We are launching our third campus here at Liquid Church this fall in Montclair, NJ. [Want to learn more? Watch this video.] This will be the 9th campus I’ve worked directly in launching.  (Plus I’ve had influence on more through my advisory role with Multisite Solutions.) This week we are looking at the things we are changing in our approach to launching this next campus.

One of the biggest differences we are taking this time around is way we are rolling out the development of our leadership team for the launch of our next campus.  Because we are using a longer launch window [more on that here] we can take more time with our core leadership team to train and equip them for before the launch.

Today’s post has three critical elements of that training that I think every new multisite church needs to take it’s core volunteer leadership team through.

Broad Understanding of Your Approach to Ministry

• Meet monthly and give them exposure to every department, system and ministry structure at your church.  Even if these people are going to be leading within specific areas people need to know about what makes your church tick!
• Use this as a time to expose your key staff and leaders within the broader church to this new launch team.  Have them meet with the new team and talk through the core competencies that make that area work.

Engage them in the Recruiting

• In June this year we are hosting a series of “home meetings” in Montclair. The goal of these meetings is to gather 200+ people from the region to cast the vision for the new location, build community amongst the core and ask people to join a team.  Our core launch team is responsible for helping us pull these evenings together.
• Although a lot of the heavy lifting of these evenings and the recruiting will fall to our staff team . . . we do want the launch team engaged in the process because it increases the effectiveness of the ask and builds a higher sense of ownership with our volunteer leaders!

Take a Road Trip!

• At the core friendship and community is just shared experience. Taking your launch team away for a weekend to visit another church is like a microwave oven for relationships.  Work hard to try to make it as accessible as possible to the entire team and jump in the car or on the plane and go somewhere!
• Visiting a multisite church that’s a bit farther down the road is a great “excuse” for the roadtrip . . . it allows you help envision your people for what “could be” in the future as your church launches new locations!

Once you get in the weekly drive of Sunday services . . . you will have less time and energy to train your people.  Take the time before you launch to prepare your people well to not only lead in their specific area but also to be a leader for the entire campus.

I’d love your thoughts!  What training do you think is mission critical when launching a new campus? [Join the conversation!]

On Friday we’re going to be looking at some of the financial realities of launching a new campus . . . and some ways that we’re working to reduce our costs for this next launch.