Use of Electronic Communications within Council, and from Council to Congregation

There will always be a balance between moving quickly to electronic communication, with its many advantages, and ensuring that we do not leave members of the congregation and councillors out of the communication process. This page is intended to describe the processes that are currently being used in an attempt to strike the right balance. Suggestions on how to better achieve this are always welcome.

The motivation in moving to an electronic medium stems from several factors, including the need to provide timely and up-to-date material to church members, and to make sure that various key documents in the life of the church are not lost through the change of key personnel. Council is also conscious that there is a lot happening around the church, and there is consequently a need to provide members of the congregation with more information about those activities within the church. While a lot of this material can (and still will) be provided in paper form, electronic dissemination allows for new material to be quickly and easily added. For busy people, this is a great boon. As an added bonus, once the material is in electronic form, paper copies can be quickly generated from them. Ask at the office if you want paper copies of any of these documents.

The list of Councillors (and Elders, since we share the photo-board with them) that is used for council communication, does flag Concillors without electronic contact. Paper copies of the agenda are distributed to them, and that option is available for any other councillor who would prefer that. (The timing of this is always a compromise between adequate reading time, convenience of handing out on Sunday morning, and waiting for all the reports and contributions. Being able to update material as it arrives is one advantage of the electronic distribution.)

The list of Group contacts http://wiki.gwuc.org.au/gwuc/GroupContactList similarly clearly identifies those without electronic access, for the explicit purpose of reminding people using it to supplement it with paper as needed.

Important communication with the congregation remains largely by paper, NewView and the Bulletin, though the electronic distribution of the Bulletin has been widely accepted and does save substantial paper and office time. Supplementing Newview with extra material is valuable.

Council is very aware of the need to keep privacy issues in mind, particularly where material (such as, but not restricted to, electronic information) may be available to the wider world. Council has updated its PrivacyPolicy, and would re-assure members that every effort is made to keep information secure within the church domain. For example, all wiki pages containing personal information is restricted to those who have authenticated themselves as legitimate church users through a username/password sign-on system. If you notice any information not so constrained, please contact JohnHurst or DavidMorgan as soon as practicable.

Encouraging members to adopt new technology requires patience and support. I personally am committed to this. I am full of admiration for those who are able to adapt to new things late in life, and keen to help them do so. I really enjoyed helping my parents-in-law master their first computer at 80. Again, suggestions on how to provide better support are always welcome.

Electronic communication, where appropriate, does save paper and time. To have printed copies of February's agenda for all Councillors would, in my opinion, have been a profligate waste, yet it was all important/interesting material.

So,

Thanks,

David

(and countersigned by John)

ElectronicCouncilCommunications (last edited 2012-02-25 01:05:31 by JohnHurst)