We all have different tools to help us organize and manage our ministry tasks and projects. Here are some that CBOQ Youth (Alvin) uses.

  • Wrike: This is our primary project management system. We keep all the various responsibilities for all our projects, including events, together. It helpfully allows you to assign various tasks to other people as collaborators (who may not be Wrike users) through their email. They can update their status or write comments/questions. One big feature is the ability to replicate the entire project. For example, when we started to plan for Avalanche 2017, we took the entire timeline from Avalanche 2016 and replicated it. That way, we can ensure all the details are moved forward and we don’t forget items we came up with previously.
  • Google Keep: This is a “sticky note” system. Microsoft OneNote has something similar (as well as other programs like Evernote). The main difference between Keep and OneNote could be illustrated through this analogy: OneNote is like a binder with different tabs to separate subjects and all your files within that binder while Keep is a series of sticky notes you’ve posted to your board. Because it’s in the Google ecosystem, it’s easy to export those notes into other formats (like a Word document via Google Drive); some other note-taking programs don’t allow for that kind of exporting.
  • Buffer: Facebook and Twitter are our main social media channels for now. Buffer allows us to schedule certain posts/tweets to those channels at key times. We use our social media channels to distribute great articles, and will use our pre-set schedule to send them out (vs having 10 show up in your feed within a 5 minute span). Also, we can schedule reminders ahead of time (like when registration begins for Blizzard). This allows us to think through when we want to communicate certain items ahead of time.

Those are just a few systems we use at CBOQ Youth. What else would you suggest?