For those of you that might not know what PCO is…? PCO is how I refer to Planning Center Online, an online database that can help you organize, plan & schedule for Sunday’s! We’ve been using PCO for about 6 months now (our band has been using it for much longer) and the results have been better than I even expected!
PCO has shown to have many advantages…
- Give ownership of scheduling of volunteers for Sunday to our volunteer leaders
- Provides a very simple “response” method for volunteers to accept or decline for a Sunday via email
- Allows you to see which volunteers are “trained & equipped” to volunteer in which areas
- Allows volunteers to “block out” dates they can’t be there (so all conversations aren’t guided toward…”will you be here?” but more “how are you…?”
- Allows all our leaders to see who has accepted (will be there) and who has declined so that we can make arrangements to still be ready for Sunday
It does a lot more, but in a nutshell, it allows the leadership and ownership of the ministry to be in more hands than just mine. Because if I’m holding on to everything myself, I’m probably failing in many things!
At the same time, it allows me to still see how things are going and hold our leaders accountable to being diligent with the responsibility that they’ve been called to!
Also, for iPhone users…there is a new APP for PCO out there on the market for FREE!! Definitely worth getting your hands on it!
- Putting all volunteer’s communication information into a database
- Keeping up with administrative privileges so you know who can schedule and see information and who shouldn’t
- Creating new “plans” (schedule templates) for each week
- Updating information for volunteers based on their room assignment and role
Just like anything, there are pro’s and con’s to everything. Weighing out the pro’s and con’s for your team is part of finding out what’s best for you and your team. For us, PCO has been working great!!
Also, PCO if you are out there…keep knocking it out! You are VERY appreciated!! 
February 15th, 2010 at 4:08 pm
This is encouraging to hear… my worship pastor has offered this to me (and the Children’s Ministry) for awhile but I wasn’t sure if it would really work out for us as well as it has for the worship team. However, now that we have 2 campuses, and a growing volunteer base, I might need to dive in and try to figure it out. Thanks for the insight!