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Who ever wants to be quarantined?! Maybe a few people out there but it’s not likely.

Thankfully there are tons of creative things you can do (and should do) to engage your participants even now as people are home.

We've mentioned how vital communication during a crisis can be. Don’t miss this opportunity to guide your people into a greater missional journey. Point to God with these ways to serve during quarantine.

• Prayer - create a prayer guide around missions (partners, projects, people, regions, needs) to send out to your participants to be praying each day for something missional.

• Learn - encourage them to keep learning in their missional journey either through a missions book or programs like Perspectives on the World Gospel Movement.

• Books - send out books about missions that people could read - biographies of missionaries, missions philosophy, stories, etc.

• Support Local Healthcare Workers - remember the work that local healthcare professionals are doing to combat the COVID-19 virus and reach out to provide a meal or help them in some way.

• Elderly in Area - reach out to local nursing homes or other facilities to see if could use assistance with supplies, errands, or other needs.

• Encouragement - write encouragement notes to missionaries, partners, donors, or others who are part of your missional community.

• Assessments - encourage your participants to take an online assessment (Enneagram, Meyers- Briggs, Strengths, etc.) to learn more about themselves and how their unique design could be used for missional purposes.

• Donate to a Cause - there are tons of causes out there now helping people in need around the current virus or financial circumstance, donate to one of those causes.

• Missional.Life - create a Missional.Life account to learn more about who God has made you to be, what story He has written, and where He might be calling you.

• Research - learn more about the specific field you were planning to visit to learn more about their culture, the religious makeup, their history, and their needs.

• Zoom Meetings - host a team Zoom meeting to keep everyone connected and engaged. Zoom meetings can be great to keep everyone’s mind in the game.

• Share Stories - have everyone share stories (online if possible) about what they are learning through this season about their short term trip hopes.

Have you or are you planning on using any of these ideas? Let us know on our facebook page. 

This is one post of many we're doing related to the current crisis. Download Cancelled: A Guide to Maintaining Missions Engagement When Your Short-Term Trip is Cancelled.

Is your missions trip cancelled? Cancelling (or even rescheduling) your short-term trip may not be the only option.

It’s worth considering if there are other options like repurposing the trip into something local (actually, this post works regardless of if you also cancel or reschedule the trip). It all comes down to the original purpose of the trip and working to extrapolate from that trip its purpose.

Let’s take for example a Youth Trip or Vacation Bible School (VBS) trip in Poland. The heart behind the trip is to engage high school students in a VBS program and have them engage well with younger kids and help make the program a success.

Now let’s see where we might be able to take that same group of high school students and engage them now or in months to come in a similar purpose.

• You could have those high school students working to creatively build things for local kids to do while they are in a quarantine.

• You could have those high school students reaching out to family with young kids to see if they have any needs during this time.

• You could have those high school students sign up for a local VBS-type program this summer

• You could have those high school students reach out to local teachers to ask what they are doing to help parents and see if they could help.

   

It’s really quite simple if you stop to think back about the original purpose and goal for the trip and then mine out a means to do that locally. Truth is, many people are quite bored and your creative ideas here could both help engage your participants and help a lot of people in your local community.

This is one post of many we're doing related to the current crisis. Download Cancelled: A Guide to Maintaining Missions Engagement When Your Short-Term Trip is Cancelled.

First, you should consider creating a weekly communication during this crisis (or whatever frequency you prefer) to stay engaged with your trip participants while we all wait to learn next steps and what’s coming.

Everyone understands the unknown of the current situation. We believe this is a great time for you to stay engaged regularly with your participants and continue to keep their hearts and minds engaged in a missional perspective of life.

NOTE: There’s no ideal time line for a resource like this... keep evaluating each week if still needed.

Here are a few suggestions for what you might include in a weekly digest:

• Prayer requests - share prayer requests from your church, organization, partners, or other things.

• Scripture verses - teach and edify your participants so they can continue to grow in their faith.

• Key updates - keep everyone updated on anything new from you or the field. People want to know!

• Stories - share stories from the partner on the field or other things you’re hearing and learning. We’re all in this together.

• One thing you could do - give suggestions for one key thing each time that they can do.

• Survey question - get to know your constituents better, send out a survey each time to learn about their missional interests, challenges, or desires.

• Note from you - make it personal and share from your heart how things are going.

• Sermon resource - share any sermons or lessons from your pastor or other churches (make sure to give credit!)

• Blog article - write or share a blog article about how others are working through this interesting time.

We hope this post encourages you to start communicating more regularly during this time. 

This is one post of many we're doing related to the current crisis. Download Cancelled: A Guide to Maintaining Missions Engagement When Your Short-Term Trip is Cancelled.

We talked about how to improve fundraising communication recently. Let's review some ideas for how you can communicate well to everyone you need to during a crisis—or even when life goes back to normal—for that matter. Here 10 ideas for communicating well during a crisis: 

1. Over communication

I truly believe that over-communicating is key. Would you rather someone say, “Why didn’t you tell me?”, or “Ok, I have enough information?”. I for one will take the latter. Granted there are certain situations where information must come out at its rightful time and place, but communicate until you are blue in the face and people are asking you to stop telling them.

