Podcast Episode 122: Episode 95: Digital Tools: Second Stage

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Join Jon, Emily and Nick as they discuss how digital tools have become the second stage.

Transcribed Content

This episode of Rockcast is brought to you by Rock partner Triumph Tech, a full service specialist partner. Rock partners provide crucial support for Spark Development Network and important services for the Rock community. Connect with Triumph Tech today at rockrms.com/partners. Welcome to this edition of Rockcast. I'm Emily Forman. I have Jon Edmiston and Nick Airdo, and we are going to take you behind the scenes today into what's happening at Spark Development Network and all the progress that we're making inside Rock. Now as usual, we to start out with an update on where we are on our latest release. So Nick, can you talk to us about that a little bit? Sure thing. We just released yesterday version 11 dot one into beta. We had several people using it in alpha. Didn't find really anything there. We we did throw a few more fixes into the alpha. Oh, actually, the beta, which is now out. And we expect that that will move forward production within ten days, probably the September 15 ish. And we're gonna start we've already started on 11 dot two. So as soon as we have a few more fixes in that, that will go to alpha. And those are just some small weird edge cases having to do with event registration. That's that's primarily what's gonna be an eleven dot two. So eleven two expect that fairly soon after eleven one. Yeah. What a one two punch. Yeah. So that shows that we're trying to get smaller, bigger releases and quicker on the on the minor releases. Yeah. So it's a good cadence. Yeah. Yep. And then before we know it, version 12 will be on our heels waiting for testers to kick the tires on that. Yeah. That's exciting. I mean, a lot of the big features that we've talked about are nearly done. They're just in, , the polishing and final stages. So and and and those aren't small features. Those are those are some big features that are close to being ready. Yeah. I feel there's v 13 features also Yeah. That I've seen. So things are moving fast, but again, we're trying to pick up the pace and we need, always need more beta testers that wanna become alpha testers. Oh, I was gonna ask about that. How are our testing teams doing? We've had, because of the situation in our world and people in IT are especially being pulled in many directions, we've had a couple people had to bow bow out, haven't been involved in alpha testing. So we definitely are looking for more alpha testers. And that we have those requirements online on the community site. Right? If someone's interested, they could find out more? Yeah. And I I'd also want them to contact me even directly. Okay. , Slack me or not Slack, chat me on Rocket Chat. And if if you think that you are interested and you have a question about anything, just come and talk to me because it's worth my while, it's worth all of our while to get them on board. And if they if they're concerned or struggling with a particular aspect of alpha testing, , I can ease their concerns and help them over that bump. And there's other alpha testers that are willing and wanting to help them as well. So we're all here on standby ready to help them help all of us. Onboard some new alpha testers. Yeah. Definitely need a strong team. Great on road to being a Rock star too. If a a very active alpha and beta tester, I mean, that's a It's a shared thing. Yeah. It really is. Because it's a it's a very, very important task. Yeah. And it takes some time. I mean, it's not something you just sign up for and just kinda do. It's a commitment. A lot of people on that team put significant time into that, and it's such a huge blessing to the community to do that. Yeah, and just a point of history, , years ago I pointed at a vendor and said, hey, you guys need to do testing. And us, as a nonprofit, Spark Development Network, we can't quite afford that and the product, but we're trying. We're doing more of that, and QA is on our roadmap to strengthen that. But in the meantime, this open source project is really relying on our community testers, and that's how we're building this thing forward. So it's I'm very passionate about that point because I was passionate about it fifteen years ago. And I think one thing that makes Rock unique is the extensibility. You can some of the things that we design and build are being used in ways we hadn't planned on them to be built. And so it's only the alpha and beta testers that have these unique edge cases and use cases that really help that testing. Because if if we test it the way it's supposed to be done, we would have a very rigid product. And we don't want that. That's the antithesis of Rock, because Rock is a flexible, extensible product. Mhmm. That means it can be stretched in different ways that we need people to test it in all those different ways. Yeah. And we're going through that right now with the community of testers with label printing and the new features we've added, and they're finding cases that we didn't necessarily account for. So it's all good when we all come together that. Well, sometimes it's having to work around hacks that have been put in too that it's doubly hard because we don't know what you did to change things, and and and we're working really hard to try to bring education into the right ways to change things through the architecture series and other, , discussions we have on the podcast. Yes. Yes. So if you are not watching those architecture series videos yet, you really should. Yeah. Which kind of actually leads me into the topic I wanted to talk about, which is our fundraising. So we talked about our fundraising a bit at, VRX twenty twenty, which I don't know if I'm the only one, but I feel the conference was yesterday and also two years ago. And I don't really know how time does that, but I think it's a 2020 thing. We talked a lot about our fundraising and some of the things we discovered over the course of the last year related to some intentions that maybe