Guest Services

What Are Your Combustion Points?

By Casey Ross / Director of Ministry Services / Browns Bridge Community Church We have a problem at our Browns Bridge church. It’s the kind of problem that can turn a guest’s great experience into a bad experience. Mom and dad can love our worship service. Little Johnny can love UpStreet. Little Suzy can love Waumba Land. And that positive feeling can go away by what happens next. Traffic. When we built Browns Bridge, we only built one exit off the campus. Trying to move guests off the campus in a safe and timely manner is not easy. We have had traffic engineers, traffic experts, Parking Team volunteers, and many others give us feedback and ideas. The bottom line is we’re doing the best we can with what we have. Traffic is a “combustion point” we deal with every Sunday. Combustion point is a term Disney uses to define… “spots where even a finely tuned process can break down and, instead of contributing to a positive customer experience, begin to turn a guest’s good day into a bad one. It’s impossible to completely eliminate combustion points, but the goal is to stop them from turning into explosion points.” (*page 24) Can you guess Disney’s combustion points? One are the long lines guests stand in waiting for a ride or attraction. Another is a guest remembering where they parked their vehicle at the end of a long day. Good experiences can turn bad at these points. It is important that your church identifies your combustion points. Disney says look for those places where guests… complain consistently get stuck in your systems have common issues and problems Traffic is not Browns Bridge’s only combustion point. Another example is the time it takes to join a small group. We officially only have four times each year when people can join a small group (two GroupLinks and two Access Group seasons.) This means people often have to wait to get into a small group. Combustion point. If you’re still having trouble determining what your church’s combustion points are, Disney has found that combustion points are commonly found in four areas: guest flow staff/volunteer-to-guest communication guests with special needs poor process design A combustion point in your church could be how guests register for your kid’s environments or how you communicate with guests who want to volunteer. It could be any number of things. It’s important that you identify them. Maybe you can eliminate the problem. Maybe you can soften the combustion point by making the experience less painful. People lead your church. And people attend your church. It will never be perfect. There are systems and processes that frustrate your guests. Your guests are aware of them. Are you? What can you do to create a better experience for them? * For more information and discussion on combustion points and other Guest Services topics, see the Disney Institute’s book Be Our Guest: Perfecting the Art of Customer Service.

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Anyone Can Serve In Guest Services And That Can Cause Tension

By Casey Ross / Director of Ministry Services / Browns Bridge Community Church "I can't believe you let him greet people at the front door of your church! Do you know what he does on Friday nights?" Family Ministry requires a background check. Group Life requires an application. Care Network requires an interview. Not just anyone can volunteer in these areas. It's no secret, however, that Guest Services makes it easy for people to volunteer. Just about anyone can be a Guest Services volunteer, and that can cause tension. Not every volunteer role should be open to just anyone, but we believe there should be some entry level roles for those new to church or new to volunteering. Why do we believe Guest Services is a good team on which to have entry level volunteer roles? Volunteers are not relating to or directly working with kids. Volunteers are not leading others spiritually. Volunteers are not leading other volunteers. Our Guest Services Captains, however, are volunteers who lead other volunteers. They go through apprenticing and an interview and have specific qualifications (i.e. experience, church membership) to serve in that role. Not every Guest Services role is an entry level role. By allowing almost anyone to serve within Guest Services, it creates a tension we have to manage. What if a volunteer, who represents our church, is living a lifestyle during the week that does not line up with the values of our church? It's a tension we're okay with. Why do we see this as a tension to manage instead of a problem to solve? If he is actively volunteering,... he's not at the lake, playing golf, watching TV, etc. on Sunday morning. We want church to be irresistible and his choice to be here is one indication that we're accomplishing that goal. he's identified himself with our church and our Guest Services team. There is something appealing, engaging, and helpful about the church and this team that makes him want to be here! we can influence him. If he's on the team, he's giving us permission to speak into his life. If we become aware of a lifestyle concern, we can have a conversation with him. we can invest in him. If he's on the team, he is building relationships with others who can pour into his life. we can lead him into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. That is, after all, our mission with every person who walk through our doors. Let's be honest, he's not the only volunteer in the church making poor decisions and representing our church poorly. People are messy. No one is as clean as they appear. Instead of communicating to him that he cannot be a part of what is happening at our church, we want to give him appropriate opportunities to take a step into our church. Some Guests Services volunteer roles give him that opportunity.

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Who Should Lead Guest Services At Your Church?

