posted by Joel Southerland

When a special day, project, meeting or event looms on the horizon it can create great amounts of stress for the pastor. The planning, promoting, and organizing can add to the workload of an already frazzled minister (not sure if “frazzled” is a word but you know it when you’re in it).

One of the solutions I have found is to choose project managers for these types of events. When I have a special event or project, I use a lay volunteer to be the Project Manager and Coordinator. The PMC meets with me to get my vision of the project, and they begin the task of putting it all together. You may think this risky, but I’ve found that they often go far beyond my expectations.

Whey they have a question, it can usually be handled through a quick phone call, meeting, text or email. A week or two before the event - or “due date,” if it’s a project - we have our final meeting to go over everything in detail.

It works seamlessly. Our goal is to have a project manager for every event we do. And, we want to keep the PMC from year to year. That way, they can be thinking about their one event (instead of my 65) all year long.

Pastor, whatever your next big day is, look for a volunteer to be the PMC and follow this plan:

• Choose a volunteer that has the capabilities to handle the project. If you are unsure, take a gamble on someone about whom you feel relatively confident.

• Have an initial meeting with them to go over all of the details - date, budget, etc.

• In this initial meeting, paint a picture of what you would like the event to look like, what you would like to accomplish with the event, and explain why the event is important.
• Give them the first task to do and set a regular schedule of “check-backs” where the PMC will contact you and give you an update.

• Work with the PMC through the regular updates to continue to iron out the details.

• One or two weeks before the event hold a meeting to go over final details.

• During the event, if possible, give the PMC credit for all of their hard work.

• After the event, hold a meeting to go over what went right and what needs to be corrected before the next event (if it is reoccurring). Encourage the PMC to work on ideas to improve the event throughout the year.

If you’ll do all of that, you’ll get to keep your clean desk!