"Playing Fair" - A Real Multi-Site Question

Just got back from a 31 hour trip to San Diego to visit "NorthCoast Church" and "The Rock Church". Both large multi-site churches in a much warmer climate.

We went looking for several things, but actually came back with what I think are the two questions we need to answer as we design and launch our new "Theater 2" venue in our Naperville Yellow Box Campus.

The first question is just a procedural question about the logistics and tech install needed to pull off a video venue service that actually happens "simultaneous" to the message being recorded in the auditorium next to it. Long story short: This is the first time we have planned to do a video service that was not a DVD product previously recorded. To run a live camera to our Theater 2 from Theater 1 where the live teaching is happening involves a system and a service flow where we can communicate and fluctuate enough to be able to start the video message at whatever point the live room begins it. (Even with TiVo type technology, we would have to change the service flow for just that room to make sure we never get to that point in the service before the "big room".)

OK, enough of that. I will come back to that in a later blog.

The second question we walked away with is about "playing fair" among campuses and venues.

Problem: If you have the ability to install some type of great new technology, some new environmental  start a new ministry at one of your sites, but you know that there are other sites that quite possibly may never have the facility or means to do the same, do you hold back that advancement to "play fair" among all of your sites?

A year ago I felt different. I felt "alignment" between campuses meant that each had to look environmentally as much like each other as possible and that if we wanted to install a new technology at one place that we would have to wait until we could install that technology at every site.

Over the last year, I have changed my mind on this one. I think seeing NorthCoast Church also helped, because they definitely don't "play fair" among their venues, even on the same site. Here are the reasons I changed my ideas about always having to "play fair:

1) Innovation - We should definitely allow each site to innovate as much as they are able. This "beta-testing" at one site allows us to work the bugs out of a new technology before eventually opening it up to all sites or even decide it is not a feasible technology and discard it before we would put out big bucks to install it everywhere.

2) Site Alignment - The graphics and universal church logos that you design are what create the visual alignment at each site. NorthCoast did a really great job of this. No matter what venue you walked into, whether one of the 6 on property of either of the two off-sites, one of the first things you would see would be a poster graphic of the series. Some venues would have that in a fancy movie theater style light box and some would simply have it sitting on an easel at the front of the room, but it was prominent and central to the arrangement of every room. You also obviously had the same graphics used in PowerPoint and video at each venue, again reinforcing the same series. Now the actual environment of the rooms was VASTLY different, but you had clear continuity between rooms because of the use of the same series graphics.

No, that is nothing particularly new. We do all of that. What I thought was really great though was the use of the visual stage sets to reinforce the alignment. The stage of the "LIVE" venue, where the teaching pastor was recorded was filled with well thought out stage props that reinforced the series theme. For example, the series we saw was about "10 Questions to Change Your Life" (or something like that.) The stage behind the live teaching pastor was filled boxes that had the series graphic on it and were filled with "An Idiot's Guide to...." type books. The reason I think this was very effective was that is allowed for another hit of the series graphic or message theme that actually traveled in the videocast or DVD of the teaching. So no matter what venue or site you were at, and no matter what the overall environment of your room looked like, your video teaching product (or the original live product) had that same stage series set-up in it, looking exactly the same.

So it wasn't ever about environmental similarities between rooms. Some had elaborate lighting, some had one video screen, some had three video screens, some had ugly plastic deck chairs. It was always about the graphics and series elements that brought alignment to the rooms.

3) The Metaphor - Another concern I have thought of in the past is about whether allowing one site to have elaborate environments hurts the overall metaphor or brand of a certain ministry. For example, our "Kids City" (children's ministry) at our largest campus is way behind where it should be in creating a kid friendly environment that is reflective of that campus' size and of the theme of that ministry. (For tons of brilliant insites on multi-site kids ministry, read Tammy Melchien's blog.) They are currently working to ensure the color palette, overall graphic and logo designs and content of each site look very much the same. In building the expansion to our Naperville Campus building, we are finally in place to take that campus's "Kids City" space to the next level. Each campus has attributes that reflect "the city". Each has the Kids City logo printed all over the place that features a skyline. Each has banners that have different buildings on them to represent a different "tenant" of the Kids City purpose. Many have city scenes painted on their facility's walls. Some even have traffic lights and other added "city themed" items.

As we design the Kids City space to be built into this new addition, such things have been suggested for this new space as a different storefront painted on each room with a real overhanging awning and working street lights. Elaborate additions to the Kids City theme. Should this larger campus not move itself forward because it is installing environmental pieces that other campuses can not have? Definitely not! Building a much more developed environment at one site does not threaten the branding. It simply takes the same metaphor used by all the sites to the next level. I think that is key. All the sites have the branding. That is created by graphics, logos, etc. They also have the same metaphor: "Kids City". It does not threaten the alignment of campuses to have one site develop that metaphor further than the others, as long as they stay within the parameters of the metaphor chosen to represent all sites of the church.

4) Size and Age - A campus that is 15 years old and contains a good portion of the overall church's attendance would understandably have resources and environmental nuances that a newer campus does not. If I am driving to a "magnet church" from several miles away, I would be very disappointed to come and find that the Student Ministry looks like the Student Ministry of a church of 200, versus a church of 2000. There is no doubt that age and size will bring advantage to that "flagship" site or sites the younger siblings will not have developed yet.

5) Overshadowing Smaller Sites Nearby - Another concern might be that developing the resources and environments at a larger, more established site might threaten the livelihood of a smaller or newer site in the same vicinity by appearing more appealing and with greater resources, as if they will choose between the two based upon that.

One thing we have clearly learned in the last few years is that the growth of our newer sites (even when in close proximity to our largest site) is based upon the entrepreneurialship of those people. They go to help start this new site and then invite their friends not because this new site has better things to offer, but because they want to be apart of something new and something risky. We also know that each new site in a new area draws a core of people because that new site is geographically closer to their home and allows them to more easily invite their friends and neighbors. These are two advantages the newer sites have that the larger, older site will not have. Some people always want to go to the biggest site, but people who get involved with the core groups of the new sites aren't easily charmed away from them by new products at the bigger sites. They are at the new sites because they are new and they find that exciting.

6) Healthy Competition - Our campuses thrive on being the best. Each campus is trying new things and implementing new programs all the time. It is that healthy competition that brings about innovation and the sharing of what we call "best shared practices". That just means, "Tell me about what you did last week that I heard was really cool so I can use it at my site." Allowing each site to independently try new things (within the parameters of the church's overall vision and identity) eventually makes every site better. There are some things that only the larger sites can try (hopefully to be adapted by the smaller sites later if successful), but there are definitely some things that only the newer or smaller sites can try due to flexibility or lack of time-honored expectations from the attenders that can be later adapted by the larger sites.

7) BECAUSE.... - The last reason we shouldn't limit sites from moving forward ahead of other sites is that whatever change or new ministry you are implementing in the advancement is going to draw new people. (If it is an advancement that does not in some way draw new, un-churched people, than it is not that important.) To make any decision to stunt the advancement of one sites progress to keep it "even" with the other sites is keeping these new attenders from being drawn to that site. That alone is reason enough to take the "playing fair" argument off the table.