{"id":3116,"date":"2013-06-27T19:57:53","date_gmt":"2013-06-28T02:57:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/?p=3116"},"modified":"2013-06-28T04:51:59","modified_gmt":"2013-06-28T11:51:59","slug":"5-essential-mid-year-trends-church-leaders-must-be-tracking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/2013\/06\/27\/5-essential-mid-year-trends-church-leaders-must-be-tracking\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Essential Mid-Year Trends Church Leaders Must be Tracking"},"content":{"rendered":"

Get out your pencil and a ruler.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s time to examine your trend lines.<\/p>\n

We are midway through the calendar year, and that means you need to check in on a few vital trends and indicators in your church.<\/p>\n

At the six month mark there is still time to take corrective measures. You can still finish 2013 with all the essential lines pointing up and to the right.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The question is, what are those essential trend lines you should be checking?<\/p>\n

Well, let\u2019s assume you are already on top of \u201cthe big 3\u201d: Attendance, finances and conversions\/baptisms. Hopefully you are getting these reports monthly, if not weekly.<\/p>\n

At the midway point of the year, the trend lines you need to be watching do not necessarily lend themselves to clean metrics.<\/p>\n

Some of these trend lines are discerned more by paying attention to key insiders or to your own leadership instincts. But you need to have a sense as to where these are pointing.<\/p>\n

For each of the following, draw out a trend line starting from January 1st<\/sup> and extending through June 30th<\/sup> and beyond.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>The \u2018volunteer engagement\u2019 trend<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>Since January 1st<\/sup>, have volunteers tended to become more, or less, engaged with your church? Is recruitment getting harder or easier?<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>The \u2018stakeholder commitment\u2019 trend<\/strong><\/p>\n

From board members to donors, is their commitment to the vision of the church increasing or decreasing? You shouldn\u2019t have to guess.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>The \u2018staff performance\u2019 trend<\/strong><\/p>\n

Overall, which way is staff performance heading?<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>The \u2018community impact\u2019 trend<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since January 1st<\/sup> has the level of impact your church has been making in the community been on the rise, or on the decline?<\/p>\n

5.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong>The \u2018spiritual transformation\u2019 trend<\/strong><\/p>\n

Has your congregation\u2019s hunger for scripture, prayer, worship, and so on, been growing, or tapering off?<\/p>\n

After you’ve examined the trends, you need to ask:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat will we do about it?\u201d<\/p>\n

You see, on June 30th<\/sup>, there\u2019s still plenty of time to make a mid-course correction. Each of these trends can finish pointing up and to the right.<\/p>\n

So, \u00a0get out your pencil and ruler.<\/p>\n

And get tracking.<\/p>\n

What other trends do you check midway through the year?<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Get out your pencil and a ruler. It\u2019s time to examine your trend lines. We are midway through the calendar year, and that means you need to check in on a few vital trends and indicators in your church. At the six month mark there is still time to take corrective measures. You can still…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,738,478,7,777,580],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church","category-effectiveness-2","category-featured","category-leadership","category-metrics-2","category-results-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3116"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3123,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3116\/revisions\/3123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}