By Casey Ross / Director of Ministry Services / Browns Bridge Community Church I get very excited about Guest Services in our church and in your church. Why do I get so excited? There are a number of reasons, but there is a clear number one reason. Here it is...Guest Services is the only team at our church and at your church who influences every single guest (all ages and all stages of life) on a Sunday morning. No one else, not even the Sr. Pastor, can say that. Think about it. The preschool environment influences preschoolers and their parents. The middle school environment influences middle schoolers and their parents. The worship leader and Sr. Pastor influence the people who come into the auditorium. But the Guest Services team influences every person who pulls onto your campus. Someone once said, "The sermon begins in the parking lot." They're right! But I'd add, "Everything begins in the parking lot." With this kind of influence, a very important question is "Who should lead Guest Services at your church?" The answer is, "Someone." Someone at your church should be leading Guest Services. It's too important not to give it leadership. On our campuses, it's a full-time or part-time staff person. It doesn't have to be a paid staff person, though. It just needs to be someone who can lead it well. It needs to be someone who cares about the guest experience at your church. Regardless of the size of your church, there are specific things the Guest Services leader will need to do... Oversee all the systems (parking, traffic, greeting, seating, etc.) that make up Guest Services. Cast vision to new and existing volunteers. Constantly evaluate the overall guest experience at your church. Train new volunteers. Lead and care for volunteer leaders who lead and care for their volunteer teams. So, who would be great at leading Guest Services at your church? Hopefully someone just came to mind. If not, talk to some of the other leaders at your church about who is the right person to lead this area. Then give them a call today and invite them to lead the most influential area of your church!

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Managing A Tension In Guest Services

By Casey Ross / Director of Ministry Services / Browns Bridge Community Church There is a tension in Guest Services. It's not a problem that needs to be solved. It's a tension we have to learn to manage. Our Guest Services teams (Parking Team, Host Team, Usher Team, Information Team) welcome, inform, and serve every guest who comes onto our campus and into our buildings on Sundays. We place our volunteers at strategic locations from the parking lots to the hallways to the aisles in the auditorium so they can interact with as many guests as possible. We don't want anyone to not be influenced in some way by one of our Guest Services volunteers. And here is where the tension happens every Sunday. Not every guest wants to be welcomed, informed, and served by our Guest Services volunteers. Some people want to be left alone. Some people want to remain anonymous. Some people need their space. It's important we realize this about people. So how do we manage this tension? Here are some of the ways we try: We teach our Guest Services volunteers to look for nonverbal signals that a guest needs assistance. At Browns Bridge, we've learned guests who need help often look up...maybe they're taking everything in, maybe they're looking for signage, or maybe they're asking God for help. We make all Guest Services volunteers very easy to identify so a guest knows who to approach for help. At Browns Bridge, we require all Guest Services volunteers to wear the same t-shirt we provide to them. We instruct our Guest Services volunteers to not go "over the top" in how they welcome people. For instance, we don't want them hugging or high-fiving every guest who walks by you. We typically do not approach a guest. Instead, we let the guest approach us. It's a tension we have to manage. I'm sure there are times we do not go far enough in helping a guest. And I am sure there are times we go too far in helping a guest. But most of the time we want to live in the middle of the tension where we welcome, inform, and serve every guest in just the right way for them. This tension within Guest Services exists where you are. How are you managing it?

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A Hole In Guest Services

By Casey Ross / Director of Ministry Services / Browns Bridge Community Church Browns Bridge has been open a little over three years. We have amazing volunteers on our Parking Teams, Host Teams, and Information Center Teams. We have the best leadership over Guest Services...I can say that because it is not me. Over the last year, we have really become intentional about focusing on not only the how of Guest Services but also the why of Guest Services. So you would think we have Guest Services pretty much figured out. We don't. We have discovered a significant hole in Guest Services. How did we discover this hole? Waumba Land, our preschool environment, made us aware of the hole. Apparently a number of first time guests have been walking into our building, feeling uncertain about where to go, and have been coming to our preschool check-in area to get help. Our preschool volunteers have done a tremendous job of helping these guests, but it's not their job to do this. So we're creating a first time guest assistance kiosk right next to our preschool environment. We've never done anything like this, and we're still working on what it will look like. But we're excited about one more opportunity to welcome, inform, and serve our guests, especially our first time guests. This situation has reminded us of two important things. First, those involved in Guest Services should not be the only ones evaluating Guest Services. Second, we will never have Guest Services all figured out.

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