Resources e-letter 25:1 - January 2025

First of all my warmest good wishes for this new year and sincere thanks for your support. May Christian hope win over the despair of a suffering world in 2025.

This e-letter is a little different from ones sent to you in the past. I have now officially retired from client work, as of 1^st January, but will continue to write for my website and stay involved in a few specific work projects.

These e-letters will continue to come out but rather more sporadically than in the past. One of my retirement aims is to be free of deadlines so I will send out an e-letter as I upload new materials to the Resources section of my website. But there may not be as many as six a year sent neatly in alternate months as up to now. And I may give myself some time off in January and February!

I have plans to rewrite more of my training events into material for the website, and not surprisingly the site itself will need a redesign as I shall no longer be running events and taking bookings for consultancies.

So if you are happy to stay with me on this journey I hope to have plenty of new material for you from the Spring onwards, but if you feel you no longer wish to receive these e-letters all you need to do is to reply to this asking to unsubscribe.  

The Topics Index

With well over 200 printed items in the Resources section of my website it can be quite a job, as I know myself, trying to find what there might be on particular subjects. To save you having to check out long lists of materials, behold the Topics Index.

This lists all my materials on each of a long list of over 400 topics, with some cross referencing.

So if you want something on ‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ it will take you to TN60 but, more seriously, if you need something on ‘self-awareness’ it takes you to TN30, TN49 and TN94. If you are looking for help on ‘person profiles’ it suggests you try the links to A6, A38, A42, TN87 and TN114. And so on.

Other indexes enable you to search by numerical order of the Articles (A), Training Notes (TN) and Health-Checks (HC) and if you know the title of an item the alphabetical index comes to your rescue.  There are also indexes for each of my six main themes of Leadership, Management, Structures, Planning, Communication and Administration.

But I feel that the Topics Index is perhaps the most helpful. So do try it next time you want to know what I have written on ‘disability’, ‘discipleship’ or ‘display software’ – or anything else on my overall subject of church operations for that matter.
  

Succession planning

While I move away from the front line of national church operations and administration, others are taking over from me – with all kinds of gifts and experience that I lack (eg. tech skills or current experience in local church operations). Succession has been one of my prayers for the past ten years.

A few years ago I handed over the leadership of UCAN, the UK Church Administrators Network, to others who shared my vision for such work. They and their successors have taken it forwards in a way I could never have done. It is really thriving now thanks to their skill and enthusiasm. I still maintain one small link with UCAN in that I  tutor for ‘The Work of a Church Administrator’ distance learning course and that will continue.

But if you want consultancy advice or one-to-one help may I recommend two of my good friends.  Andy Bagwell now runs his own full-time consultancy after several years as a Director of Operations at two large Anglican churches – see https://www.andrewbagwell.com/about and Gavin Smith runs ‘The Church Office’ website and finds time for church consultancy while still working as the Operations Manager of a large independent church https://www.thechurchoffice.co.uk/contributors/gavin-smith.  Both have my firm support and recommendation. I am sure others will join them. 
  

Latest updated materials

I check and update all my resources every other year to keep them up-to-date. Here is a listing of resources I updated in December 2024.
  

Articles index page

A9         A church members’ newsletter – An idea for a new publication
A10       An introduction to the art of training – Help people learn
A20       Annual meetings can be different – Ideas to experiment with
A54       How to get a message across – A DIY training aid

Training Notes index page

TN21     Ideas for a sermon on administration
TN22     Appoint a church photographer!
TN33     Danger at church!
TN34     Closing down a church activity
TN71     Seatings for meetings
TN97     How to minute a meeting
TN112   Set my leaders free!
TN128   Effective staff meetings
TN129   Collecting data for mission
   

Health-checks index page

HC6       Christian Effectiveness Model – Introduction
HC7       Christian Effectiveness Model – Questions/tests

Please ensure all these materials are widely promoted in your church.  Thank you for your interest.