weren't quite met and some things that just fell off. And we've been doing a lot of work. In fact, we've been making phone calls to a lot of churches and just checking in. It's really been confirming that a lot of churches had an intention to donate and maybe even had a commitment, but it just kind of fell off the radar in the middle of all the craziness of 2020. Maybe a card declined, because they had they had to replace it or, just some other things happened. And I think what was lacking really was a lot of automation of giving in many cases. So I did just wanna follow-up and mention that we have been doing, a lot of talking with churches in in most cases where we've seen a commitment and not a donation. That was a a completely accidental situation, and and everybody's being pretty good about rectifying that. However, we are still in the position of about 60% of churches that use Rock have a commitment to donate or are donating, means we have about 40% of churches, that aren't. And when you add in those with a commitment or a donation kind of below the suggested amount, it does make it very hard for us to do the things that that you guys have both been talking about here this morning, which is to, , put the gas pedal down, to work harder, to to do things , hey, what are some community hacks and how do we add extra development and understanding and discovery around that? Those are all things we want to do, but it is challenging to do in a less than fully funded state. So if you look at the number of of organizations in our community that are in that small and new category, which is why we have the funding model that we do, it's not 40%. So we still have some work to do in that. And I think some of it's in education and some of it is, in contact. But if your organization, if you don't know whether or not you're donating at the suggested minimum amount or not, it's probably something you wanna find out. And if, , it's it's kind of in your lap because there's only so much that we can do as we're running here trying to keep everything moving. Yeah. If it's your organization, you probably need to be the person to stand up for how valuable Rock is and to help get that funding in place. Yeah. When we say Rock is not a product, it's a community. And the topic of fundraising is a topic that the whole community has to be involved with. Even if your church is giving at the recommended level, a community problem, we all need to work together to solve it. And it's really encouraging, some of the generosity we see from some churches, and sometimes it's a little discouraging from other churches that are large enough and are using it and getting the value, but yet still don't donate. And have made a decision not to. We have heard from some organizations that they have decided not to donate, and that's that's the discouraging part. Right. But you mentioned if your organization is donating at the right level, I would say congratulations. You are now an ambassador of why there's value in donating to Rock at the right level. So when you're speaking with other organizations, just make sure that you communicate your love and value and investment in Rock the same way you do about the feature set that you use or about how the community is empowering you. Those should all be tied together in conversation. And and that's really what's gonna make the big difference here. Yeah. And it is making a difference. I mean, you look at all that's been accomplished with the limited resources, I mean, we know that God's involved. That's why at the top of every page, if you look in the source, To God be the glory, it's been there from almost day one, literally. Yeah. And it so rings true. And it's really, he's been present in all of this, and we are so thankful to all those who've come alongside because there are some very generous organizations that are whose leadership truly gets this. And Absolutely. Daily, I'm blown away by the commitment that the community has seen in this. I completely agree. The generosity and the encouragement that we get from some of the organizations that have seen the value and committed to us and will call us and tell us or email and say, this is so important to our organization and we want you to feel that support. It's incredible. And we could not do this without those organizations. And the plans that we have for the future, I mean, from an even technical perspective, feature perspective, I mean, we we have a vision and a road map that needs continuing resourced funding and Yeah. If they could only see what what I , you can see on the whiteboards here, or in John's black book, where we're going. You it's just so exciting, and you you can have a lot of faith that this is not a product platform that's just gonna get abandoned and stale. That's never gonna happen with the team here at the helm. So it's exciting to think about what can be done once we're, again, fully funded and funded well. And I was gonna add, if you're a church that's not donating, we'll sick Frank on you, Frank Grant. Or or or maybe you should reach out to Frank Grant and get some tips and pointers on on, , how to sell it, how to communicate the the value to your to your leadership. There's many in the community that who who are eager to make those types of, , conversations and help, , communicate the value. Mhmm. Yeah. So if it is a conversation you're not used to having and aren't quite sure how to pose it, I would say ask in the community because there are lots of people that have had a great, experience with that. Definitely. So things don't look quite the same this year. I know I've been extra busy. I know the team here has been extra busy, and I think that the people who listen to our podcast have been extra busy. And that's because we're working in that area where church and technology intersect. And suddenly, that has become so much more vital to every church. No matter what their, services or operations or mission statement looked before 2020, technology has taken a center spotlight very quickly, and we've all been adapting. Yeah. And I I just wanted to take a couple minutes