You've chosen your strategy, now choose your team

Last week we shared how we are seeing churches lean into the new reality of online ministry. If you have not chosen your model for approaching digital ministry, you probably want to follow this link to learn about the five options that we are seeing.

Today, I want to share the four roles that we are seeing as being essential in doing digital ministry well (these come from our new resource that you can get here). While these roles may look different from church to church, and maybe staffed by full-time, part-time, volunteers, or virtual contractors, we are convinced that every church that is committed to embracing online church will have people managing each of these roles:

• Online Campus Pastor: This is your church's online strategy champion. They are the ones responsible for leading the team, developing volunteers, and igniting a passion to see online ministry thrive. They will often serve as the "face of the place," serving as the service host for your service offerings and will likely be the most well-known staff member for your online offerings. 
• Digital Discipleship Director: Your digital discipleship director is responsible to turning clicks and views into discipleship opportunities. This person leverages the technology available to engage your online congregation in practical discipleship in a way that aligns with your church's chosen online strategy. 
• Communications/Social Media Director: This teammate helps the world to hear about what your church is doing and how it does it. They will leverage all of your communication channels in a way that works to encourage people to take the next step in their walk with Jesus. They will work closely with the online campus pastor and digital discipleship director to make sure that the work that they are doing aligns with the church's overall online strategy.
• Online Weekend Service Producer: The producer helps pull it all together into a format that allows the world to see it. Not only does this person make sure that your video looks and sounds good, but they are also developing the team of people needed to create compelling content on a weekly basis. 

• Be Clear: Each of these roles look a little different based on the model that you choose to move forward with (more on that next week). Before you begin to staff these positions, you must know what you are attempting to do and what your goal is. 
• Be Flexible: Most churches are unable to go out and hire four full-time people for these roles. We are convinced that these roles can be staffed in a multitude of ways: full-time, part-time, volunteer, or even virtual staff can perform these roles if expectations are clearly communicated. These roles are also combinable, though I don't believe one person can do all four. 
• Be Committed: Every church has a limited budget and has to make tough decisions about where to invest their resources. If your church is expecting significant results, you will need to make a significant financial commitment as well. The definition of significant varies from church to church, though we believe it will be somewhere between 5% and 30% of a church's annual budget, depending on strategy.