StewaraPlain answers to the questions churches actually ask.
Practical writing for the people who keep a church running: the volunteer treasurer, the safety team lead, the administrator who inherited the books. Each one explains the subject first and our software second, and none of them expire.
SafetyWhy a church emergency alert can't just be a text message.Every phone in the room is on silent, and that is exactly the hour you need to reach people. What actually breaks through, and the questions to ask any vendor.About 7 min
Church financesHow to reconcile a church bank statement.Comparing notes with the bank, one line at a time: outstanding checks, deposits in transit, and why a stubborn difference is a clue rather than a verdict.About 9 min
Church financesWhy your deposit is a debit in your books and a credit at the bank.The same deposit is a debit in your books and a credit on the bank statement. Neither is a mistake, and understanding why is most of what double-entry asks of you.About 6 min
WorshipYour song library is bigger than your key filter says it is.Why filtering songs to one key throws away most of your library, and the two other keys you can reach without anybody rehearsing a transition.About 6 min
WorshipHow to put chord charts on an iPad and turn the pages with your foot.What a page-turner pedal actually is, why a PDF often cannot be paged by anything, and what to look for in a setup before you trust it on a Sunday.About 7 min
MissionsThe hard part of funding a mission trip is putting names back on the money.Youth camp, a summer trip, a teenager with a support letter. Why the church giving page is the wrong door for that money, and what to ask before it lands on somebody's tax document.About 11 min
CareCare doesn't get dropped by the person who noticed. It gets dropped in the handoff.Why "assigned" is a hope rather than a status, the four things a handoff has to carry, and the reason an escalation machine makes follow-up worse instead of better.About 10 min
Church staffMonday's staff meeting shouldn't start by rebuilding Sunday.Why a number your staff cannot reconstruct by hand is a number they will argue about instead of act on, and what a one-page Monday sheet should and should not be allowed to say.About 10 min
Church staffYou don't have another evening to give this.Why the cost of church software is the looking rather than the work, the one thing you must never let it automate, and the reason nobody is watching the person doing the watching.About 10 min
Comms“Send to all” is a number nobody checks.Three unrelated things stop a message reaching a member, and most tools report all three as one number. Why email and text obey opposite rules, and what to ask before you trust a system with two hundred people.About 10 min
PublishingNobody should have to find their own church in a list.Why a member should never be asked to identify their own church, what “branded app” means in the two places it means different things, and why a published church site should be frozen pages rather than a live query.About 11 min
WorshipYour set list is not evidence.Reporting is how the songwriter gets paid, and a set list records what you intended rather than what you sang. What makes a record you could defend, and what to ask before software reports for you.About 11 min