Events in MinHub Groups

Small group ministry tends to gravitate toward a weekly gathering with a typical crew, weekend worship gatherings that most people attend and a few large events that happen every so often. Events are set up to track the attendance at the different types of events as well as provide a place to record ministry moments that happen in small groups, sometimes at the large events, but more often in the rhythm of regular life.

MinHub Groups makes it easy to track attendance at small group gatherings, weekend services and other types of large events and record those ministry moments when they occur.

For the sake of simplicity, all scheduled small group or large group gatherings are referred to as Events. These have an event type that helps in smart filters and stats. When creating a small group, a small group event type is automatically created in the events tab. Attendance is taken at these events by leaders with access through the MinHub Groups app. At small group events, the small group filter for that particular group is automatically applied by can be removed by tapping on the blue funnel and tapping CLEAR ALL.

Unlike scheduled events where attendance is taken, ministry moments are recorded after the fact. These will typically involve just a few people. Ministry moments might be counseling or a discipleship one-on-one or a baptism or a decision to follow Christ or even just prayer with someone. Tracking these ministry moments creates a ton of useful information in growing ministries, especially the ability to see which leaders have connected with certain members throughout the year.

Warning: some of the functionality listed here is only available for Events Admin. If you aren’t seeing some of these options, talk to the leader of your ministry about possibly administrating the events tab.

Adding an event is fairly straight forward. Tap on the Events tab. Then tap on the + button on the top of the screen. This will prompt you to create either a Large Group Event, a Small Group Event or to record a Ministry Moment. We will get to Ministry Moments later. For now, let's dive into the two types of events.

Small Group Events are created by the leaders of each small group. Sometimes leaders actually lead more than one small group, so you will see a list of those groups on the Events screen under the Small Groups segment. These are scheduled times where your small group will gather and you would like to take attendance. These will show up under the Small Groups segment on the Events screen.

If you happen to lead more than one group, the first field asks which group, otherwise your first field will say "What Is The Event Called?". This is the name of your event. The Name of the event will automatically reflect the name of the small group because this is often the case, but can easily be edited just by tapping on it.

Next, select the Date and Time that the event will take place along with an end time.

If it is a one-time event, you can leave the default Repeat option at Never. Otherwise, tap on the final box to have the event repeat. The repeat options are Never, Weekly, or Monthly. If you have events that repeat every other week or something unique like that, the easiest way to do that is to set them to repeat every week and then delete the events that you don’t need. Never is selected by default.

The next option is to choose an end for your repeating event. Select an end date in the future that is reasonable (most ministries schedule a semester or year at a time).

The last step is to tap Create in the upper right.

If you have multiple small groups you lead, the horizontal scrolling events bar at the top can get cluttered. Tapping on a Small Group name beneath the Small Groups segment will only filter events for that small group.

Large Group Events can only be created by Event Admins. These are the types of events that anyone would come to like your weekend services, large outreach events, church BBQs, etc. They are scheduled times where people attend beyond a single small group. These will show up under the Large Events segment on the Events screen.

Even though these large group events are only created by event admins, any leader with MinHub Groups access can take attendance. This way, you could have multiple people taking attendance or collecting information from visitors that is all synced together into your database.

The first field asks for an Event Type. These Event Types help categorize events. Think of them as your main programs. Maybe you have outreach events, weekend services, Sunday morning small groups, social events, missions trips, and service projects. Anything that will be scheduled but wouldn't be categorized as a small group event. Whatever types of events your ministry creates will be the types of events that are created for this field. Once your types have been entered, you will rarely enter a new one. But at the beginning, you’ll have to create one for each new event.

You can tap + Add New, enter the name of it, and tap Done > to enter a new type. Otherwise, if you're adding an event in a type that has already been created, just select the pre-existing Event Type that accurately reflects the event you are scheduling.

The Name of the event will automatically reflect the event type because this is often the case, but can easily be edited just by tapping on it.

Next, select the Date and Time that the event will take place along with an end time.

If it is a one-time event, you can leave the default Repeat option at Never. Otherwise, tap on the final box to have the event repeat. The repeat options are Never, Weekly, or Monthly. If you have events that repeat every other week or something unique like that, the easiest way to do that is to set them to repeat every week and then delete the events that you don’t need. Never is selected by default.

The next option is to choose an end for your repeating event. Select an end date in the future that is reasonable (most ministries schedule a semester or year at a time).

The last step is to tap Create.

As you create more and more events and event types, the horizontal scrolling events bar will get cluttered. Tapping on an Event Type beneath the calendar dates will only show events in only selected event types.

On the day of your event, to view the details of the event, tap on the event icon in the top section of the Events tab.

Beneath the details of the event, tap on the navy blue bar where it says Take Attendance.

This loads your attendance screen. Tapping on a person’s photo will add a checkmark, indicating that they are present at the event. Tapping them again will remove the checkmark.

The two icons in the upper right toggle between viewing your people in a list or a grid. The grid view show more people on the screen with first names, but the list view shows full names.

Tapping on the funnel icon will allow you to filter the people on the screen. If you are in a Small Group Event, the funnel will be blue and automatically filtered to your small group members. Tapping on this will allow you to select additional filters or clear filters if you want to find people that aren't typically in your small group.

These filters are especially helpful as the database grows but the event is only for a specific demographic. In addition to filtering by people data, any small group will appear as a filter option as well.

Tapping on the magnifying glass will allow you to search the list by first name, last name, or nickname. This is really helpful for Large Events to check in multiple people from the same family.

Tapping +New Visitor will pull up a screen for the new person to input their own information into the device or be entered by a greeter. When the visitor is through entering their information, they will automatically be given a checkmark to indicate that they are present.

Currently there is no syncing between ministry databases, so if you have a visitor that signs their kids in to MinHub Kids and then you want to check them in on MinHub Groups, you'll have to add them separate. You can quickly add them with just their first and last name and manually sync the rest of their contact information later.

Note that if someone is checked off as present on multiple devices without an internet connection, syncing will not “un-check” that person. Only physically tapping a checked person will remove the check. If devices differ when syncing, the most recent action taken on any person will be the one that is retained after the sync.

Tapping Done > will record the attendance into memory.

At any point, before or after an event, leaders can record notes about events. These are a great way to provide a central place to collect feedback about events and know who to reach out to for follow up if needed. These should not be used to celebrate ministry moments, but simply feedback about events.

Tapping on the eye symbol will show a quick view of the attendance for that event. Tapping on the file symbol will generate a report of the attendees that were marked present at the event.

While viewing an event’s detail screen, tapping Edit > in the upper right corner will allow you to edit the event. Event info that can be edited includes the type of event, the name of the event, as well as the start and end time of the event. If you edit the start or end time of the event, make sure to check the other as well. Changing a date or time on one field does not update the other. They both must be edited manually.

Editing attendance for a past event is also available on this screen. Tapping on Edit Attendance will give you the attendance screen back to check off more people, add people if needed, or remove checks.

Make sure to tap Save > when you are done editing anything in this screen. Tapping < Cancel will revert to the way it was before you edited the event.

When you tap Save >, if the event is part of a series of repeating events and you have changed the time or name, you will have the option to update just the one event, all future events in the series, or all events, which includes events in the past.

To record ministry moments, go to the Events screen, tap on the + button at the top of the screen and select Ministry Moment. From there, you give the moment a title, record the date and time, and select who was involved.

The logged in staff member is automatically added to the ministry moment.

These ministry moments are great for closing the loop and getting information back to pastors about how God is moving in the life of the ministry. Also, you can create smart groups to see which people have or have not had ministry moments over a given period of time to help inform your ministry strategy.