just to talk about vision casting for that. I think if we look at where we're at now, we all see it, digital platforms and digital technology needs to become a forefront of what churches work on. It's not the primary thing, it's not the only thing, but it's definitely much larger than it used to be. Then the term that comes to my mind is a second stage. So we've always had the weekend service as a stage. I mean, that's been for many the primary and sometimes, , almost the only stage. It used to be that we had lots of different ministries within churches, probably too many and many, and that's been coddled down to a few strategic ministries in the primary weekend stage. But we saw that that is putting a lot of eggs in one basket, and in times this, a pandemic is one option where that doesn't really work too well. We've seen the need that we need to have, , a second stage and maybe even more, but these digital platforms really have become that second stage during this pandemic, and I don't think that's going to change. Will the weekend stage come back and, to its former self? Probably, but we can't have all the eggs in one basket, and people just need stuff every day. So it comes down to digital platforms to kind of fill those needs. And the problem is, , some leadership get that. I mean, the people we talk with quite often get that, and they're making plans, and and they're not quite sure where they're going, but they know they're going, and they're and the good thing is they're innovating and trying things and experimenting, and that's exactly what we needed in these times. I think I said at the conference, , we need to be prepared for all the millions of ideas that are being innovative right now. And then we're a part of that, but we also know that there's lots of experiments going on out there. So there are some leaderships that don't get that, that are still in the mindset of of last year in terms of how they're allocating budgets or how they're allocating resources or even thought time. It all starts with with something that's very free, that's thinking time. Mhmm. , it's rare, but we need to invest time into into that. So, , what I think we need to do and talk about is how do we, as people who are working in these areas, elevate that to leadership teams that maybe aren't thinking that way. So if your leadership team's coming , well, we don't really want to invest too much in that that project or, , our website is still the same level of capabilities as it was last year. That's a problem. As we go into mobile, that's a problem. , we need to reach people where they are, and that's web and mobile. That's where they daily are. Everybody can't come to the campus every day. So we need to be investing in that. So part of it is making sure that the leadership see it correctly as a second stage, that they're investing thought time and resources and dollars to that, helping them understand that. But I would also say too, it's it's time to invest in ourselves. And the I always think in mental pictures, which makes me maybe a little weird, but, I would kind of see it as, say there was a ministry in your church last year that was kind of small. People knew about the ministry, but it really wasn't spotlighted. It was just kind of one of those side projects that someone had. Think of that as the digital ministry of last year. Now think of that ministry all of gets spotlighted. If for some reason something happens in the world, and all a sudden that ministry is one of the most important things, almost as important as the weekend service, you imagine there's going to be more resource dollars, more resource time, more people attached to that, but you're also going to see probably the person leading it is going to be of higher caliber than it was probably the year before. And so that's where I would say to you guys, we all can't be our same selves from last year in this new world. If so, someone else is going to be leading that ship. So now's the time to make sure that we're building into ourselves the capability, the knowledge, the leadership skills to be prepared to be that person, because our churches need those people. And honestly, there's no better person than the person who's sitting in the chair today or in analogy last year. They know it more than anybody else. But if we don't build ourselves up and if we just be or if we're just passive, we're not gonna be that person in the chair, and that person is gonna be at a disadvantage because they don't they don't understand the ministry of the church. They don't understand, , how it's been done before. So to think that we can be passive in this is probably not gonna work. Long term, , there's gonna be changes. So we have time, and and we have each other as a community to kinda pull together to say, hey. You maybe something about that. Can I meet with you and help you share about that? I know something about this, maybe I can share that. But it's also going out to external resources too. There's never been a better time in this world to learn things than now. , for $50, you can learn anything. And for and for no bucks, you can you can do a lot too. But don't be concerned. I'm I'm so shocked at how many people don't wanna spend $30 to take a class, and they'll go take a free one that's, , basically garbage. It's $50. , that is , the investment on that is ridiculous. People in history would have paid fortunes to have access to the same stuff we can get for $50. So don't be afraid to pay $50. Don't always go free. Same thing with tools. Sometimes I see people not wanting to buy a a tool. Maybe it's a couple hundred dollars, but they'd rather use a free one that's just nowhere near as useful or as valuable or as effective. It's a couple hundred bucks. The return on investment on that is huge. One thing I was reading once a list of what makes rich people different than normal people, and the biggest thing well, two biggest things. One is risk. They're not afraid of risk. But the biggest one and the biggest thing that I don't have is they're not afraid of using their money to make more money. And that's the same thing