
• removing the stress, anxiety, and scramble of last-minute enlistment,
• giving your leadership team time to enlist the right people for the right jobs instead of relying on desperate general appeals,
• getting workers committed early enough for them to receive adequate training,
• giving workers ample time to creatively prepare,
• elevating the importance of VBS by helping the congregation see VBS as a priority ministry worthy of long-range planning instead of being thrown together at the last minute,
• and, enlarging the team of promoters who are building enthusiasm and talking up VBS to the rest of the congregation and community.

Following are six steps for your enlistment process.

1. Meet with the leadership team to pray and create a list of needed positions. Think beyond the necessary Bible study and craft leaders to include greeters, security and custodial teams, pre-VBS prep teams, and positions for people who might be able to work only one hour of the VBS day or hours earlier or later than your VBS schedule (phone bank, room or snack prep, shoppers).
2. As a team begin placing names by each position. By completing this task as a team the same person does not get asked to fill multiple jobs, and a person who you would not think of might be suggested by another member of the leadership team.
3. Divide up the enlistment responsibility. Give each team member an equal number of people to contact.
4. Set a completion date within a few weeks of the day you begin. You do not want to drag out the process, plus it is helpful to let the people you are attempting to enlist know you need a commitment by a certain date.
5. Call the leadership team back together to review progress and to add additional jobs and potential workers to the list.
6. Begin the process again, and continue doing so until all positions are filled.