Tonight, I was cleaning out a bunch of junk out of my briefcase because I suddenly felt inspired to try to use it. It’s probably a good thing, since I currently have stuff that I take with me when I go work on a PC, in a gym bag. Hey, it made sense at the time, but for some reason, I’m thinking I need to do all I can to boost my image and appearance. Briefcases do not do much for me, but this one is decent, so I’m ok with that. Ultimately, nearly everything I am doing lately is an attempt to get organized and get a handle on what lies ahead. (I still have no clue what lies ahead but at least I’m not carrying around a gym bag!)
Anyway, in my briefcase I found the list I was given by the leadership in my church of the priorities needed in a new CMS (church management system). This is the list that was the starting point for my quest for the ultimate CMS. Of course, there is no ‘one size fits all’ CMS and each church needs to evaluate for themselves. In my case, we settled on FellowshipTech, but you may find something that suits your needs better.
I’m not sure if my list will benefit anyone at all, but here it is.
- Computer Check in/ event registration
- Log in from anywhere
- Contact management
- People management
- Volunteer management
- giftedness
- job description
- online giving
There was actually 14 but one of the points was not legible and what I could figure out didn’t make sense. This is from probably a year ago and there was much discussion around these points but it is literally what I had to start with. Here we are today, with F1 training in about 2 weeks and I think a January go-live date. It’s been an interesting couple of weeks around here but we seem to still be on track with rolling out F1. Very exciting times.
I’ve still got a couple of issues to work out with our check-in stations, plus a new PC just came in that will be a stationary checkin station, primarily for first time visitors. I plan to get that setup on Saturday, then get things ready for training. Hardwiring some of the kiosks is a real possibility now, thanks to those of you that offered insight on that, but I’ve got to work out the logistics on that. I agree that we don’t want to risk losing the signal once we are live. It was frustrating enough during the one test we did when that happened.
I don’t know if this list will help but it gives you an idea of where I began.