with this, is , we've got to be able to use a little bit of money to to make something bigger, better. And if that's just a a $50 class, or a hundred dollar class, or a $500 class, or a $200 tool, , we can't be afraid of investing, even if that means we have to pay for it ourselves. , it's not always the job of the employer to keep the skill sets of the people cutting edge. Should they invest some? Yeah, probably, for sure. , that makes sense. But if you're relying on your employer to give you all of that, , probably setting yourself up for unreal expectations. I mean, that might be a little controversial, but I don't I've never seen it as my employer's job to keep me cutting edge. Am I grateful when they invest in something? You bet I am, and I take full advantage of what they will give, but I'm not afraid to buy a course myself. I'm not afraid to buy a book myself. I'm not afraid to buy even a couple hundred dollar tool sets if it's going to make me better. And that's not to make me better so I can go leave and find a job that will give me those tool sets. It's to make me better so I can be better for this current role and service it as best as I can. , I think a lot of, churches have positioned their IT teams to be reactive and tactical. And I think this is probably the year as you're saying, where we need to, kind of remake ourselves into strategic leaders. And that may not be something that's handed to you from a table that has all the other positional leaders around it. But it is something that you can lean into and grow. And you will be the best advocate inside your organization for how ministry and technology can come together because you have some unique experience in that area. But if you don't have the leadership and communication skills, and if you haven't put the time towards strategic thinking, you're not going to be able to earn a seat around that table, and it will happen around you and without you. And in some cases, they'll bring in someone else that does demonstrate those things, but may not have your insight into how your ministry should function and how you can support it. Because leadership needs to see a strategic leader with good communication skills. So that may be something that you need to lean into when you're looking at what is my learning and growth plan for myself over the next six months. Definitely keep your technical skills sharp. But do you have the advocacy, the leadership, and the communication skills you need to earn a a seat at the table by demonstrating the caliber of leader that you are? Yeah. And you keep saying an important word, earn. I think a lot of times we expect to be given a seat at the table, but you have to earn that seat. Everybody who has that seat has earned it. It's easy to say, Well, they just have always had that. Well, most churches are started by somebody, right? That person, trust me, , starting something from nothing is so incredibly difficult. I mean, I've learned that. I have a whole huge I've always had respect, but I have a huge amount of respect for founding pastors. When you start something from nothing, that is so much harder than taking something that's already there to the next level. Yeah. And they don't just give the the the reins to other people based on just being friends. They will do it based on the capabilities and skills of that person. And if they do have that friendship, it never stays. No. Sometimes I might give you a temporary seat at the table, but if you can't keep it, if you can't, you won't have it for very long. I think one time I at a conference, I said, do do you think any of your pastors, if a IT highly valued IT consultant came into the church and said, hey, I'd love to meet with you and talk about digital strategy. Do you not think any of those pastors would take that call? They're all dying to have someone who knows a lot come tell them about that. Our job is to make sure that we're that person. And maybe that today you don't feel qualified, and maybe that's true, but that doesn't mean that you're not gonna continue to be that. Find small things that you can, , highly research and and and put time into, and then take an an executive summary and just say, hey. Here's one idea. I don't I know you don't have a lot of time. Let me just give you this executive summary, a sales pitch, elevator pitch. I mean, those who are in the corporate world have to get their ideas well thought out, concise, and then pitch them. It's not that investors are out there, okay, give me a two hour pitch on this. , you have fifteen minutes. Go. But you get enough of those small ones. You'll get invited to the table. That's right. The best leaders are not solely positional leaders. Some people receive their position because they it was solely a position leadership, but the best leaders are the ones who have earned their space there, and they keep their position longest. So do what you can to add value where you are, and that will be noticed. So should they set a goal to speak at next year's RX? Oh, that's a great idea. Put that goal you might not you may not speak, but get yourself ready and start working on that aspect of you. And you do have to set something out there that feels uncomfortable and you have to work toward it. Otherwise, don't grow. And don't get stuck in the in the mindset of because I am this today, I will be that tomorrow. You can be anything you put your mind to in most cases tomorrow. Well, the best way to learn something is to teach something. Mhmm. And even when I'm doing the the architecture series, sometimes I pick topics. I'm , we need this needs to be addressed. And I don't even know the I don't even know what to say. I don't even know what the right points are. But by putting it, , on my chart and saying, okay, this is what I need to work on, I start researching, I start experimenting, and everything that comes out of it, I didn't most of it, I didn't know going into it. There's some I did, but not a lot. Talk about a mindset. , look at Elon Musk. Fifteen years ago, he knew nothing about rockets. He is now leading the number one, , nongovernmental agency