2. Break your communication list down

Who needs to know what? Staff, team leaders, participants, parents, leaders, donors, partners, lodging, transportation. Take a moment a create a list of who exactly needs to know what.

3. Communication is two way

Give people space to ask questions. Whether that's through social media, responding to email, or just making phone calls, allow space for people to ask.

4. Behind the scenes

Don’t be afraid to give them insight behind the curtain. I have found a lot of questions come from a lack of context or communication. What will hurt from letting them know your process? I mean really, are any of us keeping presidential-size secrets that people cannot know? Take a breath and give the people what they want!

5. Prioritize your communication list

There is nothing worse than a participant knowing something before a team leader. Enough said.

6. Create a sample email (then test it)

Write out your email. Give it a proofread. Now read it again. Now send it to your team to proofread. Now send it to yourself. Ok, you’re all set! Hit send and let the questions roll in, just kidding, you’ve communicated so well nobody will have any questions.

7. Don't forget donors

This is a very important group. Here are a couple of approaches to this; it all depends on how your organization handles donations and participants. First of all, thank them. This is so important—but can be forgotten in the chaos. Second, let them know your policy for donations whether the money will remain with the participant until they can go, or your own policy regarding funds when a short-trip is cancelled. This might include letting them know the IRS policy on donations and refunds.

8. What’s next?!

Let them know how you will be monitoring the situation, who you are listening to, and how you are going to communicate moving forward. Should they be looking for emails, phone calls, updates from team leaders, social, or website? Be clear and follow through on those. If it changes, let them know!


9. Empower

If you have the space, empower your team leaders to communicate to your team. For one, it takes the burden off of you to communicate and manage however many people you have going on trips. Second, as leaders, we should desire to draw out of our people the ability to lead. Giving this opportunity, although small, gives them the chance to grow and lead their team well—at your direction. You might even write them a sample email to get them started.

10. Have fun with it!

Seriously, I'm not kidding. Especially at a time like this, there is so much somberness going around that being able to lighten the mood through an email, will relieve the tension for the participant and leader. We need to keep perspective that the God of the universe is in control.

In the meantime...

Share some good books to read (could I recommend “The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry”),  encourage them to engage with the community they were going to be apart over there right here, meetings over zoom or Skype, love people by respecting their space especially at this time, or make a list of places where people in vulnerable situations might be that they could serve and love well. I was telling a friend of mine after all this is over if I am no closer to the Father than I was when it started I will be disappointed. Encourage time and space to spend with God.

This is one post of many we're doing related to the current crisis. Download Cancelled: A Guide to Maintaining Missions Engagement When Your Short-Term Trip is Cancelled.

One of the key elements that will drive questions from participants, leaders, and parents is “what happens to the funds I've raised for this trip?”

Some key elements to prepare yourself and your teams for this include the following, which may include things you are already doing, but perhaps can do better/different to make this easier each time that you go through this process. 

You already understand your role as a leader when it comes to short-term mission trips. Here are a few ideas for how to improve fundraising communication with participants, leaders, and parents

Involve your Accounting Team and Financial Leaders

This one is pretty obvious, but there are some critical questions that they will need to help walk you through, including:

✓  Tax implications and verbiage you can use when people ask for a refund (because they will, even if you’ve told them many times what the process is)

✓  What should we do with the funds that were already provided?

✓  Are there any restrictions and/or considerations we should make when deciding to cancel or postpone a trip?

✓  Identify which funds or trips that already have expenses and determine what do to in order to recover or eat that cost (e.g. travel costs, etc.)

Involve your Leadership Team

Depending on the involvement of your leaders, some may already be well aware of what is going on, but here are some thoughts to consider:

✓  Be prepared to summarize for them (or provide them a summary that they can provide their own leadership/board).

✓  Provide options with benefits/drawbacks to each approach. For example, reschedule versus cancel.

✓  If you decide to reschedule, have a general timeframe for communication... or at least determine what information you will need to decide on a timeframe.

✓  If not involved in the financial communication with your accounting team, provide your leaders a roadmap/summary of the financial impact and approach that is suggested (as they will likely be asked this by their leadership)

Communicate Clearly to Participants and Leaders

✓  Create a communication plan, even if a very simple one. For example, write up a communication to the teams and create some common questions people will ask.

✓  Clearly communicate what will happen with any funds that have been raised (based on your conversations with accounting and leadership).

✓  Have others review your communication. This can be a review for typos, tone, etc., but it is important to make sure that you get buy-in from others.

✓  Copy and Paste...once you answer a question once, either copy it to a word doc so you can use it later or add it to your common FAQ area/web page.

✓  Provide some education or guidance to the process. For example, participants are not aware of the tax situation for non-profit donation. Provide some simple guidance that helps them understand enough, while keeping communication focused.

✓  Provide assurance that their concerns are addressed. While you may have gone through this process many times, this might be the participant’s first time a trip was cancelled. Try to put yourself in their shoes and address uncertainty. Assure them that you have done this before and will guide them through the process.

We hope this helps you improve fundraising communication when speaking with participants, leaders, and parents. 

This is one post of many we're doing related to the current crisis. Download Cancelled: A Guide to Maintaining Missions Engagement When Your Short-Term Trip is Cancelled.