No matter how long a lead team meeting is you need to have an agenda, and pre-service meetings are no different.  But what should you talk about in those meetings?  How do you make them engaging and enjoyable so that your volunteers are willing to show up 30-45 minutes before the service, just to meet?

I’ve already written how to boost your team with a pre-service meeting, so in this post, I’ll give my outline I’ve used for years to have a successful pre-service meeting your volunteers will love to attend.

1. Keep it Personal

As a task-oriented person, I naturally gravitate to talking about the work instead of checking on people first.  However, as John Maxwell says, people don’t care how much you know until you show how much you care.  So, at the beginning of the meeting or even before you start, spend some time to talk to your people.  Follow up on news they shared last week or something you saw on social media.  Ask them about their families or their work.  Practice eye contact and ask questions. 

If you’re group is small enough you can go around the room or just open it up for a few minutes of conversation.  You don’t want this to feel forced.  Focus on organic conversation.  Not everyone will share, but just taking the time for one or two goes a long way.

2. Share the wins

It has been said many times that which is celebrated is repeated.  So, after you finish with the conversations, call everyone to order and start off with what was successful in the last week.  This is a great time to talk about salvations, baptisms, guest flow, and/or attendance.  If you saw one of your volunteers go above and beyond, tell the story and thank them for their service. 

People want to know that what they’re doing is making a difference, so tell them about it.  It’s your job as the leader to collect these stories and share them.  Even if you feel like you don’t have any, just start looking.  If you’re not looking for something, you’ll never find it.

As you continue to share your wins, you may have other volunteers share their stories with you, giving you even more stories.  Everyone likes to win so share your scoreboard and celebrate.

3. Give the outline for the day

There are special days and there are just another Sundays. You may have been thinking about the service all week, but I can almost guarantee you, your volunteers have not.  Even if you share the service order in Planning Center, take a few minutes to go over it.  What songs are you singing? What is the sermon about? What special elements, if any, you’re planning to use? 

Getting everyone on the same page and knowing what’s coming builds morale and camaraderie. Your volunteers are there to help, but they need to know how.  Tell them what’s happening. Let them ask questions.  Delegate tasks and take their suggestions.  There have been many times I’ve come into this meeting with a rough outline of a special element and my volunteers make it better. 

Invite your volunteers to be a part of the process and marvel at what they can do.

4. Things to look out for

This goes along with the outline for the day, but there are other elements to the service that support what you’re doing.  Things like connect cards, guest reception, Growth Track, or special events coming up.  Your volunteers are part of your core group and bring the energy and excitement to the rest of the congregation. 

Letting them know what’s coming before everyone else helps build buy-in before you announce it from the stage. Use the pre-service meeting to answer questions and get them excited.  Then when you make the big announcement from the stage, your volunteers can back you up and get their circles of influence on board as well.

5. Prayer/Prayer Requests

Depending on the size of your group, you can open the floor for prayer requests.  This time doesn’t need to be long.  Just take one or two and move on.  A lot of times when people begin to share requests others come to mind and your request time can drag on for what feels like forever.

In addition, prayer request time can become gossip and/or story time.  You want to keep meeting moving, but still show you care.  If your group is too big or you’re short on time, you can mention a request you heard earlier that week or one of your volunteers shared with you before that meeting and pray for that. 

To close the meeting, pray with everyone for the service, for God to move, for people to come to Christ.  Sunday morning is your greatest opportunity all week to preach the gospel.  Your volunteers are doing that with every handshake, hug, smile, and cup of coffee.  Invite Christ into the room and watch God move.

Your pre-service meeting doesn’t have to be complicated and can be done in 5 to 15 minutes.  Using this outline will help you get your volunteers to attend week after week.  It doesn’t waste their time, keeps them in the know, and let’s them know how much you care and appreciate them.

You can read more about the why behind your pre-service meeting here.

Related Posts

Get resources to lead well in your ministry.