on space travel. When he read it all. , he he's He read. He became his own teacher and taught himself rockets. , he is the main rocket scientist at at SpaceX. That's ridiculous. Well, and he's Elon Musk, though. But the difference between Elon Musk and the rest of us is we have the same number of hours. We have approximately the same amount of smarts. Maybe he has a slight gift, but not there's so much that's being put on giftedness when it's actually just effort focus. And mindset. And maybe we don't wanna maybe not everybody can give up their whole lives to that. But you can do amazing things Right. With not having to give up your whole life. You might not go to you might not build a rocket to Mars, but you can probably solve problems at your church For sure. That no one else sees, and it just takes effort and mindset. Right. And, John, you said critically focus. I think that's important too because Elon Musk didn't move every potential thing forward at the rate that he did understanding a rocket ship. He moved that forward. He's now he's moved a few things forward. Yeah. But he didn't pick everything in the world. He's not the best at everything out there. He had to focus on what's the thing I wanna learn, and what am I gonna do about it? That's his secret. And that's not everything. And one thing he's really not great at? And honestly Communication. Yeah. Public public speaking is he's not good at it, but does he stop doing it? No. And I remember the first time I saw him speak at a conference, I literally thought he was hyped up on drugs or something because I was , what? Get him off the stage. He's embarrassing himself. But his content was good. He still got his points across. Yep. And he didn't stop. He didn't go, well, this isn't my best thing. I'm not Steve Jobs, but and I think, actually, most people find it kind of endearing now. That's exactly what I was gonna say. I'm , I kinda it. I I that he's up there doing that. It's very down to earth. Yeah. Is. It's super authentic. Yeah. But we would get up there and say, oh, that was horrible. But there's no difference. , we we find it endearing. I think a word that's really important to me right now, and you're gonna start hearing it a lot all over the place in different places, is the word diligent. I think that is, , the best word for what we need right now in the space and in and in our community and in in Rock is diligence. It means don't rush. rushing has the connotation of being crazy and and not structured. We need structured. Yeah. But we need intense focus. And I just love that word diligent. It also doesn't mean you're working fifty hour days, that's impossible, but diligence doesn't mean you're working super long hours, although I think honestly long hours are needed right now to build ourselves up and to build up these strategies. We shouldn't be afraid of that. , it might be a call that we need to work a little bit harder. But diligence, the the word is is about focusing every moment, and I just love that word. It's really easy to start a lot of things and finish nothing because our excitement moves and our focus moves. And, , everything in our culture right now seems it it ties into that from social media to, , different entertainment avenues, and and that's never gonna get you anywhere. Mhmm. And I'm I'm, again, proud of the community because there's so many people in the community who are diligent, and you're seeing the growth in them, and you're just , it's, I mean, it's impressive and it inspires me to see them doing that. It makes me want it inspires me to want to do more myself. So as much as as you might not see it yourself, just know that when you guys work hard and and you do something incredible either at the conference or or a recipe or just even helping a certain person, it's inspiring to to us. It's it's inspiring to the rest of the community. Yep. Set your yardstick against yourself. Right? You don't have to measure yourself against other people. And don't forget that the growth that you have over time, the things you're doing now that you weren't doing last year, don't just assume that that's because it's easy and anybody could do it. You worked hard for that. So don't undersell the fact that you worked hard, and don't let that discourage you from continuing on that steep growth track. Yeah. Because nobody has all the answers or even I think it's it's probably fair to , 95% of the answers people come to me for, I got it off Google. , easy. , it's totally true. That's your secret? My mom doesn't I mean, I think I've said on the podcast before, my mom doesn't think I she goes, what do do all just the way it's always been done. It's just faster now. Right. But when people come to me with a question, a lot of times, I'm just googling it and sending it back to them. And I and I yes. I know about the website you can send them. That's Let me Google that for you. Yeah. That I don't do that. I don't need to be passive aggressive about it. I just but so don't think that people who seem to have answers have all the answers. They just have a good way of finding the right answer and and are diligent about doing it. I think most of the answers the world needs right now, nobody has, or nobody in the right circle has access to right now or has that information on hand. So don't just hand off the ability to get answers to someone else because you don't have it today. And the future of Rock is you. Wow. That's true. That's a good way to wrap it up. I don't know what else we could possibly say after that. The future of Rock is you. Thanks for joining us today. Do a church that loves the idea of using Rock but hasn't taken that leap yet? With managed hosting, churches of any size can get access to Rock's amazing technology, hassle free. With just one click, Rock's managed hosting removes the roadblocks that might stop a church from switching to Rock by making the process simple. Churches get the ease of a SaaS church management system without losing any of Rock's powerful features. Are you ready to take the next step or share with another local church? Visit rockrms.com/hosting today.